To tell my friend to fuck off and never speak to her again?

[Mammanat222]

Will try to be brief.

Friend came round this morning to see our new place. We moved in a week ago.

It's got brand new [cream] carpets through-out.

As anyone in London can testify today was wet and there has been plenty of rain in recent days.

We are strictly shoes off at the moment, due to aforementioned carpet and I know a lot of people disagree with this in principle but lets not concentrate on that.

Friend turns up with her 3 year old son, he is in his rain stuff including wellies as is she. I greet them in hallway and tell them to take shoes off. Nothing rude or argumentative and friend knows I have had carpet put in, she also knows how much it bloody cost.

Friend obliges and takes her boots off but says "it took me forever to get him dressed today can I leave his boots on and give them a wipe", I politely say he needs to take them off to which I get greeted with a sigh but still she doesn't make any moves to take the boots off. She then says "look you know how hard it is for me to get him dressed, can we just not pop up and I'll keep him in kitchen"

I then try to speak to child directly and cajole him to take his boots off (think along the lines of "take your boots off sweetie and you can go up to see the cat and J's bedroom with all his toys") to which my friend says - words to the effect of 'do you know what we'll leave coming up today, I've told you twice that I am not taking his boots off' and she then proceeded to put her boots back on, frogmarch her child out of the door whilst muttering 'good luck Hyacinth with your two kids and cream carpet'

Now this is a friend I have know for almost 20 years, someone who is normally the kindest, sweetest person and her behaviour was very out of character.

I waited for an apology and it never arrived so an hour later I messaged to see if she was OK and ask what was going on to which I got a shitty reply which was "I am fine, I just don't want my son to come and play in a house full of rules and regulations, good luck if you think your kids are never going to mess your carpet up"

I replied and explained that it might seem over zealous but the carpet is just 10 days old and I not happy for dirty wellies to be worn.

Friend then replied and said she was out having some un-regulated fun with her son and she would contact me when she had calmed down.

What the actual fuck. I turned my phone off as I didn't trust myself to reply.

Where can I go with this

In all our years of friendship I've never had anything like this with her?

Agree with thesaurusgirl. Muddy wellies always off but brand new carpet, even more so.

And the comment at the end is silly.

I reckon she had just spend an age wrestling a screaming three year old into clothes and was very stressed, didn't want to repeat the performance in front of you and so behaved like a bit of a fool. If you've been friends for twenty years you will hopefully be able to laugh about it all soon.

Who on earth wears wellies indoors? We don't even do that at our community garden!

I can't imagine not taking wellies off myself and all children the moment I got through the door of any house, new carpets or not - carpets or not, for that matter.

YANBU, and her child appears to need practice in having his shoes taken on and off anyway.

I just can't imagine giving up a friendship of 20 years over some bloody carpets. My friends and I and our kids have thrown food, wine, tea and all sorts over each other's homes for years and we're all quite into interiors, furniture, design etc. Other people's company is more important than possessions.

She was clearly stressed out with a difficult 3 year old - give her a break.

Ahh! Crossed post. Differing parenting styles. It seems this has been playing on her mind a while?!

YANBU: this flat was shoes-off before DS and while he was a child, and still is now he has grown up and moved out. No exceptions. Our home, our rules.

for BalloonSlayer!

(That's meant to be 'Cheers, brilliant!' btw)

I'm always bamboozled by the amount of people on MN who are so ready to end friendships over relatively minor fallouts. It seems so teenage. Friendships are like any relationships, they have their rough and smooth moments.

Surely if you've had a 20 year friendship it means you value the relationship between you both?

She was rude but this can be fixed, don't Leave The B.

Don't send that response below. Just cool off for a few days.

We have shoes off in general, though if shoes are clean I don't insist on it - we just prefer it. I hate the idea of dirty shoes that have been walking around outside on pavements on my carpets - I go barefot at home so to me shoes oon seems odd.

I find far more people remove shes than don;'t, without any at all though.

And it is NEVER okay, imo, to walk around soemone else's house in boots and wellies!

Your friend has behaved like an absolute prick. Please do not contact her, wait until she makes the first move. You've done nothing wrong.

