We live in a block of flats that shares a communal garden, so the children play outside together. One of the neighbours is very precious about her 5 year old DD. About a year ago, she came round ranting and raving about my DS having upset her DD in some way (can't actually recall the exact offence now, nothing too ominous). She literally was going mental. After this episode I told my kids to avoid her DD for a bit and this seemed to help. Things calmed down and seemed friendlier. But yesterday, she came knocking again, absolutely raging, claiming my DS had threatened her DD (bear in mind my DS is himself only 8). Anyway, I called my DS to ask if it was true, and he admitted he had said something mean, but nowhere near as bad as she was claiming. So I told my DS we should go round to the neighbour's flat and explain/apologise for upsetting DD. We duly went but even after saying why we were there, the neighbour just ranted at us, even worse than before, calling my son names and, when I tried to protest, calling me a terrible mother who doesn't know how awful her son is (while he was standing right there). She also complained about me having stopped our kids playing together in the past, because although she seems to despise my DS, her DD loves to play with my DD. After a short while, it was clear she had no interest in resolving matters so I took my son home. He was terribly upset and was sobbing for a long time. I told him not to worry and there are nutty people in the world, so all we can do is try to do the right thing ourselves, although obviously all of this is hard for him to grasp. So I am wondering what is the best thing to do now? It's hard as there is just this one communal garden and now that it's summer the children like to play out there all afternoon, but should I try to stop my kids from playing with her DD?