Hosting a bunch of kids is not the same as hosting adult friends

[VenusClapTrap]

Dh has gone for a walk with a couple of families we are friends with. Our dc are all at school together and are close friends. I chose not to go because our Christmas guests just left this morning and I was craving some peace and quiet, and the opportunity to tidy up and tackle the laundry mountain etc.

We have loads of nice leftover food filling the fridge. DH suggested he could ask the families if they fancied coming back to ours afterwards to help us eat some of it. Fine with me. It would be nice to spend an evening with friends over a bottle of wine and nice food, and nice for the dc to catch up with their friends.

DH has just rung to say it’s just the kids coming back. No adults. AIBU to say this is a very different thing? There is literally nothing in this for me - they’re nice kids and I’ll be happy for ours to catch up with them; but this is childcare rather than a social afternoon! Plus I’m not keen on the idea of feeding all our nice food to a bunch of kids who won’t appreciate it, without the benefit of enjoying it with their parents!

I said fuck that. But maybe I’m being unreasonable?

I'd be annoyed as well. Leave him to it.

I would take to bed with a (fake) migraine (and a ton of the nice food and wine and a good book/film) and leave him to it!

Only if he's happy to babysit make it clear that you're not

Why did he offer to bring a load of kids back to yours? That’s quite peculiar of him.

No you didn’t offer to babysit, you offered to host friends. How rude of them all.

Your husband should have told the parents that it wasn't an offer for the children alone if you didn't want to spend time and food on them. Why didn't he?
What time is bedtime? I would expect parents to get them at 6.30pm.
Feed them and send home. Lesson learnt.

I hope your dh said no. Very cheeky of your friends to offload their kids on to you.

How bloody cheeky of your friends. I’d cancel, no way would I be babysitting other people's kids today.

So you said ‘fuck that’ and now he’s pissed off at you? Or did he bring them back anyway?

This is the kind of crap that always happens to me and i resent it too. The free childcare I provide never seems to be reciprocated - I just get landed on time and time again, without a backwards glance as the 'friend' 🙄 skips away for hours of peace while I wrangle a load of kids. I console myself that I am the better person and at least my kids are having fun with their friends for a bit 😁

Unclear whether it was our friends offloading or Dh offering or our dc nagging. Probably a combination. I just retreated to the tv with a box of chocs (dh’s actually!) and left them to it. They’re old enough to not need much supervising really, although I did tell them to bugger off outside to run around when they got a bit loud. Dh agreed to evict them at 6, and did so.