Children in Street

[Justmeandmyboy90]

A little bit of background before I begin, I live in a small street, there are a number of children ranging from newborn to teenager, I also have a child who plays outside from time to time, but always supervised.
I do love them all being out playing and I am friendly with my neighbours, but recently, there has been a number of occasions where the ball they have been playing with in the street has been kicked in the garden and has hit the car, etc… I have seen this happen to several gardens/cars within the street.
I find this really disrespectful and im feeling really anxious because I don’t want to be one of those people and I don’t want to upset anyone but I draw the line at the ball being bounced off my car and I would not allow this if my child was a part of it.
i also spend a lot of time on my garden, it’s a hobby, my neighbours are well aware of this as they always comment, I enjoy looking after the plants etc which are just being trampled on as the kids retrieve their ball.
am I being unreasonable or should I have a word?

I lived in a cult de sac growing up. It was half families with kids and half empty nesters/widows/widowers

There were 3 people in the street that had issues with us playing

1. Absolutely mental couple who's kid was about 5years older than me who would literally cause a scene about you being any where near there house let alone a ball going in the garden
2. The old lady next door who, if your ball went in her garden, was likely to hex you with some sort of spell from ten steps away.
3. my stepdad if the ball hit his car.

All 3 were aggravated at various times. We played out EVERY DAY (this was the 90s). I was and still am more scared about my stepdads car getting hit with anything than almost anything else in the world.

Balls in gardens happen. You'll lose a few shrubs, the kids hopefully won't put a window through - it was single glazed, an accident - and hopefully won't fall through your garage roof playing hide and seek....I still say it was the best hiding place ever, which was agreed by the neighbour who had to come rescue me from the inside of their garage and, some twenty years later, by my stepdad who i believe paid for a new roof while out of work (still feel guilty) 👀👀👀

They were the best days, let the kids play 😂😂

Meh. I can’t see a football that is light enough for a child to kick is really going to hit your car with enough force to cause any major damage. I think you need to unclench and appreciate that the kids are able to play on the street and not cooped up on screens all day.

Your car will survive. Re your garden, either plant some tougher shrubs and save your flowers for your back garden, or put up a taller fence/hedge. Children playing is more important. Oh, and your child will benefit from this community as they get older and you unclench about unsupervised play.

I would go out and speak to the kids. Tell them it's lovely to see you all out here playing now the weather is nice. Can you please just watch the ball around the cars & if the ball goes over the fence, give me a shout & I'll throw it back.

Totally agree that playing is important, but should we not also be learning about respect whilst doing so?

Regardless of whether the ball will damage my car or if I should move plants to accommodate their wishes to play, it’s not acceptable

Behaving in this way would not have been tolerated by my own parents or neighbours while I was growing up and I still managed to have a lot of fun, I just knew not to damage other peoples belongings.

I was a kid in the 70s and 80s. The streets where our playground, all kids where out most days. We respected other people's property, we didn't kick balls into cars and if a ball did go into a garden we knocked, we didnt deliberately tread on plants. It's called respect. Yes let kids play but also make them respect other people's property

It's not about respect, they don't mean to do it. I used to have children playing football in my garden and the ball inevitably ended up somewhere else, but not on purpose. I agree the car thing is annoying - a ball once broke the wing mirror on my car at a campsite - but I think the most you can do is ask them to be careful. I used to hate the balls going against my fence in my garden as everyone used to come here. But now they're all older and no one plays outside and I miss seeing them all have fun.

If they don’t mean to do it then why does it happen repeatedly?
it’s actually that much about respect that I overheard one of the girls asking another do go into the garden to retrieve the ball as she didn’t want to “ruin her Nike dunks”
funny that?!

I lived in a cult de sac growing up

Excellent typo :-) Or is it...?

Because during a ball game statistically a certain number of hits/kicks/throws are going to be misjudged or missed? I mean, I remember playing outside as a child and the ball going awol frequently.

I think it is fine having a word and telling them not to stand on the plants and to be mindful of the cars though.

Ask them to play with a softer ball?