To have told this woman that her son could not wreck the flowers?

[muggglewump]

I'm was in town today, I had DD with me and we had to wait 20 minutes for the bus.
There was a Mum and I guess 4 yr old son with her, she also had a buggy with a baby who was sleeping and her friend.
Anyway, son gets to play in the square (nice lawn, flowering bushes, flowerbed in the middle) with his tennis ball. He kicked in into the bush. He couldn't find it so decided to yank the bush to pieces, the folk sitting around him nicely said no, his Mum said "stop it X, I've told you, stop it" and carried on with her mate.
This went on, he found the ball, leaving half the bush on the floor and decided to run through the flower bed. "No X, don't do that X"
After a good ten minutes of it, I said to the Mum, "You can't let him do that, it's ruining it for other people, would he like to play with my daughter while you wait?"
I got a filthy look.

The kid carried on doing as he pleased while the Mum barked negativity at him that he ignored.
It came to a head when she told him to sit with her at least 10 times on the bus, yet he got to sit on his own and fell.
Of course she ran and picked him up.....and then still left him, instructing him to be more careful!

I know IANBU, but I don't get all the negativity, why didn't she say "oh son, that looks like fun ripping up the bush/stamping on the flowerbeds"
I'm being serious. Why be so down on your kids unless you mean it?

Well done for speaking up mugggle. I can;t stand it when I hear people issue all sorts of threats' to their kids and not carry them through. Mine very rarely get more than 1 chance!

That's what I mean, I let DD play on that grass all the time but I just don't get what amounted to 30 mins being down on her son and barking out orders for no reason at all.
Either discipline him or don't, but being negative for ages and doing nothing, to the point of letting him fall down because he was "allowed" to sit by himself at the back of the bus just baffles me.

[smug] When we were on the bus, a guy sitting behind us gave DD £1 and said what a lovely DD I had whilst looking at the child behind" [/smug]

Lol at your last comment muggle.

This is something me and DP have agreed on for when it comes to disciplining our now 5 months old DD. Mine and his parents always issued threats that were followed through and I feel I was a good kid and so does my parents. So were going to take this approach.

Well done at saying something. I would have just sat there watching it happen, cos i'm such a wuss

Oh, this really winds me up. Bone idle, I'd call it. Sort of person who would rather sit on her backside and mutter occasionally than actually get up and do something to occupy her child. No wonder the poor kid didn't want to sit anywhere near her.

Gosh, I am being judgmental, must be in a very grumpy mood!

I was being judgemental too, I found the mother's behaviour terrible.

DD and I were having hopping competitions(who can hop on the spot the longest) and playing scissors/paper/stone together.
I did say that DD would play with the wee boy but the woman didn't want that.
DD is allowed to play on that grass but not rip the bushes to bits or stamp on the flowerbeds. I'd be horrified!

Muggle,
Well done for saying something.

But . . .sorry, I know this is off track . . . do you always allow your DD to accept money from strangers?

Yes.
I was with her, it's not like it happens every day and he was a nice guy so I see no reason to refuse it.
DD said thank you, without a prompt (really smug) and I also said thanks and did the "you shouldn't have blah blah"

It was a nice old man, I get that bus often, he always has fun with DD, making faces, poking out tongues and suchlike and I don't think accepting some money is a bad thing.
She'll buy some sweets or put it towards a comic and then say thank you every time she sees that guy on the bus!
It happenned because of the badly behaved child and the Mum condoning it!