WIBU in making this child cry?!

[ILoveFlumps]

We have a new build house, which has shingles on the front garden next to the driveway.
I went out of my front door to put some rubbish in the bin and find a man with his toddler son playing on the shingles. I was a bit confused and politely said “excuse me, would you mind not doing that on my front garden?”. The man then replied “he’s just a child who is playing”. I replied “but it’s my property”
He then picked up his child who then started crying and as he was walking away he said to me “are you happy now, you made him cry?”
I’m a bit taken aback! Was I wrong to tell them to stop playing in my front garden?!

I guess, the harm, to me, is that you might be allowing your child and moseying on after her to retrieve said child, once she's met your threshold for what should be tolerated by others, on to the property of people who aren't as sanguine as you about the technicalities of privacy and boundaries. So you might be pissing them off, making them feel anxious and as if their privacy has been invaded, which personally I'd hate to make someone feel, in their own home. Or they might be right nasty bastards, who give you a gobful, or worse, and exposing your child to an ugly incident.

This is just a bit too moany for me now.

I’m pouring myself a whisky and starting the weekend. Hope it’s a good one (weekend that is, whisky’s a dead cert).

Happy boundaries y’all!

😉

I'm having a vino, since it's Friday. Bottoms up, and happy boundaries!

@steppingcarefully - it's a forum, people write quickly, just stay calm and stop making so many assumptions. With parents 99% of all the reminding happens BEFORE the toddler does the thing, we don't wait for toddlers to step in dog poo before we say to watch out. Once a toddler knows enough about rules for staying close and no going in the road, they do not hold hands every moment of walking nor scootering; that's just really silly and you'd barely get anywhere if you tried that. Toddlers don't need to hold hands to be reminded not to pick up litter, not to walk in dog poo, wait by the road and cross only when holding hands, not to walk in someone else's drive, not to pull flowers off someone's bush, not to close everyone's gate and all the thousand other things a toddler is learning they can't do by having those walks every day. While learning that they can pick up sticks, sniff flowers, stop to look at a worm or snail, play "can you see" games, give space to people passing, name car colours, talk to elderly / neighbours / dog walkers and all the thousand other things a toddler is learning they CAN do by having those walks every day.

YANBU at all. That man sounds really weird and entitled.

Just ignore the more batshit "You should have bought the woman who shouted at you a creme egg" type replies. There's always one (or two)!

@Unchartedsea

It’s so uptight on this thread! 😬 Think the intensity of the pandemic is getting to some folk. Understandably.

I think some folk are commenting on my posts without reading them properly, or understanding them.

Yes, the father didn’t handle it well.
No, it’s not ok to let your kids play on other folks property.
Yes, being a parent is tough and sometimes we will risk “breaking the rules” because we have had a shit day and welcome a few moments of calm and happiness.
No, I don’t have a halo.

And it’s NOT BONKERS to be approachable and friendly, even if other aren’t being perfect parents or playing with your stones.

What a miserable lot some of the posters are!!
🙄

Nah. The majority of posters are sensible and normal.

@Springersrock

I caught a mum and child feeding my horse the other day, despite the huge signs asking people not to.

Mum gave me a mouthful as her child wanted to give the horses a treat and I would make her cry and didn’t really understand why I didn’t give a shit whether her child cried or not

😳😳 Some people are unbelievable!

@Springersrock it's unbelievable people feel they are entitled to do things like this. There was a horse near me recently who died because someone fed it some carrots and it didn't have the teeth required to eat it so choked.

I can't believe people think it's ok for someone to come right up their garden for their child to play on their drive. I guess they are the sort of people who think nothing of going into someone else's garden to play on the swing etc (a post I read a year or so ago) I mean, if your going to share, you need to share everything.
The op was polite, the man was aggressive, no doubt because someone called him up on his parenting.