AIBU to not let a random child walk on my garden wall?

[CockysGirl]

Just got in from work and was parking on my drive and a grandparent with a small child (2-3 years old) is lifting them up so that they can walk along my garden wall. They see me standing watching and say "DGC wants to walk on your wall, you don't mind do you?" So I replied, "I'd rather they didn't, it is a tall wall with lots of rose bushes next to it so they may get hurt and anyway, it is my private property" So the grandparent glared at me and huffed loudly and said "the nasty lady won't let you walk on her wall" and proceeded to make a big fuss about lifting DGC off the wall again! AIBU to not want kids walking on my garden wall?

Thing is, I am assuming that you do not spend your life hanging about in your front garden, so if there is a risk from plants etc., you need to put up a clear sign stating this.

Well, I seem to really have divided opinion here but I stand by my OP in that i would prefer people not to walk on my front wall both from a safety POV and that my roses could hurt them or be damaged by them, plus it is my private property. The daft thing is that there is a big park just round the corner which has a lovely playground, a trim trail and some great safe walls for little ones to walk on!

@Kokeshi123 There is only a 'risk from plants' if you happen to be walking along the top of my wall 🙄

How miserable. Have they parked outside your house as well?

You are within your rights to chase her off.

However it does tell me something about the type of person you are and so the grandparent’s reaction seems fair enough also.

I was split. I’ve now read that the wall is 4 foot high. I have more sympathy with you op. I was imagining something lower. (Apols for careless reading).

Spent A crazy amount of my childhood climbing a tree with friends to get onto 6 foot wall running along it and jumping from the end. Over and over. But that was in my garden and when smaller my parents didn’t know - couldn’t see. Only recently admitted to my aged (now late) ma quite how young I did this. It just went into her full bank of ‘children stuff’. No way would I have been allowed if known about.

The daft thing is that there is a big park just round the corner which has a lovely playground, a trim trail and some great safe walls for little ones to walk on Presumably that's often where they're headed to, or coming back from, when they walk on your wall.

Gosh - first time seeing a poll with >1000 responses that was split exactly 50-50!

CockysGirl you were yanbu. I planted some conifers close to my wall and they've grown big enough to prevent any kids walking on it to destroy it further. That must make me a right miserable fucker but do I care? Not at all! Want to walk and climb on things? Piss off to the park or a soft play centre!

I wouldn’t have called you a ‘nasty lady’ and made you the villain of the piece, but as the homeowner I wouldn’t have said anything either.
There’s a wall near my parents’ house that 3 generations of the family have walked along, so I’m ok with wall walking.

I am shocked at how many people think this is OK. It's not your wall. That's it.
It's not being miserable or mean , it's not your property. Just parent your child and say no

I'm thinking this is one of those weird only on MN things, cos in reality I don't know anyone who think it's acceptable to use someone else's property as if it were their own.

Yanbu and just because a lot of posters were allowed to as children doesn't make it ok. If the child falls or injures themselves who is responsible? I often see a woman on my way to taking dd to preschool allow her ds to do this. He looks about 2. My ds who is the same age always wants to copy him, last time I said no, you might hurt yourself. The little boy lost his footing and landed on his face, he bit through his lip and there was blood everywhere. Poor mite was very shooken up and I stopped to give his mum some wipes she could use to clean him up. Owner came out and checked on the little boy and then gave the mum a telling off for being so stupid. I couldn't help but think it was deserved on the mums part.

There is also an element of damaging someone else's property.

In reality I don't know anybody who minds kids climbing on their wall.

Well I'm glad my reality is knowing people that respect others property and know appropriate boundaries, and teach their children to do the same.

There used to be a lady like you on the way to my kids school, except it was a bank not a wall the other side of her hedge. It was the ONLY 40 ft where my disabled son could let go of my hand and walk along the wall free like the other kids. So the only stretch I could hitch my trousers up/blow my nose/watch him inflate with the joy of it....joyless horrid owner put a stop to it. So then we had the upset of not being able to walk in the wall every morning.

You could have been kind. You weren’t.

Couldn't care less. Lots of children walk along our wall at the front and it never occurred to me to say no. I'm sure the grandparent would have been holding their hands so it's unlikely they would fall.

YANBU in my opinion.

I have roses behind my front wall too, and once saw a dad bending the flowers back (snapping a couple in the process) so they weren't in the way of his toddler walking on my wall.

I went out and asked why, and he said so she wouldn't hurt herself on the thorns. I told him that there was no chance of her hurting herself if she was walking on the floor, and he swore at me and told me to get a life.

He'd literally just snapped the heads off some of the most beautiful roses I'd ever managed to grow ffs, and when I told him that he said oh right I was only trying to bend them the other way. Idiot.

@Kokeshi123 Are you actually joking?? There is no risk at all unless someone is trespassing on her property!

Amazing how many people would clamber on other people's property. It wouldn't occur to me to do it, let alone to complain that it's my right. I'm starting to see why my mum is so paranoid 😂

All those calling the home owner a killjoy etc should remember that since the ambulance-chasing breed of lawyers came into existance, parents, in particular, have become very keen to sue for a quick buck. If your child falls over and breaks an arm in your care it's an accident, if it happens in school it's a golden egg of opportunity. I'm afraid that it's the fault of the litigious society in which we live. Someone was sued because a passere-by slipped on a small piece of gravel that had escaped their drive.

A nation divided!

This sounds like the perfect topic for the next referendum!

Grandparent was rude, but yabu, it's one of life's pleasures for a little one to walk along walls, they are hardly going to damage it.
Although I agree on the dry wall remark, they can be damaged.

sunshine angel
What a shame but not surprising. It’s the logical consequence of having no respect for other people’s property.

It came up on loose women a few years ago and Coleen Nolan proudly stated how she
Had abused a woman for asking her kid to stop walking on their wall. ‘How dare she tell my kid what to do etc’

It is your right to refuse, but it does make you miserable, sorry. If it was a teenager then fair enough, but a little toddler? You are a grinch!