Neighbours Children Jumping the Fence

[MrsG2017]

Oh goodness i need your opinions!
We recently moved into a rental having returned from overseas. our garden has low 3ft fences and our son (6) has befriended the little girl whose grandma lives next door.

it is lovely that they have little friendship and he has a buddy to play with .... but......

When she is there (4 x a week) she jumps over the back garden fence and runs into our house unannounced! Screams and shouts - goes into my sons room pulls out all of his toys jumps on his bed, goes in our fridge!!!

What do we do?? our son is no angel he loves it! but it has to stop

Am i being a grouch?

Higher fences?
Sprinkler?
Take her straight home every time?

Lock the door?

take her straight home every time and say that she needs to knock and ask if it is OK to visit.

In all seriousness, I'd lock the door so she can't just run in and have a word with the grandma saying that her DGD needs to come round the front, knock on the door and ask if your son is free to play and take no for an answer

tricky though as my hubby and my son like to play outside after school and i like the patio door open for fresh air

Attach that cheap trellis stuff along the fence so she can't climb over? How long is the fence?

Tell the landlord, they might do something to the fence. What if she climbed over when you weren't there and had an accident?

Have you given her a proper serious telling off and told her not to do it?

What does her grandma do/say when it happens?

Gran does nothing - it was fun to start with so we should have stopped it then.

So you’ve actively encouraged it up to now?
Just raise the fence 🤷🏻‍♀️

Tell her she needs to go to the front door.

Tell her off. Tell her not to jump on the beds or go in the fridge. If you don’t want her round take her home and tell her Gran to stop her coming over the fence.

You still have to parent kids who come for play dates even if they are invited. If a kid went in my fridge or jumped on my furniture I’d tell them to pack it in

not really we always try and call time or stop the jumping over the fence or tell her not to run about. honestly if they played quietly together it wuld be so much of an issue but i found her going through mine and my husbands room the other day!!

@gymmum82 yes agree and we do do that - in one ear out the other! my son has even started telling her to be quiet or not go in mummys room

Seriously you need to tell her off and do it with your son present. Tell her she needs to knock and ask if he’s free to play and she’s not allowed upstairs. If she doesn’t listen she will be taken home. Tell her it’s rude behaviour and cannot continue. It’s your house and you are the adult - act like it and stand up for yourself and your home!

Why don’t you act like an adult and take her home?

You face little girl at her level and explain this is your house. In your house you have your rules. She needs to learn your rules so that she can come to play.

Starts with

Knock at the door and wait.
Keep out of our fridge.
Talk don't yell.
No wrecking.

Speak to her granny, tell her these are the rules in your house that GD has to keep.

Then she has to stay downstairs all the time.
If she ignores being told, she goes straight home.

Preempt her: send your DH and Ds jumping over into the grandmothers garden and take a few boisterous turns around the house.

Then pop round to the grandmother and say “I think it’s best we keep visits via the front door only from now on. It isn’t always convenient for us as we WFH’.

We used to have all sorts of cf dc in our garden..
We got a dpuppy.
All cute and cuddly. Dc still queued up.
Strangely (!) as ddog grew the knocking and invading stopped.
Our rottweiler was truly appreciated..
By us anyway!. A decade of peace followed. I bloody miss that ddog!

Escort her out of your home and to her front door and hand her over to whoever is responsible for her and say that she must not jump over the fence and come in your garden or home uninvited.

If they ignore your wishes, t phone the police and say you've found a child in your house and let them return her.

Why couldn’t you just not let them come round whenever they chose to, if you’d rather they hadn’t?
You make it sound like you’d no say in who chose to invade your garden.

You need to put up a higher fence because if you lock the doors, and she sees you in there she will bang on the windows/doors.

Put a sign on the back door telling her to piss off. Or tell your son to go into her bedroom and see how she likes it