Or do you not leave kids unattended at a birthday party?

[Dumbodog]

Unless you've discussed it with the host beforehand?

DS 4th birthday party at a soft play on Saturday. 12 invited, mix of friends from nursery and friends from our street. However parents were free to bring siblings and pay normal entry fee for them. All fine.

The eldest of one of the mum's from nursery (her younger sibling was invited) came running over to me crying about 20 mins in to the party and tells me her mum told her to come to me if she needed anything. I continued looking for her mum and she then tells me that mummy has gone to the shops. I wasn't too bothered at that point, thought she perhaps needed something urgently although still should have let me know. Her DD was fine and went back off to play with her sister.

Half an hour later she still wasn't back and the invited kids were going into the party room for food. Her eldest DD was crying because she couldn't come in and she was now being left in the play area unsupervised. I let the staff know the situation at this point. I found the mum's RSVP text and tried calling her (not friendly with her other than to say hello to at nursery) and there was no answer. I tried on and off for the next hour!

The party came to an end and she still wasn't back and still wasn't returning my call. The staff said they could keep the kids but would have to call the police. I thought this was the best scenario as I obviously couldn't take them with me, and god forbid if anything had happened to their mum then at least the police would find out.

I received a call from the mum about half an hour after I got home and she was shouting and bawling at me! She couldn't believe I over reacted so much and just left her kids as she'd only gone to get her hair done. Apparently I should've known she would be back. She was livid the police had been called and they gave her a talking to about leaving the kids without telling anyone and she was lucky social services hadn't been called. But again, apparently I should've known she'd be back and I could've at least taken the kids home with me instead of "showing her up" like that. She said she thought others would also leave their kids, as if I was a bloody babysitter! She hung up on me when I tried to tell her that how could I possibly know she'd have been back when I didn't even know she'd gone until her kid told me. What if something happened to her? Or the kids while she was gone? What if she just never came back? She told me I was batshit and hung up

So, AIBU or does she deserve a cheeky fucker award?!

OP - you should either leave THREE HOURS leeway time after a party, or at the very least, a limo ride to your house for overstayers and the promise of a sleepover with unicorns.

Yes OP. You should have left a four hour window between party finishing and your next engagement. And if the mother didn’t turn up, you should have booked a horse drawn carriage to transport her daughters to the salon to be dropped off to mum, taking them to McDonald’s on the way to buy their tea. Then you should have paid for the mums haircut and apologised to her for interrupting her relaxing pamper session. 🙄🙄🙄

Of course you weren’t being unreasonable. Gobsmacked at some of the responses here.

Hahaha MN mums 'I live here up on my high horse and would have stayed with the kids until the end of time or taken then home in my stretch limo which has unlimited seating'.

No, none of you would have done this differently or if you had it would have been because you are pathetic weak women without backbones who wouldn't have the balls to do exactly what had to be done.

Well done OP you handled this perfectly. Ignore these ignorant women who spout crap about how they would have done it!!

@sparkypolastri and @drinkygin we all think alike 😂

Op you were in a shitty situation and the mother was a cheeky fucker. I'm really shocked at her behaviour but how long did you give her to get back and pick up her kids? You said you were trying to ring her for over an hour but it seems like that was whilst the party was ongoing. How long did you wait after the party finished before you called the police and left? If you had waited an hour and the mother wasn't responding I think you did the right thing but it reads like the party came to an end and you called the police and left. If that's the case you were being unreasonable. If not and you had given her plenty of time to return you were not being unreasonable.

No, none of you would have done this differently or if you had it would have been because you are pathetic weak women without backbones who wouldn't have the balls to do exactly what had to be done

Nope.
I definitely would have done this differently.
I would never have had left a child crying outside of the party room with some bullshit excuse as to why they couldn't come in. Has nothing to do with backbones. That was my first clue that the OP probably isn't very nice.
I would have been beyond angry with the mother.It would have made me wonder what kind of life those children have. I would not have wanted to put them through any further stress. You can state all you like that EVERYTHING negative that happened is on the mother but it's not true. The OP made choices that impacted on the children as well despite probably knowing that this incident wasn't an isolated one.
So, yes, mother is shit. Op taught her a lesson. Kids got caught in that lesson and didn't have to. Own it and move on.

The idea of leaving the children at the soft play place eaves me feeling very uncomfortable. However, I can't imagine ever acting like the other parent and leaving 2 children unsupervised. When mine where 4 their parents (or their parent's close friends) always stayed. I would never have had the capacity to take 2 extra children in my car or extra car seats. For soft play parties, there was always a clear time frame for when the party ended and everyone knew this. I hope this is the wake-up call this mother needs and she now puts the welfare of her children before fripperies.

