This thread, in fact (starting with post #64, then various subsequent posts). 
Is that “Hard to Say I’m Sorry” by Chicago? That was a breakup song.
In general, what most of the other posters said. It’s certainly OK to politely request an adults-only evening. If they get upset, well, you’ll have to call that shot. In that case, the problems will likely only get worse.
On the other hand, in my gang, we tend to deal with it differently. This may partly be because it seems like only one family at a time has small kids, but anyway.
Rather than inviting kid-family out or over to our place, we go to theirs. That way, the kid is in familiar, child-safe surroundings with all their toys, can be put to bed at the appropriate time, sent for time-out as needed, etc. All fairly quietly, without fuss, and without really interrupting the overall flow of conversation. Maybe we just have exceptionally well-behaved kids in our crowd, but we really don’t have the kinds of interference mentioned in some posts. (It’s certainly not my kid-tolerence level!)
Often we bring/make/order dinner rather than leaving all hosting duties up to kid-family (“we” in this instance being any combination of the other families we’re friends with). Usually we’re full of entertainment and don’t require much external assistance in having fun. And there’s generally an “adults-only” area (garage, backyard section, etc.) for smoking, cussing, drinking, and other adult behaviors.
We still have adult-only activities occasionally, too. The parents are usually grateful for an excuse to get away for a bit.
I’m with Bippy, especially if the parents are the touchy type. “Oh, we’d love to do X with you sometime, but we’re worried that little Helga would be just miserable, the poor dear. Do you think we could find her something more fun to do whle we do X?”
See, the problem with this approach is it leaves them open to the parents’ responding “oh no, we’re sure Helga would love to join in, we’ll be sure to bring her along!” Best just to say, kindly but unambiguously, that you want adult time.
And to touch on something I missed earlier:
Thank you. The only people included in an invitation are the people named in the invitation. If the kids aren’t mentioned, they aren’t invited.
My SIL’s MIL (got that?) was furious because a couple showed up at the wedding with their daughter, when the invite specifically said No Chidlren Adults Only or however you politely say it on a wedding invitation. Heck, even my kids, the niece and nephew, were not invited. No prob, sez Ivylad and I, it’s her wedding, she calls the shots, and we know she adores the Ivykidlets. She just didn’t want them at the wedding (they were quite young at the time.)
Anyway, I think my SIL’s MIL made a comment to the parents at the reception, because they didn’t stick around for long.
I notice you’re from Canada. Probably around the same place as me, because this was the custom when I was little, too, except I was the only kid around at the time for many of the people my parents knew. I spent a good part of my childhood sleeping on kitchen chairs connected to make a ‘bed’ after watching my parents and neighbours playing boisterous rounds of kaiser.
Yes, I mentioned kaiser, now the Ukrainian farmer in me has been revealed.
You may have to start this trend with something like buying 4 tickets to a play, show, concert, hootenanny, or whatever strikes your fancy. Offer the extra 2 to the couple and invite them to come along. If it’s clear there isn’t a ticket for the kid, it’s not that you don’t want her there, it’s that there’s just not space.
Yep. Which is why I quoted only the first line, which is true for pretty much everybody. The rest doesn’t apply here.
We have kids. We have friends with kids and friends who are childless.
You can certainly give an invitation that says “it would be great to see you without the kids.” And I don’t think most parents would be offended at the idea of an adult evening. However, you need to be prepared that they can’t afford it. It isn’t a reflection on you - babysitters are expensive and when they splurge, they may prefer a truly adult evening without their kids rather than hanging around with friends - i.e. a date.
If you can spring for the sitter, and they are willing to accept, that removes one roadblock. The second one “I won’t leave my kids with strangers” is another roadblock and some people simply won’t. Once again, doesn’t reflect on you, rather their comfort level with who they leave their kids with.
If Grandma or other relations are in town, it can remove the sitter roadblock. You can also tell them how much you are looking forward to seeing them once their kid starts doing overnights at friends.
There are some friends who are childless that we make a point of calling if Grandma takes our kids.
I don’t have kids, and our only friends with kids have kids that are under 6 months old, so they don’t go out much now anyway.
However, when I was a kid, Mom and Dad’s night out was FUN! Babysitters meant junk food… pizza rolls!
Everybody that knows us knows our house is NOT childproofed for sprouts under 8 or 9 years old. We have guns, knives and assorted tools. We have dogs and cats. We have breakable tchatchkes.
We invite specific people over to visit that understand we dont kidproof the place [although I will kidproof it for arranged visits with my goddaughters because they live far enough away that they stay for a week or more at a time] I am not going to go nuts trying to stash stuff away in a house that has NO storage space for anything [our bedroom doesn’t even have a closet. We put the dresser in the livingroom and hand clothing from a bar over the foot of the bed.] If I need to kidproof the house, it means a major undertaking to get boxes, pack guns, knives, swords and breakables just like i was moving house, and then beg some friend to let me stash the 3 bankersized boxes at their place for a week or so. Not fun, and nothing I am willing to do for anything short of a week.
I would much rather visit someone with sprouts at their place or go out somewhere.
FWIW, I don’t particularly like children. I wasnt treated like a child when small, and I am not ‘socialized’ for child interaction. I like them housebroken, and coherent - like 10 years old and up.
I just want to add a couple of comments.
