There are VERY few of my kids’ friends that I don’t like.  I can think of only one that isn’t allowed in the house anymore – or at least, in the house when I’m around.  Not a bad record in the 3+ years they’ve had sleepovers.

But, there is a new addition to that list.

I must admit that I only had limited exposure to her while she was sleeping over, but it was enough.

I had heard stories about this girl.  Sunny is a year younger than DJ – a 2nd grader in her 2/3 class.  And, I knew there was a reason her parents signed her up for taekwondo.  I knew she would be a handful, but didn’t realize how much.  (I was glad I was spending most of the night away from the house though.)

I knew things were going well when I started getting text messages from Derek about her.  Here is how it went:

Derek: lucky…we have the girl from hell.
Emmy: Bwahahaahha!! Why do you think I wasn’t sad to be gone? 😉
D: You suck hard.
E: I didn’t think you and Garbanzo had those kinds of talks. 🙂
D: We compare notes… 😉 Please bring beer.
E: I have several in the fridge. I’ll share.  The harder stuff is hidden but Brian will share I’m sure.

Later, while they were at the park, I got this:
D: OMG. Sprinklers….death…..aaaaahhhh.
(The parks department had decided to turn the sprinklers on at 7:30 pm on a Friday night.  Families were fleeing the grass.)
E: Quick! Run around yelling “I’m melting, I’m melting!!”
D: I already did. ugh…i dislike this place now
E: Ms Panda suggests running to the closest bar at the end of your “i’m melting” scene.
D: unless they allow children, sure, but Sunny doesn’t drink unhealthy drinks!!!
E: A little whisky for medicinal reasons will help her. Mix it with her milk.
D: she was playing with some guys dog. what the hell is wrong with her.
E: Lol! If she picks the right dog, all of your problems go away.
D: I made her give the dog back. I thought she was going to eat it.
E: Oh, so she stole someone’s dog?!?! Nice! Do we need to do a count of animals before she leaves?
D: No. LOL. I do not like this friend yet she wants to go home and make cookies. Now that is unhealthy.

I came home to the fun.  The kids were bouncing off the walls.  You could tell Indigo was about ready to collapse.  DJ was barely holding on to her sanity.

The girls had begged to sleep in the tent on the back deck.  They were waiting for me to come home and put them to bed.  I call all of the girls together, get about 5 minutes of full frontal Sunny and her attitude, and throw the girls and Bob into the tent.  I sat at the bar in the kitchen writing a blog post and periodically yelling for them to settle down.  Every time they would start settling down, Sunny would start talking to Bob in that sing-songy play voice that makes dogs go crazy.  This would get everyone up and yelling again.

After nearly an hour of this, I gave them the final warning – go to sleep or no sleeping in the tent.  Thirty seconds later, I threw them out of the tent.

My kids didn’t argue.  They hung their heads in shame, grabbed their stuff and trotted upstairs to their room.  Sunny was perplexed.  She didn’t quite understand how this happened or why.  So, I broke it down for her as I walked her upstairs too.  She was a bit shocked.

She immediately decided she was going to sleep in DJ’s loft with her.  Nope.  They can’t sleep in a tent together – that path had been explored.  They were going to sleep apart from each other.  Another dumbstruck look from the kid.

They finally went to sleep and we were in bed by 1am.

The morning was just as joyous.  Damn is that girl bossy.  Holy fuck!

Every time one of the girls would step a hair out of line, Sunny was there chastising them and demanding justice.  I finally asked her if she was a kid or an adult.  She started her response with an explanation of why she was upset.  I stopped her, told her that was interesting, then told her the response I was looking for was either “kid” or “adult” nothing more.  She answered she was a kid.  I explained in our house the kids get to play, get in trouble, laugh, joke, and generally have fun.  The adults are the ones to get upset when rules are broken, we get to give the lectures, and we get to hand out punishments if we deem fit.  Situations where the kids are trying to do the job of adults will not be tolerated – we expect the kids to be kids.  Sunny didn’t know what to say – so she left.

Garbanzo laughed.

But I will have to applaud DJ.  She did show she had limits with the girl.  She finally gave her the smack down verbally.  You could tell she was also done with the crap.

The lone kid who has been on the “never again” list now has a friend to join her.  Because Sunny is on that list too!