So you’ve decided to host this year’s summer barbeque. You’re going to have a lot of guests and maybe even your boss attending your outdoor grilling event. Naturally your guests will be bringing children. Here’s a few techniques that you can use to ensure that your barbeque is a success so that everyone leaves feeling happy, full and raving about the great meats that you grilled; instead of leaving grumpy and upset because of unruly children.

Your two main priorities when hosting a barbeque should be great food and great comfort. You probably already have your food perfected, but have you considered the comfort of your guests? You should find a shaded location and place comfortable chairs here for your guests to rest. Place a few citronella candles around the area to keep bugs and other pests away, and hang a few sticky flycatchers in the limbs surrounding the area. It’s virtually impossible to keep an outdoor area pest free, but you can eliminate a lot of the pests using the flycatchers and candles.

Inform any person under 18 that this private shaded area is for adults only, and that the children and teens should find somewhere else to play or gather. Your guests will thank you for it!

If you expect children at your barbeque, show a bit of courtesy for the children when it comes to serving alcoholic beverages. Keep the coolers with the beer and wine coolers in the house, so that little hands cannot grab a cold one. Have an adult watch over the brew, to ensure that mischievous teens cannot sneak a drink to their favorite hideaway. By keeping your alcoholic beverages away from the regular cold drinks like tea, soda and juice you do not have to worry about getting arrested for contributing to minors because some child or teen decided to try one just to see what it tastes like. You also keep the alcoholic drinks away from those who try to avoid them. This is not only polite, but also a very kind thing to do if you have guests who may be recovering alcoholics.

When it’s time to serve the food, you should keep things in order. Have other adults help you, and serve the children first. Adults will enjoy their meals more if the children are stuffing their mouths full of food instead of whining, “I’m hungry” as you try to fix plates for everyone at the same time. Feed the children first, so that they can eat and get back to their play so that the adults can enjoy their meals in peace.

Once everyone has eaten, everyone should enjoy desert together with hot coffee or tea. Children will eat forever if they have sweets around, so by serving desert last, after everyone has completed their meal, the children will know they should entertain themselves before gathering around for the sweet treats provided for desert.

If you have not asked for volunteers to help with the cleanup yet, then this would be a good time to do so. If there are a lot of children, then you can use desert as a reward for them helping with the cleanup. Let the children know that desert will be served to them, once all paper cups, plates napkins and other trash on the ground and tables is placed into trash bags. You’ll find that children will cleanup much faster when they see adults enjoying desert without them, and it teaches them that having fun sometimes involves working as well. This is a good thing for children to learn.

Above all, make the event an enjoyable experience for all. You can have a great event even when there are many children attending, you just have to make sure that everything is kept orderly when children of many families gather together. If you happen to have a spoiled brat attend, and if a parent gets upset because you have asked their child to clean, then just smile and ignore them. Stick to your rules, and you will find that the upset parent really only has two choices. Sit quietly as the children clean. Or the parent can prepare their child’s desert as the other children are cleaning. You can see who will end up looking unreasonable if that happens, and it won’t be you!