To stop throwing the balls back over the fence?

[Danielsss]

Those bloody balls. The kids next door constantly play ball games, the balls always go over our fence! We would always get a knock on the door, every 2 minutes. I ended up saying if just throw it back over, it's still as frequent!!! How do I stop this?

Math, if someone has a newborn baby and is breastfeeding would you say they are being unreasonable for not wanting to put the baby down every half an hour to go running around after neighbour kids?

So you didn't see my suggestion that the OP should get a gate or provide a ladder or slats in her fence to allow the children to get their own balls?
The OP is annoyed by the knocking.
Solution: eliminate the need to knock.

The children the OP talked about are being polite by knocking. They may have parents who have told them not to climb into the garden to get their balls.

The OP needs to get a gate.
Or she needs to accept that knocking is done out of politeness
I'm sorry but that's bonkers. The OP either needs to put in a gate at personal expense or be willing to accept people knocking repeatedly to get footballs back?!

Sorry, but that's a crappy attitude. The OP wants to have her cake and eat it. She doesn't live on her own private island.

And to repeat, I have suggested that the OP tells the kids to climb over her fence and get their own balls. She has not mentioned any unusually close attachment to her plants, or any bird baths or gnomes or other tchotchkes she has in her garden.

She can continue to waste her energy fuming about the knocking or she can come up with some practical solution.

As a parent and a gardener and a neighbour (and as someone who is over 50), I would suggest she goes for the kindest option and puts any money spent in pursuit of that option in a category in her budget entitled 'Life Is Too Short'.

Why would anybody in their right mind go out and buy wood to ruin their fence by attempting to make it into a ladder? A fence is not made for climbing on, it is to enclose land. And why would you buy a ladder to enable other people to climb over into your private garden? That is martyrdom of the highest sort.

Fuming about knocking when you could buy a ladder is verging on the definition of madness.
So is indulging in ridiculous thoughts of which this is a good example: Why not suggest that the kid NEEDS to play somewhere where they won't be continually disturbing their neighbour or play a different game?
Seriously, this is first class insanity.

Francis, you are not the OP, and she has not mentioned precious 20 year old plants or espaliered apple trees or any of the other problems you have projected into this discussion.

Danielsss Sat 27-Aug-16 10:26:02
They knock every 2 minutes, that really isn't polite
You are bothered by the knocking.
So suck it up and get a gate.
Or tell them they can climb in and get the balls themselves.

Or fume silently. The choice is yours.

Or perhaps the children should just wait until the OP has the time and inclination to get the ball. Children are not some sort of small God to be pandered to. It does them no harm to learn consideration and that perhaps a game of football should be kept for the park where it doesn't matter as much if your kick goes awry. I don't care if they are going to be the next David Beckham, or if the OP's garden is entirely paved with concrete. She is entitled to say no to the little buggers, especially if they are ringing the doorbell every two minutes. I would be sorely tempted to say more than 'no'...

Oh, and I'm still waiting to see a picture of the ladder on your fence math...

So you didn't see my suggestion that the OP should get a gate or provide a ladder or slats in her fence to allow the children to get their own balls?

Seriously?? You really think mothers are obligated to spend huge amounts of time and money not to mention put them at risk of a lawsuit in order to turn their private gardens into (very dangerous) 24/7 playgrounds for random strangers, purely in order to be permitted to breastfeed their own newborns in peace??

Sorry, I thought you supported mothers. Obviously you don't.

So suck it up and get a gate. Or tell them they can climb in and get the balls themselves. Or fume silently. The choice is yours.

Or, tell the parents to stop them knocking every two minutes (assuming that the parents are not trying to raise obnoxious spoilt brats with zero manners)? Or simply refuse to answer the door, so the children learn a valuable life lesson about taking responsibility for their actions, patience, and not demanding the world hand them whatever they want on a platter?

Throw them back at the end of the day. Seriously. Life is all about having to throw metaphorical balls back over your metaphorical fences in any case.

Sorry, don't believe the every two minutes angle. Just ask them to stop knocking and that you will throw the balls back at your own convenience or at the end of the day , whichever suits you more. They'll learn to be more careful and you can fulfill your neighbourly duties. All this moaning and suggestions to stab the balls is frankly terrifying

Seriously?? You really think mothers are obligated to spend huge amounts of time and money not to mention put them at risk of a lawsuit in order to turn their private gardens into (very dangerous) 24/7 playgrounds for random strangers, purely in order to be permitted to breastfeed their own newborns in peace??

