I Assumed My Daughter’s Friend Was Busy All Summer. When School Started, We Both Learned the Truth.

Care and Feeding Someone’s holding a grudge. Photo illustration by Slate. Photo by JNemchinova/Getty Images Plus. Sign up for the Slatest to get the most insightful analysis, criticism, and advice out there, delivered to your inbox daily. Care and Feeding is Slate’s parenting advice column. Have a question for Care and Feeding? Submit it here. Dear Care and Feeding, My daughter has a best friend who lives three houses away; they are both 8 years old. Her friend has been coming over to play at least once a week for about three years. Occasionally, maybe once every other month, they have been able to play at her friend’s house. This summer, the friend has started coming over and bringing her little sister, who is 6. I let them play the first two times; it didn’t end well. The sisters argued about what to do and made my daughter choose. The child who didn’t get what they wanted would then scream, cry, and run home. So the third time, I sent the little sister home and said, “Sorry, just the big girls get to play today.” About 20 minutes later, the big brother came and said she had to go home. I didn’t think anything of it; it was close to lunchtime. But the rest of the summer, the friend couldn’t play every time my daughter went to ask. I just assumed they were busy. The first day of school, they both came over to ask if they could play. I said, “Just the older one, sorry.” After about an hour, they decided to go to the friend’s house to play. When they got there, the mom told my daughter, “I’m mad at you because the sister can’t play at your house, so you can’t play here.” So apparently she had been mad at us all summer for not letting both girls play. I texted her to make sure she knew I was the one who said she couldn’t play with my daughter, but she never replied or talked to me about it. There are also some other reasons I don’t want the younger sister at our house. She has ADHD and doesn’t stay with the older girls; she dumps out toys, spills water, gets into the pantry and fridge, breaks stuff, drinks out of any cup sitting on the counter, and wanders around the house. She also stole some small things like a year ago, so I don’t really trust her. When she is there, it is definitely babysitting for me. I have stuff to do; I don’t want to babysit. The older sister and my daughter play nicely together, and I don’t have to constantly intervene. Am I in the wrong for sending her away? I don’t know what to say to the neighbor. If she needed help with babysitting, I could do it occasionally. —Neighbor Trouble Dear Neighbor Trouble, It sounds like you should try to have a conversation with your neighbor, maybe even stop by if you see her outside and try to chat. But also be OK with the fact that she might not be willing to talk. I don’t think you did anything wrong, but her feelings are hurt. No mom wants their child turned away. And because you didn’t have a conversation with her earlier about why you can’t always have her younger daughter over, she doesn’t know the reason. Talk to her and say, “I’m usually off doing other things and can’t give your younger daughter the attention she needs, but let’s talk in advance, and I’d love for her to come over sometimes when I know I can be more attentive.” Again, it might be too late for a conversation if your neighbor is feeling raw about the situation. At least now you know what to do if this kind of situation ever arises again. In the future, I’d focus on being more communicative with the parents of your daughter’s friends about playdates, any limitations, or what you need for things to go smoothly. So, consider this a lesson learned. —Arionne More Advice From Slate I am a new mom of 1-year-old twins, “Bella” and “Iris”. When I was pregnant, my husband and I decided that we wanted to give our girls names that we liked, as opposed to both of our families’ traditions of using family names (think “Dorothy” and “Ethel,” which are good names, just not our style). My mother-in-law was perfectly fine with this, and thinks that the names we picked out are much better than the family ones. My mother, however, will not stop giving me grief about it. Advice Family Kids Parenting