I think SolomanDaisy is right, she probably had a hard morning with a threenager, then took it out on you.
I wouldn't tell her to fuck off and never speak to her again, thats just a tad extra.

I would give her a call / txt tomorrow asking her if she is ok and go from there.

Even in a shoes-on house, wellies come off at the door (even in posh shoes-on houses - I've been in a few).

The texts would bother me more, tbh. It sounds to me as if your friend is very stressed about something else and another fight with her 3 yr old was one fight too many.

As squoosh says, this can be fixed.

This is just down to simple manners. If you visit somebody else's home and they ask you to remove shoes (doesn't happen in my house but not an unreasonable request for wet willies imo) then you do it. If there is a genuine reason why you can't or won't then you explain it politely and offer to leave, so giving your host the final decision. You do not try to impose your will, or your spoilt child's will, on others

balloonslayer has it spot on

I wonder...is she jealous/resentful of your new house maybe?

Beliefs about shoes on/off apart, it does seem there was more to this exchange than meets the eye. Is she struggling with this child currently? Does he display any traits that would make it very, very hard for her to persuade him to take wellies off (or put them on in the first place?). She was rude, and unreasonable, and if I were you my feelings would be hurt (although I really wouldn't even attempt cream carpets with children). But as it's a friendship you value I'd be inclined to give it a day or two and then text again and say that you'd like to draw a line under the whole wellies/carpets incident but maybe you could meet on neutral territory as you still value her firendship? Hopefully that would be enough of an olive branch that she might tell you what's really going on and making her snap over a toddler/cream carpet moment.

'It is odd that someone up thread asks if my friend is TTC as the first thing she said when I told her I was pregnant was "oh I wish I was pregnant" but no they aren't TTC as friend's partner doesn't want any more kids mainly due to how "hard" he finds their current child.'

So she's having a hard time with her kid and is unlikely to have another longed for child?

Not excusing her behaviour but do you think she's stressed?

Yanbu, your house your rules! But a cream carpet with kids, are you mad!

The Hyacinth thing made me laugh, that's actually very quick of her and funny. I know she didn't say it in a funny way, she wanted to be rude but it would made me laugh a lot if anyone called me that .

Yabu to have cream carpets, they're a flaming nightmare. Especially when you have children but even if you didn't! The amount of tiptoeing you will have to do to ensure stains don't happen is untrue. My nan has a cream carpet in her living room and subsequently won't let anyone in there, including herself! She's locked the door and only goes in there to hoover it and clean her lladro... Everyone sits in the dining room which she's put a sofa and the TV in. The cream bloody carpet is like a shrine . Couldn't handle it... Wood flooring all the way for me.

Maybe your friends toddler is going through a difficult phase of not wanting to get dressed and she knew if the wellies came off there'd be an almighty tantrum upon leaving and she'd really struggle to get them back on? She did offer to wipe them tbf, if they were cleaned properly then they shouldn't really cause any stains... Either way it's not worth ending a 20 year friendship over. And you do need the good luck wishes with cream carpets .

a) colour carpet doesn't matter - if you have wet wellies on, surely its not beyond the realms of acceptability to need to take them off in someone's house

b) she needs to be better at getting her child dressed then if the reason she can't take them off is because its hard to get them on. Please.

We are a shoes off house but don't expect guests to do so. Wet wellies though I'd be shocked if someone thought it was ok to walk around in those, even in the kitchen.

Nobody else's business why you picked cream carpets. Yes they are hard to maintain, but you do what you can to keep them clean, i.e no shoes!

She was ridiculous, yanbu!

YANBU

I think she is jealous that you're having a 2nd child and she isn't. She was having a crappy day and you asking to take her DCs was the final straw.

Yanbu op.

Regardless of the carpet colour if mud is going to get on my new carpet it will be by me or my dc not someone else's just because they couldn't be arsed take their kids wellies off.
I have a lovely friend who has cream carpets throughout her new build house and three dc under 10 she has a shoes off at the door policy and if her dc have been running bare foot in the garden she makes them wash their feet before they are allowed on the carpets. I find it a bit ott but she's a fab mum and it's her house so I totally respect that.

Your friend was rude.