That's nice their mother will buy them everything. Here's a suggestion for answering when this ask for something, "Let me write that down and we'll see if Santa brings it Christmas". Then smile. You haven't said no, you've let them know they ain't getting it from you, you've now put it on their mother to buy it. After all...she buys them everything.

Make sure dad picks up the kids and delivers them. Stay as far away from BM as possible.

IF you've got to pick them up, go straight to a bookstore and into the children's section. Give them 5 rules they must follow
1. They must stay seated and quiet
2. They get a book, they take care of it while they read.
3. They return the book from where it was.
4. They are to be respectful of others around them.
5. Ice cream if for everyone who follows the rules. No 2 chances, these are the rules to be followed.

Then, meet with dad for dinner. Make sure his kids sit next to him so patrons know the rowdy kids are his. After dinner, he takes them back home. If dad wants them to come to the house, they must stay with him at all times. Dad wants them over, dad gets them. Pop popcorn and plant them in front of the boob tube with dad.

Have rules written for expected behavior when in the bedroom. Explain when a rule is broken, they are not old and responsible enough to be in the room, so have a pain by number (there's paint books that already have watercolors on the pages and all you'll need is water and a paintbrush) or some other activity book for them to do on the kitchen table. The activity book should be fun for them and keep them quiet. Expect all the kids to want to do this...so make sure you have a booklet for everyone.

Good luck, IT's obvious you are at rope's end with these kids. Remember this. One day these little ones will grow up to adults. They will remember everything that was said in done. You want to keep your cool while be firm and fair with them. If you must be with them, find an activity that keeps them busy. Do you have silver that needs polishing?? Put them to work no matter how messy it is. Let them work on the kitchen table. Have them do something that benefits you.

If this helps, my mom just called about one of my nephis that graduated from high school last May. He just doesn'tknow what he wants to do in life, but doesn't want to work and could my folks send him to college. He thinks he wants to get into the nursing school because his folks (divorced) are flight paramedics. He really wants to take a year off and just bum around, but he hasn't any money and so would they put him in college. Lovely huh? My mom called to see if I'd be interested in helping him. No way...the lazy. If he'd been a motivated kid, dropped in to check on me once in awhile instead of always in front of the computer and tv playing games, I'd done it. This kid never wanted to do anything unless he was paid, overpaid I might add, for some dinky job. Just letting you know....it's kids whether they skids are family. When you've got some real yahoos to work with, it's stressful.

Hang in there, make a game plan, try it for a month and see how it goes.

sorry for all the misspellings...I've got to slow it down when typing and proofreading....*sheesh*