Neighbours Kids

[CaptainMummy]

We live in a semi detached house, and next door is a little girl (3.5, a few days older than Ella) This little girl used to be very physical and hit out alot, but has calmed down alot and actually plays quite nicely with my girls (most of the time, she can still be very possessive of things and does still hit sometimes)

Anyway, my problem is that any timer my girls are outside, she comes STRAIGHT over. We have scaffolding up just now and they had to take a bit of the fence down so she can literally walk right in. My two little ones like her coming over most of the time, my eldest doesn't seem to bother much.
She makes a mess, tries to come into my house, doesn't listen when I tell her to stop digging (at the side of my grass there is a bit that is just earth, and she keeps pulling at it and stones going all over my grass). I don't mind her over sometimes, but I just hate the fact that she is forced upon me when I would rather not have to watch every two minutes to make sure she isn't hitting one of the girls. The thing that annoys me most is that she comes into my garden to play when we aren't even outside, plays on all the girls toys and the trampoline etc.
The fence will be fixed soon, so I'm hoping it will stop, but she can climb over and her mum seems to just assume its fine for her to be here all the time. She and her friend were out in my front garden and throwing toys over the fence onto the pavement...

If I tell her 'no, you can't come in to our garden to play today' she just looks at me blankly, and stands there not moving. If she does go back to hers, she is round again after 10 seconds trying again. It doesn't help when my 2yr old is saying 'Hiii, you can come in to play if you want!'

My girls do go into her garden to play sometimes but I would never allow them to disrespect anything of hers, and I am still keeping an eye on them, whereas her parents send her out, close their door and don't have a clue what she is up to.

Am I being mean? I just feel like I have a hard enough time trying to keep the peace between my own girls, without having an extra little person to look out for, who doesn't even listen to me

 

[DeuceMom]

deleted

 

[george83]

We have a boy in our street who is exactly the same but older. He's 8 and plays with my 5 year old and mostly they get on ok but whenever we play out the front (we have a shared grass area for the street) he just comes and joins in. The other weekend my oh and youngest 2 were asleep and I was so pleased to have some 1:1 time with my ds1 so we went out to play with a bat and ball and within 2 seconds this boy was out and our game was ruined. I know it's good for ds1 to have friends but equally I find it really annoying that there's no let up. My oh gets really angry and sometimes quite blunt with the other boy but I think it's bad parenting from his family and they should have the decency to say 'just wait and see if you're asked to play'.

 

[Pearls18]

I wouldn't be happy with a 3.5 year old coming around, at that age you'd be having to babysit her! I don't let DS2 out of my sight outside, he's the same age. If you're comfortable I would tell next door that you're not able to keep the close eye you would need for children of that age so you'd prefer she didn't come over...in reality I'd probably not let my kids outside until the fence was back haha, not good with confrontation!

 

[BabyGirl999]

That is unbelievable and I would NOT be happy with that! How can her parents let her do that?!? They literally are expecting you to babysit/childminder her! I have no solutions unless you are comfortable to confront them, but that really is shocking!

I would probably just try to be really firm and say something like 'no we're not having visitors today' and if she stands and stares at you just let her! Just be firm.

 

[catty]

Are you able to put up a higher fence - a 6ft fence might solve with this problem without having to say anything. Though maybe that is expensive, im not great with conflict but when my kids are in the garden il be pottering around in the kitchen and getting small jobs done i certainly dont want another child just popping round that i have to watch!! I think the parents are actually really bad letting her do this at such a young age, what if they just assumed shes at your house but shes not and ends up god knows where

 

[catty]

I was just thinking about yhis again and eughh its honestly my worst nightmare! I dont think id manage to go into my garden with the fear of having another child popping over.

Its really bad of the parents letting their child play on the garden toys when your not even there. Very rude imo. My next door neighbour has a trampoline and 1 bit of my fence has came off and the kids were trying to squeeze through to get on the trampoline. Never in a million years would i have just let them go on when its not theirs!
Are you friendly with the mum? Id maybe say something along the lines of you have your hands full at the moment with the 3 girls being so young so your glad you didnt have a fourth, althoygh sometimes when you have the 4 girls in the garden you feel like you do or something joking along those lines (cant even think what) and hope she gets the message! or actually tell her straught which i couldnt do

 

[LoriCroit]

It sounds like she doesn’t have anyone else to play with and enjoys playing with your girls. Maybe your girls and you are a very stable, positive experience for her and even at her young age she gravitates to a nice family like yours.

Have you tried sitting down and talking to her mother and set up some guidelines so that they both understand? Having the fence up should help. It might be nice to place some rules on the play times so that both she and her mother understand that at your house or in your yard there are rules. (like not climbing the fence, throwing toys, hitting, etc.) I wouldn’t hesitate to have this discussion with the mother, while being sure that the daughter knows all this too.

I hope this helps and it all works out so your girls can grow up great friends with the neighbor children.

 

[AnneD]

If she is in your garden when you're in the house, I'd take her back to her parents and explain that she was in your garden on her own and that you don't want to risk her getting hurt, especially when she is unsupervised. If you don't want her around when you're in the garden, I'd probably do the same and explain that you've got your hands full looking after your three and you can't cope with an extra child to supervise.
Sorry if this sounds mean.

