Can’t get outdoor toys because of DHs dream garden 🙄

I would hate this type of relationship.
If I want my kids to have a toy I just buy it, I don’t seek out permission from DH.

If you have had a trampoline for so long it’s basically unusable surely the children can’t be young enough for a playhouse?

Get the toys! How old are DC?

We have completely transformed our garden over the past 8 years, but one thing we have always allocated space for is the DCs swing and slide set and made sure to keep a patch of lawn for football and cartwheels. They're 8 and 10 and use the swings all the time.

Sounds like you need a new patio.

Always an alibi here op.

My lord this is sad.
We have a TINY garden and when we moved in, it became my domain. For a year it was just concrete and pebbles (dd was only a few months old.)
Its now house to a fabulous mud kitchen and VEGETABLES!!! she absolutely loves growing fruit and veg so now we have about 20 different things growing all over the place. First thing in the morning she's out there with me checking her plants. Evenings, she's out making potions and puddings in her kitchen. We don't have room for a slide or Wendy house unfortunately, but she spends more time in there than either me or DH so she gets to decide what she wants in there 🤣🤣 my picture perfect garden can wait until I'm older, she loves it and thats the main thing 😍😍 just do it

Define wasted. They used it and grew out of it. Buy the stuff.

Dream garden when they are older, right now kit it out for the DCs to enjoy.

We had a lovely wooden playhouse that lasted 10 years, 2 house moves and 3 kids. Any garden toys can be stored in it over winter. Quoits went down particularly well with my kids.

I love gardening and I love my garden, but I accept, without question, that it's the family home, the kids won't be young long, the swings will go before they hit 12, the trampoline by 15, the basketball hoop may last longer, I'll reclaim it in phases until they grow, but basically he's being a T*.

If you get a nice big playhouse, between that and a garden storage box you can put the rest of the toys away under cover during winter.

I just find it so bizarre. It’s like saying you want children but refuse to give them a play area. Surely this is what’s fun about having a kid?

Are you seriously going to go along with him depriving your kids of your outdoor space and a play area because he has a picture in his head that he's done nothing about for years?

Wake up! He's an asshat in this and your kids enjoyment of an outside play space should take priority here.

Make a nice seating area, table and chairs and a big umbrella, and add some toys and a couple big things the kids will use and you can eat outside, the kids can play and burn off energy, and your husband can plan the garden in his head.

Get a tent and camp out back on a nice weekend. Get a hammock and watch the stars or a telescope of you have a nice sky view and do some stargazing.

I would get rid of the trampoline, they're future ER visits and insurance views them dimly, at least here.

Get the parasol and some garden games. I’m not sure how much use slides and swings get tbh - maybe depends if you’ve got a playground nearby. But we had all sorts of other things over the years. A playhouse can serve later for storing supersoakers, swingball etc etc. Paddling pool is an essential - I wish we still had one with these heatwaves!

Get the kids a climbing frame and a slide. Before you know it they will be teenagers and not interested in the garden anymore and then he can do whatever he likes to the garden.

Yes it's so selfish and if the children are old enough to have an idea of what's going on they won't forget - I'm well into middle age and still remember my dad refusing to let me keep a bike in the shed as a teen just because it was 'his' shed (there was plenty of room!). It really coloured my view of him as a person!

You could say to him, I'm going to prioritise getting the kids some garden equipment so they can enjoy the garden.
Give him a choice: you source the item, maybe second hand etc, or he does in the style he wants to incorporate into his garden designs plans afterwards (but with a deadline!)

Also make a little flowerbed and add some pots for DCs and start them with simple plants, some from.seed...nasturtiums, zinnias, radishes, carrots, geraniums, spring bulbs?

Have you posted about this before? I swear I have read a similar post like this before.
Jusy bloody order some garden toys for DC, why on earth does your DH get to veto that.

I think it's really sad and selfish that he's adamant about this. He will watch them making endless pebble coffees in a weedy patch, and not want them to have things to enjoy themselves. Kids outdoors stuff gets so well used and can provide so much fun.

Also, things can be rehomed after and not be permanent. So does he lack imagination, or is he just weirdly controlling and rigid?

The children don’t have that many years where they want to play in the garden.

my child is unusual and gave it up exceptionally young, so I’m not sure what age to suggest, but I do have an idea.

what if you take the age when your youngest will have likely outgrown the space, the number of years between now and then, and the budget for phase 1 of the garden, and agree to put an amount aside every year that will get you to phase 1 by the time your children lose interest.

We spent a fortune on our garden the last 18 months. We have a patio / deck area that's the "grown up zone" and the grass is 90% covered in kids toys.... water table, slide, playhouse, trampoline.

When they are older, we'll just get rid and reseed.

A garden needs to work for the whole family. What's his plan... to eventually do up the garden and not let the kids play in it?

Ah, my husband is a bit territorial over the garden as well. I just sneak things in over the summer, let the children see them first and then he can't say no when they're all excited. Would he rather they were stuck inside on screens?

Get a plastic slide that does a splashdown into the paddling pool. Its essential :-)

I don’t know why this hit such a nerve in me. I feel like lots of men say no to stuff like this like they’re the boss. And then if anything goes wrong when you’re getting the things / doing the things they said no to then you have to take the blame! WTF? And I feel like most women just pretend they don’t see it or they don’t care? Of course the children should take priority in a space that they’re the only ones using but that’s not really the point. Who put men in charge? I hear stories like this ALL THE TIME. But when you post about men being shit loads of women say ‘not my man.’ ‘I feel sorry for you, you’re so bitter.’ But why are so many women full of little stories / complaints like this then?

It's their house too right?

The garden isn't a fucking ornament, it should be enjoyed not looked at through the windows. Get ordering. They will have left home by the time he pulls his finger out.

I've built a garden over the last years, bit by bit. I do one area, working around what is there when necessary, then move onto the next. Rather than having it all planned out in advance, I'm taking a more 'going with the flow' approach. I think this might work well for you, your budget and DH. Set it up for the kids then build the garden around it. You'll get a beautiful garden and a lovely family play garden at the same time. There's no need for it to be one or the other.