to take my noisy children..

[fishoutofchlorinatedwater]

to a private swimming pool in a (not particularly swanky!) club of which we are members in the middle of the day? Twice this week an elderly lady who has been swimming at the same time has complained to me about the noise which they are making and pulled cats bum faces at me for the entire time which we are swimming. She claims that she "cannot stand the screeching" , winces every time they make a noise, and puts her fingers in her ears. For most of this time, she is attempting to relax on a lounger at the side of the pool rather than actually swimming.

It has really spoiled my afternoon, as I'm sure it has hers, however club rules clearly state that children are allowed in the pool between 9 and 5 (and not otherwise). We have been well within this time. Presumeably she is free to swim after 5 (and if not, she has chosen to join a club which allows children to swim during the day).

My children are 2 and 4 (boys, which shouldn't be relevant, but they are fairly typically boisterous). They are not doing anything too awful, but there is a lot of giggling, a bit of splashing (each other / me - nobody else) and generally larking around. They are having fun. Sound echoes in the pool environment. I have asked them to keep the noise down (repeatedly) but it is fairly futile, and to be honest I'm not really sure I should have to as they are just doing what children do in a swimming pool.

No, x2 boys, why should it make a difference?

Arf at cat's bum faces!

Yanbu.

Your children are allowed to be there and any normal person should expect children to make reasonable noise, espessially when having fun in a swimming pool.

Me and dp go swimming fairly regularly mainly for a nice relaxing form of exercise. Therefore we usually go at a time where it is adults only. We forgot about the timetable once and ended up swimming with several "noisy" children and realised of course this was our "problem" not theirs and just had our swim as usual and have made sure to go at adult times since.

I just wondered, most of the quiet children I know seem to be girls, I think you've done well to manage to get 2 toddler boys to be calm and quiet!

They would regularly just run round in circles screaming
You see, to you; it's "happy noise". To everyone else it's just, you know, screaming...
We all have far more tolerance for our own children than we can possibly expect from random strangers.

Maybe she has problems with her hearing/ears. I have Ménière's disease and screeching and high pitched noises can really hurt my ears, especially if they are in an echoey place like a swimming pool.

Perhaps they are noisier than you think.

I don't particularly like screeching/screaming children, be it "happy noise" or a tantrum. I never allowed my two to run around in circles screaming, and if they were annoying someone so much they had asked me twice in a few days to try to keep it a bit quieter I probably would have at least tried. They are boys, too, not that it makes the slightest bit of difference.

Well they would run round in circles screaming at home / in our garden. And I really couldn't give a monkeys. If they did this in a public place (other than a play park) I'd ask them to calm down (and as I've said up-thread, we do just avoid anywhere too nice - e.g. I only take them to very clearly child friendly cafes - the sorts with play corners and outdoor play equipment). But they are naturally loud and energetic, and surely there have to be some places where that is OK? I'd love to hear people's tips for getting an exuberant 2 year old to play quietly!

Ooh, this is quite enlightening. Are there really people who wouldn't allow their children to e.g. chase each other round the garden (not likely to be overheard) shouting? Just because shouting is "not on"? I've always taken the view that there are places and times when they need to be quiet (DS1 seems to manage pretty well at pre-school, e.g.), and other times when they can just be a bit feral and let go.

I'm sure that they're not louder than I think, soapandglory. I know that they are reasonably loud. But as I've said a few times, I did try to get them to be a bit quieter (albeit not with much success), I didn't completely ignore her request - but the only real way I could avoid them making noise would be not to take them swimming at all.

Assuming you don't actually charge admission to your garden, op, I'd say that was fine .

The incident you posted about took place in a public swimming pool, though, used by other people who might not relish two screaming toddlers making their ears bleed as they tried to relax.

I don't know. We live in central London, therefore wherever we go we are pretty much in close proximity to someone to be annoying if running around in circles screaming. Do you have neighbours? I wouldn't like screaming children next door. Noisy playing if fine but screaming for the sake of it isn't.

Ours know that if they were to continual make a racket when out when asked not to then we would leave ( and it's usually something for them), or if at home they would be removed from whatever is making them wound up. So in your example if I had told them twice to calm down and they didn't then there swimming would be over as we would get out

I think you're overstating it by about 27 miles a bit, Flogging! They weren't actually running round in circles screaming in the pool, just making playing noise.

We live in the middle of the country so no, no neighbours. They have nobody to disturb but the sheep (and DH and I, but I think we've just tuned out most of it). But really, they weren't being that bad in the pool (IMO). Lots of laughing, a bit of "Mummy I am coming to splash you" / "Look at me!" and similar, and a few squeals during splashings sessions. And a couple of jumps in. But it wasn't constant yelling (it was constant chatter).

Not your problem.

If kids allowed in pool and not being ridiculously noisy then she just has to lump it.

I'm not a big fan of swimming with kids (or aqua aerobics classes) unless I'm purposefully going swimming with the children.

I do however occasionally bugger up and end up in the pool at my gym at family swim time. I wouldn't dream of complaining about normal behaviour. The kids/ parents have paid their subs too.

It would depend on how loud they really were, I suppose. Some giggling and splashing and occasionally calling out? Sounds fine to me. If it were more along the lines of non-stop screeching and shouting, that would certainly get on my nerves. From the OP's description it sounds more like the former than the latter.

I had similar in a hotel pool that was also used as a membership gym. We were only there a couple of nights and wanted to make the most of our stay - the boys (about 6 & 7 at the time) were fairly early risers so we decided that as we could use the pool from 7.30am (it was open from 6am) we would get up and have a swim before breakfast while it was quiet.

I am fairly noise intolerant and generally a considerate person, so the boys were no making a lot of noise, just happy kids stuff, and we kept to one side pf the pool leaving the other side for anyone wanting to swim lengths.

Kept on getting dirty looks from an elderly lady which really put a damper on our enjoyment. Anyway, breakfast called so i took the boys into the changing room to hear misery guts moaning to another old lady that she pays her membership and is entitled to swim in peace. i am usually pretty quiet but i'd had enough.

I reminder her that we had actually paid too and had a limited time to use the facilities and she had plenty of times when the pool was unavailable to hotel guests to use it....and if she didn't like it she should complain to the hotel and stop spoiling other peoples enjoyment. She just glared back but the lady she was with smiled at me - I think she'd had enough of the moaning too.

Putting him back in nappies premenantly us going to confuse him, he obviously understands as he is dry most days. If h was not and showed little understanding than you could say put him back in nappies. T is not the case here

Sorry wrong thread

Have you ever "sushed" your children?