How much managing of a party is there to do at a soft play when almost all of the attendees have a parent with them and the staff are apparently policing the door to the party room? It wouldn't have been impossible to have the baby along too.

The mum is a cheeky neglectful fuck. It speaks volumes that her most overwhelming thought was being shown up rather than endangering her children and not answering her phone. I have a 6 month old OP so I feel for you there. A couple of hours away from you at that age is plenty. However, there is lesson here for you not to invite children to a party when you don't know them or the parents. I'm sure this happens but sorry I just wouldn't. You did the right thing not taking the children home as you had no idea how long she would be, you don't know them, she wouldn't know where her kids were and anything could have happened to mum. Perhaps try and get someone to help you next time that could have stayed around. I'm surprised none of the other parents offered to wait with the children

Pallisers yes, everyone would ask 'do you need any help?' when dropping off, but I have to say if the answer had ever been 'yes please' I would have been very concerned. It would have indicated a lack of planning and attention to detail on the part of the hosts.

It's not the done thing around here to 'host' a party where you expect other parents to give up two hours of their weekend doing the heavy lifting that makes your party run smoothly, and in the case of a soft play, asking that they pay to get in and pay for any siblings they bring along with them.

Fine if the host pays for all and sundry, but hosts proceed with the assumption that parents are going to leave children and they plan accordingly and rope in teens or family members.

spareasquare hasn’t rtft or had personal experience of soft play parties.
At our one, the party room is tiny, fits kids and adults who are helping the kids eat at a squeeze. Staff are strict about not letting extra kids that haven’t been booked in. I guess they do birthday parties all the time and get these requests all the time.
Parent needed to stay with older uninvited sibling as this situ meant that the party host couldn’t keep eyes on older sibling in soft play and supervise the birthday meal for her dc in the party room.
It’s stressful to have been put in this situation and it is not a clue that the op is not very nice!

Then- mum did not answer phone!
What if her kids had fallen from the slide and hurt themselves? Mum didn’t even let the op know she was going or when she would return! This bit is shocking to me.

And like most people I disagree that she should have to stay until mum returned. Her 6 month old baby was at home and her mum needed to get to work.
I’m glad the mum got spoken to by the police and I hope there are now increased eyes on her, if she can leave her kids like that and not answer her phone when she’s away from them it tells me she doesn’t care too much what happens to them.

The OP did the best she could in the situation caused entirely by the CF.

Most criticisms probably come from horror that someone's dreadful parenting was left bare for the authorities to see.

Well, that was also the best outcome for the future safety & welfare of the children
the CF needed to receive an official warning and has hopefully been flagged also to SS

The OP can't be expected to take her baby with her to a party,
just so that she can stay on until a CF returns to collect her kids

She made the decision that she wanted to concentrate on her party,
not on a 6-month old baby who might be quite demanding, hence left with her GM to concentrate properöy on her.

Anyone would be VERY unwise to take home kids who are almost strangers to her, especially without 2 spare carseats.
The CF would quite likely have called the police on her - many parents would, if an almost stranger took their kids to an unknown home.

If the OP had stayed on, then her mum who was babysitting would have been late for work, maybe missing pay for that shift, naybe getting into trouble for such late notice

• many people can't afford to lose pay and certainly don't have spare for the ludicrous suggestion of taking the baby in a taxi to the OP

In any case, the OP wasn't a close friend of the family who could reassure the kids more than the staff,
or provide more information about the family to the police - because she didn't know them

So many stupid comments on this thread. It's easy to see who the real life CF are.

Lucky your kid is at nursery not school as that would have been something you would never have lived down re the police

You've clearly got that around the wrong way. It's the 'mother' who abandoned her children who should be worried about 'living it down' at school/nursery. She's an utter disgrace. I would applaud any parent who took the sensible steps the OP took. It'd be good to know that if I dropped my kids with her and something did happen to me, that she'd take the appropriate steps if I failed to turn up on time.

you should have made it very clear on th invites that you would not be able to facilitate late pick ups so children would be left aloneness if the centre if they weren’t collected promptly
If someone is so stupid that they don't understand that the time listed on the invitation is the time the party ends, or that they must be back at the venue at that time if it's a drop off party, then they are too stupid to even have a child in the first place.

Another one here thinking that you handled it brilliantly. Anything could have happened to the mother as she wasn't answering the phone and the police was the safest bet. As for taking strange children home, here in Mexico you could get lynched for that.

YANBU

You did exactly the right thing, OP. Also, good on the centre for having a policy in place for this and implementing it when required. It's sad that this even requires a plan/policy in the first place.