 

[AnneD]

If she is in your garden when you're in the house, I'd take her back to her parents and explain that she was in your garden on her own and that you don't want to risk her getting hurt, especially when she is unsupervised. If you don't want her around when you're in the garden, I'd probably do the same and explain that you've got your hands full looking after your three and you can't cope with an extra child to supervise.
Sorry if this sounds mean.

 

[BabyGirl999]

I think AnneD's suggestion is excellent.

 

[c1403]

We have a similar issue, so much so that sometimes I dread 3.30 when the neighbours kids come home.

My eldest is four, youngest two and the girl next door is 6. When she comes over they do play nicely together but I feel like I am constantly checking on them....lately my eldest has been going next door too but then the youngest wants to go too and I'm not comfortable with that. We also sometimes have the girls cousin come over too and they do tend to invite themselves.

At first I didn't get on too well with the mother but lately it's got better. I guess you just need to set ground rules, such as she can only come over if your children are outside and she needs to ask first. We have managed to get this far. If my husband is home he can be quite stern with them and say no but I find myself giving in for a bit of peace!

On the days I don't want her over I shut all the blinds and tell the girls it's raining ha ha not really but I do try and keep them away from the garden door.

 

[c1403]

It sounds like she doesn’t have anyone else to play with and enjoys playing with your girls. Maybe your girls and you are a very stable, positive experience for her and even at her young age she gravitates to a nice family like yours.

Have you tried sitting down and talking to her mother and set up some guidelines so that they both understand? Having the fence up should help. It might be nice to place some rules on the play times so that both she and her mother understand that at your house or in your yard there are rules. (like not climbing the fence, throwing toys, hitting, etc.) I wouldn’t hesitate to have this discussion with the mother, while being sure that the daughter knows all this too.

I hope this helps and it all works out so your girls can grow up great friends with the neighbor children.

This is so true. The little girl that comes to play at ours has twin brothers who seem to get all the attention. The mother is a single parent and works hard. When she is over here she loves drawing and has eaten vegetables (her mum was so surprised) and I think when she grows up she'll have fond memories of playing here. That said it can bloody annoying at times too.

 

[Zephram]

Exactly as AnneD says. I would simply take her home, say you found her unsupervised in your garden again and basically that it's not your job to watch her (in a diplomatic way). Say that if she wants to play with your girls you would prefer her mum comes and schedules a play date with you.

 

[CaptainMummy]

Thanks everyone. Yesterday my dd3s scooter was missing. I checked my whole garden and even got dd2 to go check in the girls playhouse and it was nowhere. Knocked on her door and she wasn't in so my dd was very upset. Turns out she had taken it inside so we did get it back last night... but she has a scooter almost identical! I don't get why she took dds. As well as this, two of the girls little windmills have gone missing from our garden and I'm sure I saw her with one the other day (whilst on our trampoline!) so I've just sent a message and asked if her mum could make sure that let she doesn't come into our garden anymore. I am quite friendly with her (though we aren't 'friends') but hate confrontation and really hope she doesn't take offence!
Yesterday she was climbing up my fence (on the other side) which is a big 6ft one and on the other side the dog that bit my daughter... had to run out and get her down as obviously she wasn't being supervised. Her mum heard me shouting and came out so if I wasn't in, who knows what could have happened!

 

[c1403]

Thanks everyone. Yesterday my dd3s scooter was missing. I checked my whole garden and even got dd2 to go check in the girls playhouse and it was nowhere. Knocked on her door and she wasn't in so my dd was very upset. Turns out she had taken it inside so we did get it back last night... but she has a scooter almost identical! I don't get why she took dds. As well as this, two of the girls little windmills have gone missing from our garden and I'm sure I saw her with one the other day (whilst on our trampoline!) so I've just sent a message and asked if her mum could make sure that let she doesn't come into our garden anymore. I am quite friendly with her (though we aren't 'friends') but hate confrontation and really hope she doesn't take offence!
Yesterday she was climbing up my fence (on the other side) which is a big 6ft one and on the other side the dog that bit my daughter... had to run out and get her down as obviously she wasn't being supervised. Her mum heard me shouting and came out so if I wasn't in, who knows what could have happened!

Oh that is not good. She shouldn't be taking your daughters things. We are quite strict on what toys are allowed out when 'friends' are over. Mainly because my girls have a lot of toys and I don't want them all broken, kids can be so heavy handed.
When their friend goes home we have to put her back over the wall so I make sure she hasn't got anything.
When we went away once she said she came over, I'm not sure if any truth as she does tell fibs but now we lock the playhouse and toybox in the garden if we go away. Awful we have to do it though.

As for the dog situation, that is quite scary. Hopefully the Mum took note when she came out.

 

[AnneD]

Are the gardens fenced in where you are? Ours isn't, so I can't get my head around letting a kid that young go around unsupervised. On the other hand, we do have poisonous stuff like daffs and lily of the valley in the garden, so I wouldn't feel comfortable leaving children totally unsupervised in the gatden because of that.

 

[Babybear85]

Oh nooo this is totally not on your not overreacting. W
Our neighbours have children the same age as mine and we never would allow this. Sometimes the littlw boy pops his head over i actually dont mind but his mum always says to get down as its an invasion of privacy really! I always say its fine! Occasionally theyve nipped in the garden to play but if they want to play i normally suggest bikes out the front and his mum always comes too shed never expect me to watch them. This is not an over reaction on ur part at all