Can you believe this?

My child has a 45 minute class each Wednesday. He’s become friends with 3 other kids in the class which is great. The adults hang back while the kids do their thing so of course we all gab. Everyone seems nice. Three of the kids are there each week with their grandmothers; they watch their grandchildren once a week. It’s sweet.

Last week one of the women, lets call her Tilly, asked if I’d be interested in going for pizza with the group after the next class. She also suggested I go back to her daughter’s house for a play date. I was happy to take her up on the invitation.

The pizza lunch was fun. All the kids behaved and I shared 2 cheese calzones with the three women. Afterwards we all went back to Tilly’s daughter’s house. This is when the fun started.

When we arrived Tilly said we all had to take off our shoes, and then rolled her eyes while saying “house rules.” The kids went off to play in the playroom & then Tilly explained that her daughter had a “fancy” coffee machine that she was still getting the hang of. It was a Keurig & Tilly started in about how expensive & stupid it was to drink coffee this way. Then she said she’s decided to keep her mouth shut about it because her daughter is sick of hearing her complaints. We all sat down at the dining room table and dug into a cheese ring.

Suddenly they all started to gang up on me. They wanted answers about the “crazy” parenting styles we’re all using these days. *Margi started in about playing with the kids 24/7. “My daughter & her husband don’t have a life anymore; we never played with our kids the way parents are playing with kids today. You’re all nuts” she said. Then Tilly chimed in about Time-outs. “You know what a time-out was when I raised my kids?, a smack on the ass.” *Lillian added that things fell apart when kids started to have rights. She said, “There was a time when teachers were always right and children respected authority. Not anymore.” They were all looking at me and shaking their heads. Then Tilly asked me if I cooked more than one dinner for my kids a night. I knew this was a set up. I told her that I sometimes did, if I had a hard time getting them to eat the first choice.

That was the last straw for them. They all laughed in my face, shook their heads and simply told me I was doing everything wrong.

I tried to excuse myself by saying I was going to check on the kids. They started shaking their heads again “they’re fine” said Lillian. “What do you think they’re doing? Do you hear screaming? Just sit down and relax” she said.

I didn’t know what to do at that point so I changed the subject and suddenly brought up the first thing that popped into my mind. I said “Hey, do you ladies like Celine Dion and the movie Titanic?” We then all enjoyed coffee and cake together for another 30 minutes.

*All the names of the grandmas have been changed to protect their identity

Posted by BadPlaydate in Family, Fatherhood, humor, Motherhood, parenting Tags: bad playdate, bad playdates, family, fatherhood, gossip, grandmas, grandmothers as caretakers, grandparents, humor, judgemental, kids, mom, motherhood, NYC, parenting, playdate, SAHM, silver foxes, stay at home dads, stay at home parents, suburbs, toddlers, working mom