Kid sleepovers are meant to be fun (especially if you're not the one hosting and can have a glorious, kid-free night)! Pizza, pillow fights, scary movies … what's not to love? But can you imagine dropping your kid off at the friend's house, only for your kid to be handed a "sleepover rules" contract by the friend's parent? This is apparently a real thing that some person dreamt and recently shared on Instagram — and she's making all of her kid's friends sign it.
The crazy list of requirements is spreading on Reddit this week, and there's good reason why ...
The rules include the following:
No touching or tickling.
No changing in front of each other.
No being too loud.
And — last but not least — no complaining.
Sure, one could argue that it's good to let kids know the rules at your house before the sleepover starts, but things got even weirder toward the end of the "contract."
"If my behavior falls below Ms. X''s standards, then future play dates or sleepovers might not occur again without serious consideration and stipulation," it concludes, along with a place for each child to sign.
Let's just say ... people had THOUGHTS about the super strict contract, and were generally not here for it.
"That is completely insane," one person charged.
"This lady’s kids are going to have NO friends," another person added.
"Imagine your kid coming home from a sleepover saying 'Oh, well as soon as I got there, Ms. ___ had me sign a contract'….I think I would instantly be ALL THE WAY [expletive] up even before seeing this nonsense," a third person wrote.
Others pointed out that the contract honestly made no sense.
"Does the second to last paragraph imply that Ms. [So-and-So] guarantees you will have fun if you follow the rules?" one commenter asked about the graph that says those who follow the rules to the mom's satisfaction will have a fun time and get brunch the next day. "What if you follow the rules and don’t have fun and/or don’t get brunch? Can [she] be sued in crazy court for breach of contract?"
Another person called attention to one rule in particular that just felt … odd. "The changing clothes one is the weirdest to me," the person wrote. "Like, oh no, your child might see someone's underoos?!? Like, running around in our undies was a point of order for me and my friends at that age. And in later years, skinny dipping at the creek. People this uptight shouldn't have kids. If these rules continue in this vein, she's just gonna raise a hella rebellious teenager."
(Touché!)
"This is super weird and reeks of homophobia," a third person countered.
The Reddit user later added that the anonymous mom's son is about 10, and (no surprise) this was the first sleepover she'd hosted.
"She posted it on Instagram because she was proud of what she came up with," the Redditor added. "She posted a picture of them watching a movie later."
The user added that although the rules themselves weren't "terribly unreasonable," the presentation sure was.
"It's one thing to establish rules at the beginning of a playdate, like you said maybe the friend is raised with a different set of boundaries, but to have a contract is another," the person continued. "Defining boundaries and setting expectations is absolutely necessary for children. Having children sign that set of rules for a sleepover is excessive."
Yep. No matter how you slice it, it sure seems that way.
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