This so-called 'mother' has done this before no doubt. She actively planned to abandon her older child in a public place when she made her hair appointment. By deliberately not answering her phone and then failing to turn up on time at the end, she actively chose to abandon her younger, invited, child as well. I hope social services does get involved in this neglectful family.

Well this is AIBU so people are going to disagree - no surprises there. Comments about the OPs actions are in no way agreement with the CF.... I think everyone is in agreement with that. However if you invite a child to a party you open up the possibility that parents will leave their children and go. (Particularly if it is not expressly stated on the invitation that they’re expected to stay.) Some people clearly believe it’s ok to do that. So as far as the Cf is concerned she left them legitimately and you’re the one who left them unattended. No doubt she will spin the story so she was a bit late and found you’d gone etcetc. I hope your kids end up at different schools because I expect she’s going to be the mum who doesn’t let this go. I doubt she has any capacity to feel shame about what happened just an unjust sense of outrage.

Leaving a 4 year old and 8 year old at a soft play party is too much, especially when you don’t know the hosts. 4 is too young for a drop off party. If you and CF mom were good friends and she has picked up her bloody phone when called then it might have worked but totally insane to do it with a parent she barely knows and then go AWOL.

Still, I would have had a hard time leaving them at the soft play. It’s a shame you didn’t have more friends at the party where you could have asked another parent to stay behind with the CF’s kids. If it were my 4 year old’s party, that’s probably what I would have done, asked a good friend to do me a favour and stay with this woman’s kids until she showed up. Very scary to just leave them there with no responsible adult although of course the blame is on CF mom herself for having put you in that situation, OP.

@maidavalla2000
Did you not understand the post?
It wasn't parent misunderstanding regards leaving kids.
She left her older child
Did not tell OP child was there
Told her child which stranger to approach
OP only knew child was there when child spoke to her
Cuntymum didn't answer phone
This is child endangerment
And no I wouldn't bring a 6 nth old
Honestly wake up

So many stupid comments on this thread. It's easy to see who the real life CF are.

This with bells on. OP did the right thing.

Good for you OP.

@maidavalla2000
Did you not understand the post?
It wasn't parent misunderstanding regards leaving kids.
She left her older child
Did not tell OP child was there
Told her child which stranger to approach
OP only knew child was there when child spoke to her
Cuntymum didn't answer phone
This is child endangerment
And no I wouldn't bring a 6 nth old
Honestly wake up

This exactly. Fed up of parents who would cover for this mum. It's not kindness it is delusion. If she would do this what else has she done to those girls? Any distress to the girls was caused because their mum wasn't there. It seems she hadn't even organised lunch for her 8 year old.

To my mind, the mother's actions will have done the damage. At eight, children are old enough to be embarrassed by being dumped at a party for four year olds uninvited and having to ask a stranger for help. If OP had stayed, as a virtual stranger she is not likely to have provided significantly more comfort for the children than the staff did. This way, the mother learns it is wrong and, I would imagine, the authorities will keep an eye out for further damaging behaviour on her part. OP did exactly the right thing. It requires bravery to report behaviour such as this, but covering for it helps no one in the long run.

Fed up of parents who would cover for this mum.

What this thread illustrates well, is how people get away with abuse and neglect for so long. Usually opportunities to spot a child at risk are not as obvious as this. If everyone who encountered neglect did the right thing like OP then a great deal of harm would be prevented.

The people criticising the OP for ensuring those kids were safe are not kinder than everyone else.

ou should have made it very clear on th invites that you would not be able to facilitate late pick ups so children would be left aloneness if the centre if they weren’t collected promptly
If someone is so stupid that they don't understand that the time listed on the invitation is the time the party ends, or that they must be back at the venue at that time if it's a drop off party, then they are too stupid to even have a child in the first place.

Feelings are running Hugh in this post, and I don’t want to get involved in a slagging match!

My point was that OP has given the impression she had to leave pretty sharpish - usually at these things parents are hanging around for a while afterwards, chatting and piling presents into cars etc. It isn’t unheard of that someone might be say ten minutes late, but I get the impression OP wasn’t on a very tight scedule, I couldn’t see that she really waited any time at all.

At my daughters last party no parents stayed (I was a little surprised, but I hadn’t instructed her to stay on the invite so up to them) and the pick up probably took twenty minutes or so with parents chatting to me and catching up, it was much more casual than OP’s party sounds. Th n not had to pack the car etc. So we were there for almost an hour after the party finished. I would have been too stressed if I had to leave at say ten minutes after the party ended.

But we are all different and OP is clearly very comfortable with her actions, so not sure why she has posted here😊

It requires bravery to report behaviour such as this, but covering for it helps no one in the long run.

This. Well done OP.