if I expected family xmas party not to be a soul destroying death trap?

[boHOHOhemianbint]

Hmmmm, sorry, I'm a bit riled about this one and need to get it off my chest.

Went to pre-xmas family do at my mum and dad's yesterday with my dad's side of the family who we don't see at Christmas otherwise.

DS is 16 months. At the start of the party everyone was sat in the living room and my great aunty got up to go outside for a cigarette. My mum starting saying "It's alright, smoke here, it's ok, Aunty X always smokes in here" etc etc. Fortuntely my Aunty insisted on going to smoke outside but why on earth would my mum insist that she smoke in the same room as a baby?! If she had then I would have had to have taken him elsewhere for about half an hour until the smoke cleared (she smokes seriously hardcore fags, my aunty!)

Bar a tiny bit at the beginning when DP helped, I spent the whole party running around trying to make sure that DS didn't touch the candles in the fireplace/eat washing powder/generally do himself a mischief. I got literally 4 minutes off a couple of hours in to get a bit of food before I was back on duty again. But here's the bits that really did my head in:

1. At one point I came around the corner to discover DP and my uncle standing there eating whilst DS is on the floor trying to put his fingers into the plug socket. I ran over and switched it off but was carrying drinks so I had to try and do a one-handed swoop to pick him up, as Uncle just stands there and DP keeps saying "no" ineffectually.

2. I was getting really annoyed about 3 hours in and told DP I would like the chance to sit down and have a drink. He goes out of the room with DS and comes back 2 minutes later without him. The next thing I know DS is halfway up the stairs by himself, totally unnattended. DP got really angry as he assumed someone else was looking after him, but I got angry with DP because he was supposed to be looking after him; surely if he was going to leave DS in a room with now very pissed people he should have made sure one of them was aware they should be watching him?

I'm just so fed up about it - I didn't get any time to talk to anyone, hardly got any food despite having spent 3 hours in the morning making things for it, and spent an hour sat by myself in the hallway trying to feed DS whilst everyone else had a great time. Is it unreasonable to expect other people to even help out for 10 minutes so that we could have a drink or 10 minutes to talk to people? I'm 5 weeks pregnant and nearly had 2 heart attacks during the party with DS getting into real danger. Is it unreasonable to expect some allowances to be made for a very young child, rather than just making us feel excluded?

The way I feel now I don't want to take him to anymore parties until he's older, although by then I'll have another tiny baby. I feel like if I say anything family just think I'm being mard - I'm the first person to have a baby out of all my siblings/cousins so they don't understand and think I'm just uptight but surely my parents/older relatives should get it?

Am I BU?

but usually relatives enjoy spending time with the little ones - strange that everyone took no notice of him and didn't think to help out

is this an annual event ? You do gain a different perspective when you have lo's. tbh toddlers and this type of event don't really mix ime. Is your parent's house normally toddler proofed , if you've never made an issue of it before then you can't really expect them to have anticipated such dangers but not to say you can't raise it for future. The smoking is plain inconsiderate to everyone but rather depends on the general attitude in the family , if it has always be accepted then they won't feel a need to change iyswim. It would have been nice if dp had helped you out so you could see your other relatives , perhaps he is the sort who needs it spelling out though. Don't think you could rely on anyone else doing so though. Mental note to avoid in future or engineer it so things work out better.

Boho the good news is that it does get a bit easier within a couple of months. Your DS is at the particularly hard to manage, crawly, stick his fingers into everything, understand nothing stage and within a couple of months it will get much easier.

Having said that your DH is being spectacularily crap but I've learnt with my DP I have to spell out what needs to happen and how,

a couple of months is abit optimistic ds is 18 months and still like this. i'm thinking about 6 months should do it.

Oh dear am I doing the positive memory thing that my parents do where they insist that I was toilet trained over night and was quoting sonnets at the age of 18 mmths.

Maybe it takes a wee bit longer, DS is about 21mths now and over the last two months it has become so much easier from that manic stage in that he will sit for a few minutes and doesn't try so many life threatening things, and vaguely gets the word No.

i just shout at DP if he's being gormless, and deal with the consequences later
not very subtle, but it's effective and gets everyone else's attention too....people do forget, or are unaware of various implications
usually he feels a bit guilty, and shapes up a bit
that said, he's actually really good with safety/plug sockets/falling hazards, so i don't have to do this very often

ds gets the word no. he just chooses to carry on regardless.

if you were on childminding duty today id make sure your dh was doing it on christmas day or the next family party!we take turns,his family do he gets a bit drunk i run round like a headless chicken looking after ds my family do...well you get the idea

My SIL & I moan about this sort of thing everytime there is a family get together like this at our DH's parents house.

