Was DH unreasonable to ask the neighbour's kids

[differenttoyou]

to go inside at 9.40 this morning. There were 3 of them and they'd been outside on their trampoline (which buts right up to the fence) since 8.00 am singing at the top of their voices. Eventually we couldn't take it any longer as they started to sing a song from Frozen and they ramped up the volume until they were virtually screaming. DH called over the fence and asked them to go and sing inside.

Sheesh some people on here. Cant remember who said it but somebody wrote that if their children had been sent in by the neighbour for being noisy then they would be making more noise and hoovering at 7am - seriously?? Are you 14?? Get a fucking grip.

I don't think the DH was BU. Id be mortified if my children where making that much noise and the neighbour needed to have words, and id be apologising for not dealing with it myself. I certainly wouldn't be encouraging them to do it more and joining in, but then I'm not a cunt.

Really?

So you wouldn't be a bit miffed if, at 9.40, the man next door stopped them from playing in their own back garden?

After all, he had plenty of opportunity to complain when it was actually too early!

From their point of view, their dc come in at that time and said "the man next door shouted to us to stop playing in the garden". Out of nowhere.

I think people would be more affronted than they're letting on!

oh, the poor little lambs, after 90 minutes of noisy, couldn't-give-a-stuff-about-anyone-else play in the garden, they get asked to take it inside by a neighbour. Asked, you note, not made - how exactly did he make them do anything? And he said it was about the singing, not anything else.

But I guess their creative spirit has been fucked forever by this horrid man. Poor little mites, how will they ever get over it.

And 6.15 this morning? I would go round and have a word, their parents clearly either couldn't give a shit about the neighbours or are oblivious.

Sheesh, this thread.

I would welcome a neighbor telling my children they were being noisy. Children pay particular attention when the message is coming from someone other than their parents.

So, children need to learn to shut the fuck up but adults aren't required to use basic manners?

Righto!

How do any of you know what the neighbours think? So far I haven't spoken to them but I don't actually think that there will be a problem when I do. They are nice people and I'm sure that they just didn't realise how the sound carries. I'm not anticipating falling out with them. They had visitors from abroad so an extra child was there. In that case fully understand why the kids were outside. I didn't ask for them to go inside, I just wanted them to tone it down a bit and had I got there first, that is what I would have asked them to do.

Once again, people are extrapolating. I haven't said that the neighbours were miffed, I haven't said that we never expect the kids to be out there. All I asked was whether people think that DH was unreasonable in the way he handled it. I thought that he was, he doesn't. No standoffs with the neighbours, no hard feelings etc.

6:15?! Bloody hell I would NOT be impressed with that!

And at 9:40 on a Sunday morning they would have woken the whole house up - me and the kids - and that would go down like a lead balloon.

YANBU OP.

I don't know why people have decided your DH was "aggressive"! Projecting much?

I'm not entirely sure that the actual time is particularly relevant, let's not forget that this had being going on for an hour and a half.

I'd have cracked by then. The sound of children playing outside is lovely, I adore children, and it's such a happy, joyous sound. But screaming out at the top of their voices for an hour and a half, THAT'S the unreasonable part.

The parents should have put a stop to it. They were unconcerned enough about their neighbours to not bother doing so; I doubt very much asking them nicely would have made any difference.

Rock and a hard place, but I too would have told them to pipe down.

My kids wouldn't be singing Disney songs loudly because I couldn't stand it on my own behalf, never mind the neighbours'. It's bang out of order to let kids make that level of noise, bang out of order to release them into the garden to play noisily at 8am on a Sunday in a built up neighbourhood and DH seems to have done at 9.40am what he'd held off from doing for 1hr 40, until he finally cracked. I've every sympathy myself - why are kids these days supposed to be immune from learning consideration? Mind you the parents here seem selfish buggers, so I suppose the kids are heading the same way.

I think after an hour and a half of singing, it is perfectly reasonable to ask them the be quiet. Of course children are allowed to have fun but they aren't always aware when what they are doing is disturbing others and if their parents aren't going to step in, you have every right to appeal to them directly. In a polite and measured way, of course.

I also reckon the reason the neighbours kids were out at 6.15 this morning is because OPs DH told them to go indoors at 9.40 on the Sunday cos that's the sort of reaction you would have got from me

I think you are making a big assumption that the neighbours aren't miffed. Tbh when you posted that they were out at 6.15 this morning I thought they were dealing with it in a passive aggressive way and you might be facing many more early morning concerts.
I think you Dh was out of order and one of you should have at some point in the day called next door to explain. So far all the neighbours know for sure is that the grumpy man next door shouted at their kids at 9.40am for singing in their own garden :( You don't know if they know it was for 1 1/2hrs or at what volume as you posted they may not have heard due to room arrangements.

Ah they rent. The plebs! That explains everything. Perhaps you could buy them out? Or maybe offer £10k to the landlord for a strategic strip of their garden and then put landmines in it, to stop the kids going outside.

