Sleep overs.

[Dorasmum]

How do you manage manage sleepovers with your children? What age did they start going to friends places? How did you manage requests from your child to have someone over or for them to go to someones house when you weren't ready for it to start yet? How do i say no without offending someone or shouldn't it matter because it's really not their business?

I'm not sure I'll be ready for it to happen for a while yet. I won't be happy with a couple of meetings with a friends Mum outside the school to be comfortable with sending my kid to their house for the night.

Obviously with relatives and close friends it's ok, DD1 has spent a week with my parents twice in the last 6 months, she loves it.

I was thinking too lately I understand now why my mum used to umm and ah so much when i begged to go stay with some of my friends, she knew them well enough but in retrospect their parents weren't exactly model parents. I used to think we were the rich because we had the big farm and 5 bedroom house and all my friends lived in mill houses and spent most of their spare time down the pub. They weren't that bad but Mum tried to be extra cautious. Discovered later we weren't rich, Mum and Dad were just good with money and worked hard.

Em

[Jakaluma]

If you're not comfortable just say "we don't do sleepovers yet" (family excepted). If you just state it (rather than make an excuse iykwim) I'm sure people will just say "okay" and not worry about it. A couple of my son's friend's families have that policy, and we never feel offended or put out. Each to their own!

Our children's first sleepovers where young - DS1 would have been 4 or 5, and DS2 was 2 1/2 and still drank milk at night. Plus we all slept in one big mega bed at that stage. But it was both of them together, with very close friends who lived just around the corner, and all four children slept in the same room and my two even slept in the same sleeping bag! They loved it!

They then had a group of about 4 or 5 families who they (and us!) felt comfortable having sleep overs at, and their children loved coming to ours for sleepovers too. Often it worked for the parents too (a night out!) and often it was siblings. One of DS1's friends had two or three attempts before he managed a full night - but he really really wanted to, and no-one minded the "I want to go home now" at 9pm LOL. Never had drama or tears or anything negative.

When DS1 was 7, he spent from 3 to 5 nights (he went about 4 times) with a friend who had moved 2 1/2 hours away. That was hard for me, but I never showed it he was ready to do it, we knew the family well and were totally comfortable, and it opened up fabulous new experiences for him.

Something I often chuckle to myself at is how you can tell who cosleeps at home and who doesn't - some of their friends all want to bed down on one mattress, other's need their own mattress and own space or they can't sleep.

[sweetsugarsunshine]

Yep... I just say 'we dont do sleepovers yet'

If the parents are okay with the sleepover - Im more than happy for their little one to stay at our home for the night But I just dont feel comfortable with sleepovers at all... not sure when I will..
My older boys have stayed at my mums and their grandads a few times which is fine, but thats where it stops Im afraid.lol.

[RubyRoo]

DSD probably started having and going to sleep-overs when she was around 6-7, but only the odd one here and there....more now that she is older (she's now 10). We've always made sure we know the parents well first though. One of her friends has a no sleepover rule, apparently due to a bad experience that her dad had as a child. She also has to have one or both of her parents come and stay with her when she comes for a play. I think this is quite sad really.....a bit too overprotective IMO, and this little girl is missing out on experiences she would have otherwise (I think sleepovers are one of the most magical memories from childhood!)...

If there are older siblings (adolescents), and especially opposite sex, I would be MUCH more cautious about having either of our girls go and stay at a friends' house. Some of my friends had some sexual abuse issues in this sort of situation.

We had an incident recently where DSD was asked to go to a pool party and sleepover at a friends' house for the other childs' birthday. She was a new girl at the school this year, and we hadn't met her parents at all, and here she was wanting DSD to go and stay over. We tried several times to ring the parents, tried to meet them at events at the school, but kept missing them. As a result, we said DSD couldn't stay over, but could go to the pool party. When DH went to pick DSD up, she was having such a good time, and the parents seemed really nice, so he said she could stay after all. She had an absolute ball, and it was so good that she didn't have to miss out after all.

[emd]

Sophia is 4 and I cannot even cope with play dates (other than family) without a parent present at this stage. She's already asking for sleepovers or to have her best friend sleep over. We satisfy Sophia with sleepovers at Grandma/Grandpa's, or group holidays where other families and their kids are all staying together. But I don't see myself agreeing to sleepovers at friends houses until she is much older. My concern is that she doesn't yet know what inappropriate behaviour is or what to do about it. Some kids know this stuff by age 7, some don't have the confidence to deal with it til they're older. I'll just have to wait and see.