Do you babysit for free?

when my son was little I used to have the local kids round, but even in those days(my son is now 43) parents were very careful and would like to know exactly where their kids were and where they were playing. When we went to the seaside with the in laws, i usually looked after all the nieces and nephews as I would play building sandcastles with them and generally having a good time. If we went to a social club , I would also look after the kids then as i didnt want to play bingo, so the parents could play bingo without any interruption. But truly I didnt mind, but having someone elses child all day without any contact with the childs' parent, that is totally out of order and it seems that the parents send the child out and expect free babysitting. It does make you wonder , that if your son hadnt had a game at 4, exactly how long his little friend would have stayed at your house. Would he have stayed for tea and supper and then would you have to make a bed up for him too?

I do not think that a parent should leave their child at another person's house for the day unless the child was invited to spend the day, This is extremely bad mannered and I think that I would have sent the child home at lunch time. There has to be boundaries and these boundaries should be respected. Have I babysat for free? Oh yes, to my delight many times this summer when my grand twins were here. My son and his wife needed plenty of time alone to reconnect after being separated for six months as she lives and works in Qatar

I ran a daycare at my house, so I would never have extras over for free. It would have put me over my limit. I think the fact that they had to share their home so much made my kids not want to have a lot over. the other thing is that I was raised with limits, and I would set those same kind. You can only sty there so long or they can only stay here so long.

I dont know how old your son is and his friend but I think the age might need to be specified. If he is young then the parents should be watching him more closely instead of just letting him roam to other peoples houses without having permission from you to be there. If your having to feed them to that would bug me since food is so expensive. I would sent him home when he gets hungry. Where I live kids cant safely walk to my house to play its not a safe road for kids to walk on. So I dont have to worry about this probably until my kids are teenagers. My house is boring so they probably wouldnt want to bring their friends here someday anyway lol.

My kids don't ever have friends over here. If I had more space then we could entertain, but the place isn't even big enough for the kids who live here, let alone any that don't! I too would be a bit miffed if I were you. I probably would have sent the kid home at lunch time instead of feeding him.. unless the kid's parents have done the same for you before.

Hi bounce58, yes I have many times. But that was when my kids were living here with me. They are grown ups now. However, my grandkids are over a lot and they have a friend that spend too much time here. Sometime he is still here when night falls and I ask him if his parents know where he is. Once his grandmother called and come over here and pick him up. This young man has a cell phone and they hardly ever call him to see where he is. I say I was babysitting too without pay.

Haha! Maybe the parents doesn't know their kids are over at your place? Do you usually ask the kid if his/her parents know that he/she is here? I'm not in this situation before.. But i do help my parents to babysit my brothers in the past when they were younger...

When i was growing up, for the most part I was conscious of how long I stayed over for. A lot of the times I didn't enjoy myself fully because I knew if I wasn't home in time I'd get yelled at for it. I think that kids should have a limit, you can only stay for a few hours etc unless you call and ask me and I make sure the other parents are fine with it etc.

I have found myself in that situation before...lol...I had some neighbors once and their children might as well have moved her stuff on in. She was at my house all the time. I liked the fact that my daughter had children to play with but I had to watch that little group like a hawk to keep them out of mischief..LOL. I guess it could have been partly my fault because I wouldn't let mine leave the yard unless they were riding their bikes right in front of the house. If they wanted to play...they had to come over. It was worth it to keep mine close though. It's not fun to feel like your a free baby sitter all the time though.

Now, my neighbor and I will trade off watching our girls when one or the other of us has an errand to do and that is no problem at all because I know that they will be returning the favor eventually. However, as far as the other neighbor that will leave when his kids are at my house, that makes me upset because he is not going to return the favor and he didn't even have the common courtesy to let me know that he was leaving his children with me.

Sometimes these situations come. The friends of my kids come over, and I would have to do the baby sitting. I do not like it because the responsibility is just too heavy. I am fully responsible for whatever will happen to the kids, including my own kids.

i wouldn't babysit for free unless it was for family.

I wouldn't babysit for free unless it was family like a niece or cousin ... But unless it was a friend of the family or a stranger them I would charge times are hard time is money there are many things u can't do for free

just do what is right, as long as your son is playing and happy with his friends just do a little sacrifice, when you see your son smiling and happy you will replenish because of joy that you see on your son.

Oh my yes when my children were little my home was like the spot for free babysitting. While I never minded because this way I knew mine were at home. I could help but wonder why the parents did not worry that the hours passed and the children were at my house. If they ate and or if they were still here. Maybe they just knew I was a good host.

I used to do it but some mothers were taking advantage, really counting on I would do it so I don't do it anymore, of course if I see it's really important.

Here in the Philippines it is quite common to baby sit without asking for a fee to do so. If it is once in a while that's fine with me but since I am a career woman I cannot do so on a daily basis. I leave that for those stay at home moms here in the neighborhood. Some pay others in kind out of showing appreciation that their kid was cared for even when you are not ask to.

No, at least not yet. My children are still a bit to young to have their friends over, but I am pretty sure that in a few years from now I will find myself in a similar situation as you. I know when I was younger in early teen years, I used to have my friends over and vice versa and we used to spend the entire day in each others houses and at times even have a sleep over. But again, these were planned ahead of time and the parents always knew when we were coming over. But I know that those days of friends coming over will soon be in my very door step. Looking forward to them.

I sometimes babysit my relative's kids, they're my little cousins and kids can be a big handful sometimes. I only babysit when I come over and the adults want a break from the kids so they hand them to me and I take them for a stroll to the park to feed the ducks. My cousins also tend to invade their neighbor's house with no permission. The neighbors have kids too so my cousins play with them and the neighbors don't seem to mind. They're not getting paid either. I guess it's like having your kid's friends over for a little fun but it's so tiring when they stay over for a whole day. It's not exactly babysitting if the parents are clearly at home. So it's like visiting, if you want to make it fair have your kid over your neighbor's house sometimes