Hi all,
I need to rant and I also need advice if anyone has any.
Our family of three, including a 2 year old child own a semi-d in a 'nice' area. There are 13 houses on our cul-de-sac and six of them have children aged between 8 and 14. Our house is sort of half way down the street at the end of which is a very nice and huge park with payground and all kinds of sports grounds in it.
Over the last five evenings, the boys on the street, aged 10-12 have been bringing out a basketball hoop onto the street and playing basketball at the end of our driveway which is also about 3 meters from our young child's bedroom. The first night, I went out at 8.30-ish pm and asked them calmly to move away as out 2yr old was trying to go to sleep. They went away for 5 minutes and came back.
On the second night, they did the same and I went out again and explained that our child goes to bed at 8pm and pleaded with one of the boys who has a sibling of the same age teling him that he should know how upset and cranky young children get when they are tired and can't sleep. They went into the house next door (semi-d) and were howling and causing all kinds of racket until around 10.30pm. I texted the parents and asked them to ask the boys to keep it down as our 2yr old was woken up and is really upset. I got a reply to say that the boys are over-excited.
The following night, they were back at it again and when we asked them to move, we were told that it isn't our road and they can do as they please.
On the fourth night, we parked our cars on street in order to reduce the amount of space they had for basketball and hoping that they'd get the message and move away. Reinforcements from neighbouring roads came in and there were about 15 children with 15 balls on about 2 meters (with of the road), bouncing balls of our cars. We called the gardai and they came along 20 minutes later.
It's needles to say that the gardai were practically useless as they kept saying that children are children and they have the right to play and if they weren't intentionally damaging our property there is nothing they can do. They did go to talk to two of the parents though but came back with the same 'children are children',...
We have written to one of the parents who is also our road's representative to the Resident Association asking him to deal with this. We have pointed out that we have as much right to live in our home peacefully as children have to play and that IF we are the only residents bothered by the noise, it should be easy to move play elsewhere and resolve the issue. I am not sure how this is going to work out because we weren't home yesterday evening and I dread going home this evening and having to put up with this kind of bullying. Those children look into our living room window to see if we are there and then congregate just to be a nuisance.
Before anyone asks, we haven't fallen out with any of our neighbours, we mind our own business and are not in anyone's way. There are no noisy parties or a lot of guest ' traffic' in our house.
I just don't understand how can parents allow this, knowing that it's upsetting somebody.
Thanks for reading and does anyone have any advice?
I need to rant and I also need advice if anyone has any.
Our family of three, including a 2 year old child own a semi-d in a 'nice' area. There are 13 houses on our cul-de-sac and six of them have children aged between 8 and 14. Our house is sort of half way down the street at the end of which is a very nice and huge park with payground and all kinds of sports grounds in it.
Over the last five evenings, the boys on the street, aged 10-12 have been bringing out a basketball hoop onto the street and playing basketball at the end of our driveway which is also about 3 meters from our young child's bedroom. The first night, I went out at 8.30-ish pm and asked them calmly to move away as out 2yr old was trying to go to sleep. They went away for 5 minutes and came back.
On the second night, they did the same and I went out again and explained that our child goes to bed at 8pm and pleaded with one of the boys who has a sibling of the same age teling him that he should know how upset and cranky young children get when they are tired and can't sleep. They went into the house next door (semi-d) and were howling and causing all kinds of racket until around 10.30pm. I texted the parents and asked them to ask the boys to keep it down as our 2yr old was woken up and is really upset. I got a reply to say that the boys are over-excited.
The following night, they were back at it again and when we asked them to move, we were told that it isn't our road and they can do as they please.
On the fourth night, we parked our cars on street in order to reduce the amount of space they had for basketball and hoping that they'd get the message and move away. Reinforcements from neighbouring roads came in and there were about 15 children with 15 balls on about 2 meters (with of the road), bouncing balls of our cars. We called the gardai and they came along 20 minutes later.
It's needles to say that the gardai were practically useless as they kept saying that children are children and they have the right to play and if they weren't intentionally damaging our property there is nothing they can do. They did go to talk to two of the parents though but came back with the same 'children are children',...
We have written to one of the parents who is also our road's representative to the Resident Association asking him to deal with this. We have pointed out that we have as much right to live in our home peacefully as children have to play and that IF we are the only residents bothered by the noise, it should be easy to move play elsewhere and resolve the issue. I am not sure how this is going to work out because we weren't home yesterday evening and I dread going home this evening and having to put up with this kind of bullying. Those children look into our living room window to see if we are there and then congregate just to be a nuisance.
Before anyone asks, we haven't fallen out with any of our neighbours, we mind our own business and are not in anyone's way. There are no noisy parties or a lot of guest ' traffic' in our house.
I just don't understand how can parents allow this, knowing that it's upsetting somebody.
Thanks for reading and does anyone have any advice?