First of all, while not always true, often two or three kids will play together better than just one. One kid may be more likely to bug the adults every five minutes than two or three. Of course, there are kids who will sit quietly with a book if by themselves and come crying to mommy every five minutes to say “Sister’s picking on me”
Secondly, I have an anecdote about how location matters in child good behavior. My brother and his wife have some good friends, the Smiths. Bro and wife had one daughter, aged 2, Smiths had two daughters age 3 and 6. They found out the hard way that a good “adult friendly” evening could be held in the Smith house, but not my brother’s house. At Smith house, child aged 6 could go to her room, while the younger two played elsewhere. Adults play games or talk until bedtime for resident children, then Bro picked up his child (who was wandering around saying “Where’s my bed?”) and took her home to bed. At Brother’s house, 6 year old was whiny and bored, 3 year old was clingy, and 2 year old was puzzled and unhappy. Here was her friend, and her friend didn’t want to play. Plus, the Smiths had to go home earlier, so that they could put their children in bed on time. No fun was had by any adults. And so one day, my sister in law said “We need to invite ourselves over to the Smith house again”. After they explained why inviting themselves over was a better idea than inviting the Smiths to their house, we agreed that this was a reasonable notion.
OH Poppycock!!
There is absolutely NOTHING wrong with either the parents, or the parent’s friends wanting and needing some grownup time. This country has gotten itself into WAY too much of a “Children are God” mentality. And yes, I have kids, one is 26 and is about to make me a grandmother. The other is 14 (yes he was a surprise, but a welcome one). It is healthy and normal to have grownup time, and there is not a thing wrong with it. Not even if they don’t have kids of their own.
To the OP, no it’s not rude at all. The only thing wrong with it would be if they really are in such dire straights that they simply cannot afford a sitter at all. Are there grandparents in the picture?
I"ll bet if you delicately and kindly approached it as you did the in OP that it would be just fine. Just couch it in terms of “we love you guys, and little Angel too, but we’d LOVE to have a grownup weekend occasionally, is there any chance grandma and grandpa can watch her?”.
The pit is two doors down. Unless you’re just trying to be cute and forgot your smilie, leave it at the door. There is no call to behave that way.
If you are at another person’s house, there isn’t “another room” in which to banish the child.
Isn’t banishing the child similar to having the kid-free evening and not “having kids around all the time” as you touted in your previous post?
Lastly, why should the friend have to sit there holding their thoughts and now interrupted enjoyment of the evening while the parent scolds and deals with the child? It is the parent’s responsibility to parent, why should friends constantly have to suffer through the inevitable temper tantrums as the parent holds “lesson time” in teaching the child how to act?
Why shouldn’t they have occasional evenings where they do not have to suffer through this. Again, even when, or rather Especially when one does have kids, they still will want and need time away from this with other grown-ups for normal adult conversation, and activities.
Nonsense. As several other posters have said, there is nothing wrong with asking in much the same way the OP wrote her post. No one is saying “come over but don’t bring your kid”. That would be rude. Wording it the way the OP did is sensitive and lets the parents know how much the friends, including the child, are valued.
Oh sheesh, NOW I get to this part! Sorry Leaffan for beating you over the head, that’s what I get for being on the edge of the world, and the last to get home and read the threads (well, except for our buddies the Hawaiians that is :D).
You’re awesome!
Be serious; thats Otto’s plan every night, dear.
For us, all our friends have kids. We all had kids at the same time. Almost literally, as one friend and I were actually due on the same day. We mostly get together with our kids in tow. But from time to time we will state NO KIDS ALLOWED. We plan ahead of time so we can find sitters or aunties to watch the kids. No one is offended. Sometimes we have one or two teens to watch all the kids at one person’s house while the adults go to another house. That’s lots of fun for the kid. And the parents get to play board games and stuff without having to stop the game every 5 minutes to get someone juice or break up a fight.
To the OP, could you say something like, Hey, we’d like to go out and do this or that with you guys. If you’re having trouble finding a baby sitter, my sister (or whoever) would be happy to watch your little girl at our house while were out. That way if they are having money issues you can tell them the person loves kids, and is doing it as a favor to you.
Same here. I think the rest of your post summarizes what I see in my future, too. My last GF had kids under 10 and I don’t think I want to do that again–although I only knew one of them and he was extremely well-behaved, I just don’t have the ability to talk to/care for the little people. Since as far back as I can remember (I’ve been able to vote for less than two years, BTW) I’ve considered myself to be on an adult’s emotional and intellectual level, and I don’t do well when I try to downshift.
Regarding the OP’s question, I imagine that informing them that your house is not kidproofed would do the trick. Or if you have a pet, tell your houseguests ahead of time that your pets are nasty to kids and as hard as you’ve tried you can’t get “darned stubborn Fluffy” to play nice with the young’uns. If they ask, Fluffy gets really irritated when you lock him/her up in a seperate room, and you can hear him/her meowing/howling the whole time. Of course, you’ll have to not have kids there and not lock Fluffy in a room while they’re at your place, or else you’ll blow your cover.
In my last GF’s family, everyone I met over 18 had at least two (usually four or more) kids, and almost universally started poppin’ em out before they were 18. Every single one would have taken a lot of offense to a suggestion that they come sans kids. Having little kids running around is just part of everyday life for them. Those who insist on the kids being left home would be considered self-important and stubborn. My GF, knowing I come from a different culture and a very different family, was pretty tolerant of my wish to spend as much “grown ups only time” with her and her family as possible. It’s inevitable in their situation that you’ll have to put up with the kids, but they could all leave the kids at grandpa’s house for the night occasionally. You’d get enough grown-ups-only time, but when it happens is up to the parents, not the parents’ friends; requests to do it otherwise are seen as immature and selfish.
Here’s another Doper who used to love it when the babysitter came over, BTW. I had some really cool babysitters that I had a lot of fun with.