To feel free to use other children's toys in the sandpit?

[HarderToKidnap]

We go to lots of parks with our 2.4yo DS. He loves the sandpit and often we take our own spades etc, although sometimes we forget and sometimes go somewhere adhoc and don't have things with us, or go to a new place where we don't realise there is a sandpit.

Now, often in communal sandpits there are various buckets and spades lying around looking abandoned. I always feel free to give these to DS to use, having had a quick peek round for the owner. If after I pick up the spade I can't see anyone looking territorial, I will just give it to him to use. I keep an eye out for anyone coming near us spadeless, so I can quickly check with them whether the spade is theirs, and leave the stuff where i found it when we're ready to go. If I abandon my spade whilst DS toddles off to another attraction and I see someone else using it, I never mind. Just part of being at the park.

Anyway, got a mouthful off someone the other day for using a bucket they'd left in the pit. They'd stuck some paper pictures onto the bucket and one had come off. I'd noticed this before picking up the bucket, which had been laid there a good twenty minutes before DS picked it up. I stashed the paper pic safely and was intending to leave it in the bucket when we left. To reiterate pic had already come off bucket and was next to it. They were REALLY cross about the use of the bucket and obv thought we'd caused the pic to come off.

Discussing with friends today, there seems to be an even split between those who thought I was hideous for using someone else's toys, and those who thought mouthy mother was a lunatic. MN Jury, what say ye?

P.S., I'm not intending to change my behaviour at all, btw, regardless of MN consensus. I love the give and take in the sandpit and have had nothing but positive interactions with other mums and kids re the sharing of toys, save this one incident. This AIBU is purely for information gathering purposes!

I wouldn't mind if you borrowed my son's toys in that kind of situation, it sounds like you're careful enough, but I wouldn't let my son take anything without asking first.

Ultimately children have no concept of value and I think it's good to teach them from an early age to ask before taking anything that's not theirs, be that in a shop or a play area.

Yanbu. Totally with you. Where we are sand toys in a communal sand pit are there for anyone to play with. The woman was rude to kick up a fuss over a plastic bucket.

Amazed people let their children use other people's things without asking be that a bike or a bucket.

It's just rude and entitled. Sharing is lovely but it's a voluntary act and entails a conversation between the owner and the borrower.

Amazed at these blurring of boundaries.

I only have a 20mo - so am unsure about older children, but how would i explain to him that we go to toddler groups where all the toys laying about are there for him to use, but when we go to the park the toys laying about on the floor not being used are not to be touched? He understands if a child is using it not to touch, but something left on the floor would be very confusing. I don't see the harm with him using it at all - just the same as i don't with others using his.

I think this attitude may be why i see so many territorial toddlers at groups we go to. DS picks up a tractor from the floor and another child (who was playing with something else) walks over and snatches the toy and says it's theirs and DS isn't allowed to play with it. The parents then indulgently smile at me and say 'he has one similar at home so he thinks this one is his' Erm so? even if it WAS his, so what? We weren't stealing it ffs.

I haven't read all 5 pages but I have to say I think YANBU OP.

I take DS 1 & 2 to the sandpit at the local park and it is always a free for all with buckets and spades and small toy cars.

Some of these are obviously abandoned and I see no issue with other children playing with these whilst their owners are otherwise engaged elsewhere in the park. So long as the toys are given back to their rightful owner if requested and not taken away.

I often bring plastic toys for the boys and they end up being used by anyone. I have no issue with it.

However scooters and bikes are different... I guess because they are more expensive and children tend to be more possessive of these... and don't generally share these in playing together like they will with a bucket or spade or toy car.

Those people comparing a child's bucket and spade to a lawn mower, power tools along with childhood play and adult etiquette etc are just plain bloody pathetic.

I don't think kids get that confused by the idea of separate rules for separate places. In pre-school/reception they seem to understand just fine that there are school toys for everyone and toys that belong to a person which they must ask to play with. Surely it's more confusing to allow all 'sharing' then stop certain types of sharing later on.

My 20mo must be slow then, because he does not understand different places, different rules. He doesn't speak much yet so would not understand the concept of 'asking'. He doesn't go to pre-school/reception/nursery or anything else like that - so maybe that's why. It wouldn't mean anything to him that toddler gym and home is different to the park/sand pit. Possessions are not even a 'thing' to him yet.

IMO, leaving 'personal' toys out in communal areas invites them to be played with and if they get broken, you shouldn't have left them out

So if I leave my car in, say... a playground carpark, I am asking for it to be played with. And if it gets broken, then well, that's my fault for leaving it in a communal place?

This sounds like the line of someone who has helped themselves & broken it, not offering to replace it. Kinda like, it's your fault I broke it, because you left temptation in my way.

But they can work out what belongs to the park and what doesn't? well, the slide is hardly likely to belong to a visiting kid, seeing as it is generally cemented into the ground. Bit of a daft analogy, to be honest.

Completely abandoning a bucket and spade for 10 minutes while a toddler stares mournfully at it and can't concentrate on building sandcastles with their bare hands seems a bit mean to me, like deliberately flaunting something they can't play with. If a kid wants to make sandcastles, you can take your own for it to build with, you don't go assuming that someone will let you use theirs.

If you leave a bucket and spade in a sandpit and bugger off for 20 minutes, then you are being incredibly petty to get all uppity about a toddler using them. so if you leave your phone on your picnic blanket, can I feel free to use it to? After all, you have pretty much abandoned it & & it would be incredible petty to not let me, wouldn't it.

That's why i let my children play in other people's gardens and houses. That's exactly the same as a council owned communal park. Except the buckets aren't communal. Just because they are in a communal space, it doesn't mean they suddenly become a communal item.

