He's 8 and stays with us two afternoons a week. His parents allow half an hour of tablet on school days. With us he asks politely, I say yes, and somehow it's an hour. I don't want to be the soft one who undoes their rule, or the strict one he stops looking forward to. How do other grandparents keep the same arrangement as the parents?
From the parent side: what I wanted from my in-laws when my daughter was small was just 'ask your mummy', not a yes or no. That one line saved so many fights. Half the time she didn't bother calling me, she'd go and play outside instead 🙂
Is the rule written down anywhere he can see? With my son, rules that live only in the parents' heads got renegotiated at every house he visited. We put the times on a small card, and the same card is stuck up at both homes. It doesn't stop the asking. It does mean the answer is 'what does the card say', which takes you out of the middle.
A card is simple enough. I'll suggest it to my son this weekend, and I'll practise 'what does the card say'.
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