I have 2 under 3 and she has 2 under 4 - the men folk have a jolly old time catching up with their relatives - having a drink and a fag outside - They seem to get 'dog' hearing ie: They can't hear you calling their name but can hear a beer being opened at a 100 paces!!

it's not so bad now but it does take a few stiff words to bring them to 'heel'

ohhh I did one of these parties at ex's Auntie's house. I never went again.

next time. just say "I am not going and neither are my children because you don't bother looking after them.

The older generation have forgotten.

Can I just point out that the electric socket isn't as dangerous as you seem to think it is. To electrocute himself your ds would have had to get fingers into both of the lower holes, managing to open the shutters that are covering them (when inserting a plug, the longer top pin going in first releases the shutters on the lower ones). The chances of this happening are incredibly small.

Doesn't excuse dh's crap (and familiar sounding ) behaviour, but thought it was worth mentioning.

Big parties and little kids are a nightmare.
I would never go-it was too much hassle.

Ummmm, why not just let ds climb the stairs (both mine could do that at about 12 months and so could most of their friends) and run around a bit? It's a family house - how much danger can he be in?

boho YANBU. I has a similar day yesterday. Had loads of people who could have entertained my 13mo DS, but yours truly spent most of the time chasing him stopping him doing himself an injury. Got 5 mins to scoff some food and that was all.

Roll on Xmas day .

Unfortunately you can't rely on other people to look after your children when you're at a party, especially a family party. It sucks but that's the way it is. The best parties are where you have 10 year old + girls - they love looking after children ime. Adults are rubbish.

YANBU

This is why I avoid parties with the children if I can.

DH will spend the whole time chatting with friends/family while I am trying to look after the children, would rather be at home relaxing on my own with them safely in bed!

YANBU, I can understand your frustration!

I thought the whole point of going to family events was that they did all the entertaining while you actually got a break for a minute - and just basked in the glory of everyone admiring your PFB as much as you 'oh look, she DREW A CIRCLE, isn't she clever?'.

Tbh, I make my dh do the running around if family not doing it/elsewhere, espesh now I'm pregnant... but I do have to be explicit 'can you go and see what dd is up to/change dd/get her some water'. He does switch off more than me (but is v good really).

Thanks for all the feedback!

Lalalonglegs, I can't just leave him to climb the stairs; he can do it, but if you're not standing right behind him he will sometimes fall backwards. Plus he hasn't quite got the coming down safely thing so if I let him do whatever it'll be broken limbs and social services a-gogo!

at 12 month old babies wandering up and down the stairs - my 20 month old can't do that remotely safely. My 4 year old couldn't be trusted until he was nearly 3!

Can'tsleighwon'tsleigh I agree that sockets per se are not as dangerous as we might think, but once when staying at my parents had my back turned on DS for about 3 minutes and found him in the hall, merrily trying to stick a key into the switched on plug holes.

Oh agree with the older children looking after them, I love it when we are around my nephews aged 14 & 22, they are complete sweeties and play with DS for hours.

No you are not. At the end of your post I thought 'well, I suppose it was her DH's family, and he probably wanted to catch up'. Realising it was your family and you'd spent all morning preparing, I think he (in particular)/they were out of order.

I would have a quiet word (or a loud scream if that works better) and make sure he pulls his weight over Christmas.

no you aren't BU I've just had fmaily to stay for Xmas and it was pretty much 2 days liek that!

and no way would I let DS wander upstairs in a strange house - I dont' care if its a 'family' house there are still:
stairs to fall down
Beds to fall off
ornaments to break
lipstick to find and smear on bedclothes
toilets to drink out off
books to tear
etc etc

I let DS (30 months) go upstairs on his own in OUR house only when I know I've closed /childlocked all cupboards and the only open door is to his room. But I follow within 5 minutes.

We had an ENORMOUS baby gate/fence that could be latched to make a hexagonal enclosure. I put my foot down and insisted that it went away with us ALWAYS, despite my DH's grumbles. Otherwise I could not put DS down safely for a whole week or weekend - he would be chewing a flex or climbing bookcases the minute I did so, and of course DH was always oblivious or at the pub. The cage was very roomy indeed, almost the size of a small room, and with lots of toys in there has had lots of space to play. Often people would get in with him!

boho you must have the patience of a saint. We went to a friends wedding with DS when I was three months gone with DD. I lasted 45 minutes with similar behaviour from DH before I took the pair of them outside for a serious conversation about expected standard of behaviour. Worked really well until the speeches when DS escaped and heckled the best man! Spent much of the grooms speech on the brides lap.

IME family & friends only take the pressure off you if they've got/had babies of their own recently. But I'm very outspoken about smoking around any children so family aren't surprised when I ask them not smoke around my kids.