Ds would freak out if someone tried to use his bucket and spade, but then because of this I suppose I wouldn't leave it lying around.

MrsKoala - I wasn't just replying to you, others have brought up this idea - If he doesn't get that idea, which is fair enough, surely it is better teaching him to ask before taking until he is old enough to tell the difference.

Many people here seem to be advocating take without asking which I was always taught was incredibly rude. I didn't realise times had changed so much that this is now not considered rude (apparently from the majority of comments here). Probably explains all the arguments I have seen around the pool where some children feel it is fine to use someone else's floats/inflatables without permission.

'MrsKoala - I wasn't just replying to you, others have brought up this idea - If he doesn't get that idea, which is fair enough, surely it is better teaching him to ask before taking until he is old enough to tell the difference.'

And i will when he's old enough to speak and there is an 'owner' to ask. But at the moment i can't teach him that it's okay to not ask at toddler gym but not okay at the sandpit. he just wouldn't get it. If i saw an owner i would of course ask on his behalf, and if i see anyone with something i tell him no. i do say this isn't yours (we are also trying to instill this at home - ie 'mummy's make up' 'daddy's glasses' etc - doesn't seem to be making a blind bit of difference tho ) etc. But i would not get a bit annoyed if another child played with his stuff and neither does he...yet! (his sibling arrives in Sept and i am predicting some change then).

YANBU

I never encourage my children to use unsupervised toys in sandpit, but if they rich out for one, I take a look around and if I don't spot any child who looks territorial, I usually let them play. If I do spot a (potential) owner, then I step in and tell them to leave the toy as the other child will get upset. More often than not, the other parent will also step in encouraging the other child to share. It is a good opportunity for both children to learn actually. Usually the problem is resolved by taking a toy and giving something else in return. Win win.

Communal sandpits are great opportunity for all the children to learn:

• If you value your toys, take good care of them and don't leave them lying around
• If you want to play with someone else's toys, you need to ask first and you need to return them immediately, whatever the reason the owner wants them back
• Equally, you have every right to ask for your toys back. Here actually if I see that my children want a toy back "just because" I try to encourage them to leave the toy with the other child especially if he or she is toddler/baby
• We are not going to stop giving our toys to other children just because there are some children who don't share. They have their reasons for not sharing but we will continue to share because on the whole it brings us all so much joy - children make new friends, they get to play with different toys, they spend nice time together etc.

Yes, children don't know different shades of grey, but they need to learn them as they grow and adults need to teach them.

differentnameforthis - all your examples are silly. If a child sees a bucket in a communal sandpit, it is impossible to know whether it 'belongs' to the sandpit or some eejit parent who has wandered off and left it.

I fail to see how it is less 'entitled' to leave your stuff lying around in a mess than it is for a child to use said stuff.

Some of you sound so mean. We are talking about a child using a bucket and spade FFS.

You can't really teach them to do it at 20mo but you can model the right behaviour - it's not ours so we ask.

In an area where the boundaries are blurred and there are some communal toys I think you still ask first, you model asking first, but then what you do if there's no one to ask may be different - it may be that you play anyway and talk about how you will have to give it back as soon as the owner comes back. But you still teach them that asking first is important - this is not mutually exclusive with lots of people generously sharing and swapping toys in a lovely afternoon at the park, you can have both going on at once.

I'm in the YABU as well.
I have have absolutely no problem sharing things when asked to and encourage my Dcs to do the same but helping yourself in son on quite frankly.

• but helping yourself in not on quite frankly.

Two situations where a toddler plays with a spade that isn't theirs - in one the parent asks first on behalf of the toddler, in the other the parent makes no effort to do that 'because sharing is lovely'. In neither of those would I feel annoyed with the toddler, or not want them to play with the spade, but in the second one I'd be deeply irritated by the parent.

It's so tricky - when ds was little we used to just take one spade and one bucket. he used to put one down when using the other and it was just very awkward when other children would try and take them. One mother even commented that he was not very good at sharing despite the fact he was actively using both toys to build a castle.

I never left his stuff in the sandpit when he moved on as I had no desire to track them down when it was time to leave.

OP - your whole stance seems quite aggressive (what's with the jumping off the bridge comment?) - so YABU

If it's not on gorionine, do you think it is ok to go off way out of sight for 20 minutes and leave your stuff lying around? Thereby making a mess.

No, the item does not belong to you so you should leave it. I had those dive sticks in the swimming pool and other children just took them and thought fair game to use. Then they were stolen. So when I replaced them, I put those waterproof name stickers on. Still people though ok to play with and a man was really affronted when I asked him to give the stick with my son's name on it back! I would not ever allow my dc to play with toys belonging to others unless invited to.

You would not have encountered the row over the picture if your dc had left property belonging to others alone. Keep a named bucket in your car if you love sandpits that much.

Although the other family was silly to leave the bucket alone for 20 mins and also a bit strange to shout about a picture on a bucket.

Yabu, you're encouraging them to be little thieves by taking something because it's not being used, and not asking permission.

Once again, to be a thief you have to take something with the intention of permanently depriving the owner of it. Using an abandoned spade in a sandpit and giving it back when or if they come to claim it doesn't even come close.

Tidy up after your children when you're out if you don't want things touched! Or learn not to sweat the small stuff or you'll be heading for an ulcer.

do you think it is ok to go off way out of sight for 20 minutes and leave your stuff lying around? Thereby making a mess.
It might not be ok to leave things lying around in a messy way for 20 minutes 9although there might be a good excuse like taking a child to a busy toilet on the other side of the playground for example) it still does not give a right for people to help themselves with something they clearly do not own.