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?

Francis, I love swingball, good idea, but not sure it would work as the only game allowed- not enough skill and not physically demanding enough. Ah, it takes me back though, used to love swingball, just think nothing beats a good kickabout/ cricket/rounders/table tennis/catch. Don't know the size of the balls that land in the OP's garden.

I daresay it would be cheaper to buy the ladder than erect a slide, a swing and a sandpit. Chalks and gardening? Yawn

I don't believe it's every two minutes unless they have several balls and a real system going.

Or use a trampoline!

Cricket balls are lethal and I also remember the heavy hockey balls we used to have at senior school causing many injuries- thank goodness OP doesn't have those flying over!

We have a ball problem. The out-of-control boy behind us and his out of control teen brother constantly kick their balls in our garden then scale our 6ft fence, traumatise our bunny and give no fucks retrieving it.
Not just balls, water fights with water in plastic bags have ended with our garden covered in broken bags and me giving them a gobful.
This 6year old boy stands on his shed and tells our kids and everyone elses to fuck off you cunts, gets his willy out, pees in others gardens, on peoples dogs and throws chocolate into gardens to poison our dog and neighbours (the same dog he pees on).
So, we have a garden full of balls which we have given up throwing back. Our side fence (and theirs) backs onto a huge big park with swings and toys so no excuse for fuckin balls bouncing off our windows/kids/pets.

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

Math, I have ten foot high concrete walls round the back of mine. I'd love to hear your suggestion as to how to quickly, cheaply and safely find a way for a small child to climb a ten foot concrete wall!

The OP isn't a breastfeeding mother, as far as we know. Maybe a little less projecting?

You seem awfully keen to accuse everyone of projecting and having agendas, I've noticed this on a lot of threads. What exactly are you accusing me of projecting? I genuinely can't figure out if you think I'm a child-hater or the new mother.

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.

Okay you're either a literal sociopath or a bored troll.

The rational and reasonable solution is to tell the kids or the parents that balls will be returned once a day. Not a load of hysterical blather about McGyvering fences with random bits of wood and turning your private garden into a public playground just so kids won't have to suffer the torture of going an few hours without a ball.

Blimey there are some miserable sods on this thread. Do people really damage kids' balls? Or even advocate it?

Can't see why people insist on poisoning their lives with unnecessary passive aggressiveness. Unless you are too old or have severe back problems, why don't you simply throw the balls back.
Accidents happen. Kids don't do it on purpose. Are they destroying your priceless orchids, hurting your dog? If not, why start a battle that's completely useless?

What is dim about teaching your child to be considerate of others?

Nothing!
So throw the balls back, or tell the children they don't have to mope around all day waiting for you to get tired of making them wait, and invite them to climb in or climb through (via a flap) and get them instead. You can point out any plants you want them to steer clear of.

This would be the considerate thing to do. It would also model good sense to them.

Or you can sit on your high horse, indulge your feelings of being put-upon, and waste your energy being angry and dreaming up alternatives to football for these children who clearly love football.

Littleprincesssara, FYI - this is projection: 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?
Your comment has nothing whatsoever to do with any details the OP has mentioned. If it doesn't have any relation to your own current situation why would you even bring it up? Flinging in hypotheticals of that sort seems to me to be the choice of someone with a massive bee in her bonnet about other people's children, an out of control feeling of resentment, and a desire to vent.

Others are clearly having the same problem, conflating their own experiences of feral children and teens with children whose only crime is to knock to ask for their balls back.

I would like to know how we get from the concept of a garden where children may quickly retrieve a ball to 'public playground'. Hysterical much?

I think mathanxiety is taking the piss.

I don't think anyone actually believes going out and converting your fence into a ladder, or building a gate, is a more sensible option than teaching a child some patience.

So, Math, you are basically advocating that everyone should spend all day running backwards and forwards to throw balls back to children who, for whatever reason, repeatedly get the balls into your garden. Do you know, oddly enough, I work, therefore I am not at home all day. Nor do I want, when I come in after 8 hours on my feet, to go at once and do a trawl around the garden looking for any balls that might have come over during my absence. I do not want a random child, or even the nice child next door (with a lovely sensible mummy) coming into the garden when I am not there. It is my garden, not anyone else's, and I don't want the gate left standing open, or my plants (yes, I am precious about them) being accidentally trampled upon by an uncoordinated child.

I am not being passive aggressive towards this child. I am flattered that she wants to get attention from me when I am home, but I also have a life. I have raised my children and do you know what? They were taught that they have to have patience and didn't get what they wanted the moment they wanted it. They have both turned into considerate adults who understand that 'now' might not be suitable for everyone.

By the way, I am still waiting to see your ladder fence. Since you keep going on about this, I am dying to see your one, since you obviously have built it to keep the neighbourhood kids happy.

Math - I don't have children and I don't know anyone near me who has children. None of my neighbours have children. There are no children living in my (central London) neighbourhood at all. I love children dearly (worked with kids for years) but this is all 100% hypothetical to me.

The reason I brought up breastfeeding is because you've been extremely, extremely zealous about breastfeeding. I was curious how your limited black and white worldview would respond to a hypothetical situation that is not black and white.

Math, still waiting for an answer as to how I hypothetically would install a gate or make climbable my 10ft concrete walls?

And yes, your insistence that people should install gates (at their own expense) and give strange kids permission to come into their garden whenever they want does essentially turn their garden into a public playground.

My old home used to have a swimming pool - it's not only extremely dangerous for kids to be unsupervised around a pool, it's also illegal in my area to have an unsecured pool.

While I'm not advocating the fence at all, I agree with maths that you can simply throw the ball back, end of story. That doesn't mean that you have to patrol the garden like a labrador waiting for the ball but simply throw it back. It's what we do, it's what our neighbours do, sometimes even checking with the neighbours that the ball is theirs. It's normal and it I have never seen it negatively impact my dignity or self-esteem.

10 ft concrete walls? I someone posting from prison?

Leave Math alone. She was responding to the nasty responses on this thread- I am surprised so many of you are rounding on her as opposed to the truly mean spirited intolerant posters on here.

littleprincess- a public playground? You are funny.

I don't mnd the balls comng over, it is the constant banging of them against the fence when they play football and bouncing on the patio when they play basketball. The noise is awful. I can't sit in the garden when they are out there.