how often do your teens have friends round? and do you feed them?

[SlartyBartFast]

actually its ds and his gf. of 4 months.
he wants to see her every night, yes i know its young love.
but i am missing family meals. should i rstrict?
obviously i should but to how much.

This is always a difficult on - DD1 had a boyfriend who would call in on his way home from work every single night at about 5pm and then stay all evening until I got stroppy about it. I said I was happy to feed him a couple of times during the week but every night was impacting too much on the rest of the family (especially as we didn't like him very much either but that's another story!).

How old is your DS? DD1 was supposed to be studying for A levels and so that had an impact on how much time she had. Note the "supposed" -if she hadn't split up with her BF in the Easter of year 13 she wouldn't have passed any at all!

he is in year 10, and aged 15, so come september it will much more important that he has nights to himself.
thing is if the gf comes there is not really enough room at the table for the familyk, so dh and i eat in sitting room and i like family meals

My personal choice would be that about 4 times a week is ok - that way you get some family time as well.

If coming to eat then once a week is enough and he could go to hers for dinner too.

Otherwise, she should come after dinner, or depart before you all sit down to eat.

thanks.
she is not walking distance, so relies on lifts. i will suggest 4 X a week.

Do they help with the washing up/loading the dishwasher. If not, suggest they do it on a regular basis, properly & to your standard! Also get them to change the bin liner, feed the pets...anything else you can think of. Hope they contribute to the conversation and entertain you! Lovely to have family meals together, maybe it's a sort of compliment that he wants to do this. Possibly better than being out and you not knowing where he is? Does she get fed at home...? Your home might be more welcoming.

thanks for your comments.

i assume it is just young love, they dont want to be apart . and better of course than being out and about in the dark and unknown

My sons are 17 and 20, they have always had friends in and out of the house at various times.

If I have cooked enough, I offer food, but if I have only cooked enough to feed four, then I don't offer.

The only exception to this is DS2's friend whose dad has terminal cancer and I tend to feed him every time he's here, and also send some home with him for his dad to eat when he feels able to.

good idea. it is hard to menu plan otherwise.

I think I'd try and get him to have "set nights" when she comes around and stays to eat, so you know that you can have family meals on the other nights.

I too have feeding issues with my son and his girlfriend but I'll start my own thread rather than hijacking yours

Hi - first post so bear with me!

I have two teenagers - 15 and 17 - and I'd rather they were round at mine then hanging out at the park so we have always encouraged it.

I do feed them - and make them all muck in laying table, clearing up etc, etc - it's all quite good fun. But they all have to bugger off after 9 - Sunday to Thursday. Many of them crash at ours over the weekends and it's noise down by midnight - and lights off by 2am - or they get wrath of me (which only had to be handed out once for them not to want to see it again - me, towelling nightgown and Clarins night cream - sufficiently terrifying). And it's 2 nights max a week.

As for boyf of No. 1 daughter he's allowed all weekend and mid week on special occassions.

MD