No
I think people should allow neighbour's children into their gardens to get their own balls if they are annoyed by the children knocking to ask for their balls back.

LOL @ 'huge amounts of time and money', lawsuits....

The OP isn't a breastfeeding mother, as far as we know.
Maybe a little less projecting?
I thought this was a thread about a problem the OP wanted to solve.

Clearly it is a place where a lot of people can project all their hostility towards children. My mistake.

simply refuse to answer the door, so the children learn a valuable life lesson about taking responsibility for their actions, patience, and not demanding the world hand them whatever they want on a platter?
Yeah, passive aggression teaches children plenty about how to be a grown up .

Not to mention that teaching them to take responsibility for their actions might involve allowing them to retrieve their own balls.

But I really want to know how we got from a case of children knocking to ask for their ball back to demanding the world hand them whatever they want on a platter?
Get a grip.

mathanxiety is right. All the frothing 'little brats' comments are vile. I'd rather live next to a repeat 'ball over the fence' offender than some of you.

There is rather a lot of projecting going on here and all over MN

You want to solve the problem AND keep a friendly relationship with your neighbours? Speak to them and agree to throwing balls back once a day/week.
You are not that bothered about how you get on with your neighbours? Well, doe whatever you want.

Simple, really.
A very long thread over quite a simple problem imo.

mathanxiety is not right, she's ridiculous.

OP is irritated by the knocking.
The sensible solution is for the kids to stop knocking and accept that she will throw their balls back when it's convenient for her.

Instead, mathanxiety wants her to make a ladder out of her own fence for them to climb into her garden whenever they feel like it.

What the actual hell? I can't people people actually exist who think that is reasonable.

The kids next door to me are CONSTANTLY playing football in the garden, and consequently the balls are always ending up in my garden. I leave the back gate unlocked during the day and have said that they can just come round and get them when they like... They always knock the back gate (I assume their parents have told them to) and are very polite.

My only issue is when balls come flying over while my DDs are playing or if I have friends over for drinks/BBQs in the garden as we've had quite a few accidents - however I know they do try to be more careful.

They're just kids.

You can't people? There are doctors for that sort of thing.

Here's a thought, how about the kids don't play games which involve balls being kicked over the fence several times a day.
Accidents will happen, most reasonable folk get that, but this thread seems full of several balls over the fence daily, that's just not on, and as for building ladder fences, that's pure lunacy

I know I am right. The rational and reasonable solution is always right. Everything else just contributes to the net nastiness of life and it is always wrong.

The OP has not said anything about a flimsy fence, nor has she mentioned precious plants.
She has spoken of her annoyance about the knocking.

The reasonable solution can involve everyone winning - the children climb over and get their own balls, and there is no more knocking. I see from many of the posts here that that would not sit well with many.

I can hear the howls of outrage already -
Why do children deserve to feel they 'win'?
Where is the pathetic emotional satisfaction for the garden owner in a win-win solution?

Any solution that might making the children hang around all day doing nothing, watching TV, or playing X box if their football goes in at ten past nine in the morning is just vindictive, standing on your rights, and making the children feel powerless.

That is not a good model of adult behaviour.

Give as an example Brillo

Why Jonso, are you hard of thinking?
I'm chuckling at the ladder fences as opposed to telling the kids to play another game, keep the ball low etc.
Ladder fences

Go on Brillo do it

telling the kids to play another game, keep the ball low etc.

There really are some dim suggestions here.

She doesn't want peace and quiet in her garden, Francis.

She wants the kids to stop knocking.

Solution: allow the children to climb the fence.
Associated with that - make it possible for the children to climb the fence (ladder or slats).
Or here's another idea - make a pet flap in the fence big enough for a large dog (assuming there is no large or small dog in either garden) and the children could squirm through that to get their balls. It would probably cost about £100,000 though

Your ten foot high solution is just silly.
A high fence like that would surely shade the precious sun-loving plants.

Swingball, slide, swing, bowls, chalks, sandpit, gardening, paddling pool.
None involve disturbing the neighbours.

I rather fancy that if the children wanted to play swingball they would already spend all day every day playing swingball.

Are you really suggesting that all ball games are equal and equivalent?

Are all TV shows equal and equivalent?
All board games? You lose all the pieces from your Scrabble game but don't worry, you can play Candyland.