(We've been renting same house for seven going on eight years.)

And yes, your renting scum neighbours now hate you, because you can bet they know that you told their kids to leave their own temporarily rented garden which they use by the grace of God, and will probably be consulting their 'chav handbook' for more ways to annoy you.

But why? Would you really let your children scream and shout in the garden at 6.15am - I'm really hoping you are actually joking.

It's unreasonable and intrusive to allow your children to do tha for that length of time at ANY time of the day. Children need boundaries, they need to learn what is, and isn't, acceptable. Being allowed to scream for an hour and a half is so far beyond acceptable that I'm at a loss to understand why someone would object to their children being told to STFU. And they weren't, they were just asked to take the singing inside.

So, children need to learn to shut the fuck up but adults aren't required to use basic manners?

haven't seen anyone suggest that here - what is being suggested is that children (and their parents) learn some consideration for their neighbours, and were asked (how is asking not manners??) to take their singing indoors after it had been going on for an unreasonable amount of time, at an unreasonable time of day. Yes, they were in their own garden, but the noise they were making travelled, so not at all unmannerly to make that point. Gosh, can't believe all of that needs explaining!

Perhaps you ought to be the one moving to the backside of nowhere if you can't cope with the basic manners needed to get along with your neighbours.

(FWIW, we had neighbours (pre-DD) who had their toddlers out in the garden at 7am every fucking day. I never said anything to them, even though I got totally fed up with being woken up at that time every bloody weekend. I asked some of the parents at work if I was being U in getting pissed off about it, and no-one thought I was, they all kept their kids in, or took them to the park, until a more reasonable hour, like 9. Thank God for real life, eh.)

Jesus, the OP has already said about six times that the ONLY reason why she mentioned renting/owning is because someone suggested she moved. She responded that they owned, but the neighbours rented and would probably only be there for a couple more years.

Besides, there's nothing wrong with renting. I've rented, loads of people rent, in many countries it's unusual to own your own home.

Can we keep off the 'OOOooh you OWN and they are renting SCUM', please. It's totally irrelevant, and NOT what the OP said or implied.

Actually no, I probably wouldn't have involved my DC, I would have gone out there myself with my strimmer!!

Childrens play often involves shouting at 9.40 is NOT early.

I get up at 6am every day. Sometimes I sing when I put the washing on the line before 7am. It's daytime and it's my garden.

stratter do you seriously think people, adults or DC, shouldn't be able to sing in their own garden?

What a joyless world that would be.

No of course I don't, but there's a world of difference between you singing whilst hanging your washing out, and kids screaming out songs at the top of their voices for well over an hour.

Not at all comparable. And everyone needs to learn consideration. Everyone.

I still say 09.40 is not early for anyone to be having fun in their garden and making noise.

I think we will have to agree to disagree.

Ok - mornin' - quite possibly the parents are MNetters and deliberately sent them out at 6:15am this morning! If they've lived there a year and this isn't a regular occurrence - just high jinx because their friend from abroad is here. Let it go for now or DH will get known as the local Victor Meldrew and you his long-suffering tight-lipped missus. If it really is unbearably often then DH must get an adult fitness trampoline and sing Dancing Queen really loudly at 5am. Hopefully he won't have to sing it too many times before someone tells him to take it inside.

Perhaps you ought to be the one moving to the backside of nowhere if you can't cope with the basic manners needed to get along with your neighbours

Are you mixing me up with someone else because I never mentioned anyone moving?

Perhaps if you weren't so busy sneering about the "poor little lambs" and their "creativity" you'd have picked up on that.

Honestly, the competitive children-hating on MN is ridiculous sometimes.

Just so we're clear I have never said the OP or her DH were U for being annoyed by the noise. I said he should have asked them to be quiet, not asked them to leave their own garden.

I can't believe that all needs explaining either so we're in the same boat, huh?

fair enough, that shouldn't have been aimed at you personally. But I don't agree with what you said at all, what a ludicrous extrapolation.

I don't hate children. But I'm not best pleased about inconsiderate people (whatever their age), which is what these children were being - not if they'd started at 9.40, but they didn't - they started at 8 and got progressively louder. At 9.40 they'd had 90 minutes of fun so it's hardly going to kill them to either pipe down or take their singing inside and irritate the shit out of their parents instead.

Just because you (not your personally) are in your garden, doesn't mean your noise is contained in your garden, does it? And when did asking someone to do something become such an awful thing to do? He didn't tell them, or order them, he asked. What a bastard.

recharging!!!

I think that vision will stay with me all day!! For some reason in my mind the DH is lycra clad.

Anyway, thanks for giving me something to laugh about on my way to meet my new boss (scary)

Oh no, I totally agree with you that 9.40am is plenty late enough.

I'm not so sure I'd be happy with it at 8am, though. But I think it's the volume of it here, rather than the times - which we've all got hung up on. I'd be going insane if I'd had an hour and a half of top of the voice screeching at any time of the day. It's simply unreasonable, and the parents should have put a stop to it.