Sunday, June 8, 2008

Annoying Neighborhood Kids

What are you supposed to do with them? Honestly, this is all new territory to me. I grew up in the country where we didn't have neighbors. No one just ever showed up at our door or peeked in our window while we were eating supper, waiting for EE to come out to play (as was the case last night).

As nice as it is to live in a neighborhood with tons of kids, I don't want to be obliged to play with the annoying brats adorable neighbor boys every. single. time. we go outside. Like I said, last night the neighbor boy waited for EE to come out so they could play. That's all fine (well, not really, but I can't tell her "no" everyday) but ANB (annoying neighbor boys) were playing outside with little/no supervision. Older ANB was riding one of those toy John Deere gators around, running over younger ANB more than once (at one point I almost had to run over and pull it off younger ANB's foot). I didn't feel comfortable letting LC play with them while the madman was driving around. They finally figured out a game that used only their imaginations and was fairly safe for all of them to play, including LC. This entire time dh and I were watching while the other parents were oblivious, working in their backyard. Call me overprotective, but I don't want EE to fall into the whiny (OMG are they whiny!), constant arguing, annoying habits of these boys. As we are leaving last night younger ANB was all, "Can we play tomorrow? Can I play inside at your house? When can we play inside? What day?" And on and on and on. His mom said he waits at the corner for EE every night. I have a feeling this will continue for a long time considering younger ANB and EE will be in the same grade next fall (please don't let him be in the same class).

I'm hoping there will be benefits to EE playing with ANB. See, their dad is on the football coaching staff for the college here (remember, we are big fans) and I'm hoping for some sort of compensations for being friends with ANB. A few free tickets would be fine, or even free merchandise. Not much to ask for babysitting playing with his children, right?

3 comments:

Minyo said...

Just saw your post about the strike through on bhb. You figured it out well :)

Bummer about the ANK...maybe your kids will rub off on them instead of your kids learning their behaviors.

If things get really bad, you could always hang a black/gold flag out on game days and they will never want to play with you again :)

Cristin said...

That would drive me so nuts...

Grumpy said...

And I wonder why we have no friends on our street. For the last 5 yrs we've been making excuses not to be at home when ANKs are around... I admit I'm over protective but when the kids glare at me and my kid and the parents talk behind your back, its not acceptable! So we walk to the park, or walk to the store, hang out there and then come home... Yes it is terrible when you can't enjoy the quiet of your own yard for these kids. But I have my limits! (Yes, I'm horribly over-protective but getting better! LOL!)

What I have found worked for M, is if she starts emulating the ANG-B (annoying neighbors Grand-Brat) I remind her what is acceptable in my house and what is not and also let her know that if she continues to act like that kid we will remove the privilege of playing with her. We had a problem as well at one point, where she took direction for the ANG-B over Mummy's direction.... and wow did that make for a huge discussion!