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Old 05-16-2018, 06:35 AM
 
28,164 posts, read 25,160,121 times
Reputation: 16664

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Quote:
Originally Posted by emotiioo View Post
I couldn't tell you what any of my neighbors habits are. Perhaps spend less time paying attention to what others are doing and you will have less anxiety.

If you sincerely feel these children might be in danger, call CPS. Otherwise, butt out.
Really? Do you live in a rural area or urban?

We live in the city and its kind of impossible not to pick up on the habits of your neighbors, unless you're a hermit.

I know one of my neighbors gardens on her days off. The other neighbor has a little girl that lives with her and the grandparents stay at the house every weekend. Another neighbors' parents pick up the kids for weeklong vacations in NJ a few times each summer. Another neighbor has 4 German Shepherds. I could go on.

This is just what happens when you live in a city environment. I'm sure my neighbors know I take my kid to practice every Wednesday night at 6 and pick up the other one from the bus stop every day at 3:15. Or they know I like to sit on the front porch every night.
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Old 05-16-2018, 07:11 AM
 
5,938 posts, read 4,671,418 times
Reputation: 4629
I'm curious to see when Hedgehog will update us. It isn't like someone with 10k posts doesn't come back.
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Old 05-16-2018, 07:59 AM
 
Location: Foot of the Rockies
90,316 posts, read 120,193,363 times
Reputation: 35920
Quote:
Originally Posted by ItIsWritten. View Post
They alternated talking to Grandma, Dad and Mom. To my knowledge, they answered the phone each time. If not, someone rushed home.

It's really not that difficult to imagine if you've been around children at all of this age. They have no problems answering a phone and many can also dial out.

Foster care is often a bad idea as they will be left alone even more inside an institutional setting which is often unable to handle so many children. Our receiving home was a mess. Kids traumatized much more. Again, weigh the risks. Children hardly ever follow their training, especially at that age. Easy peazy to get into the house. Parent's don't like it? That's what happens when you are not there supervising your kids, others may take up your load.

I know this from experience, again. I checked on the neighbor kids for a while until their older sister came back home and started babysitting. We also had two foster kids of our own at the time.

I am not sure what this means but if you've been around kids this age, I am sure some things come to mind eh?
So you really don't know as much about the situation as you claimed. And "someone rushed home"? How many of us have jobs where a) We can hold a lengthy conversation with our kid (or anyone) on work time and b) can "rush home" if there's a problem at home? Many people live 10s of miles from their jobs, and have jobs where you have to be available the whole time you're at work, such as teachers, nurses, etc.

I have raised two of my own and spent a career in pediatrics. We had to test vision at age 4. Many of those kids had a hard time following the simple directions for a picture eye chart. I can imagine trying to solve some problem at home.

My last sentence was sarcastic. What can go wrong, will.

Quote:
Originally Posted by ItIsWritten. View Post
Spot On
I don't know if you noticed, but the poster you quoted said age 7 was too young to leave home alone, let alone 5.
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Old 05-16-2018, 08:28 AM
 
Location: Central Virginia
6,512 posts, read 8,296,673 times
Reputation: 18579
Quote:
Originally Posted by tottsieanna View Post
Op, why not go over to your neighbors when they are home and introduce yourself, and mention that you noticed the van driver dropping them off after school. With your daughters permission let them know that she would be happy to watch them till one of them gets home from work.
I concur with this advice, OP.

I recently read an article about a 4-year old dying in a house fire. There was a miscommunication with the two adults in the house - each thought the other was home - the mother left to walk her older child to school, during that short time, the house caught on fire and the little girl died.

Another thing is, this sounds like it's a daily routine, a pattern. You've noticed it. What if someone with ill intentions toward children has also noticed this routine.
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Old 05-16-2018, 08:56 AM
 
13,262 posts, read 7,935,364 times
Reputation: 30752
Quote:
Originally Posted by PriscillaVanilla View Post
I personally wouldn't want my teen daughter in their home, if they are untrustworthy enough to abandon their own kids on a daily basis, who knows what else they would do? It's not like they'll treat other people better than they treat their own kids. It's also very unlikely they have money to hire a babysitter. We have people like that in our neighborhood who work 2 or 3 jobs, leave their kids alone all day and all weekend; some seem to think random strangers should look after their kids or they try to rope someone they know into free childcare. I feel sorry for the kids, sure, but I don't feel sorry for the parents. They make the neighborhood a worse place. People learn about these problem areas and then decide not to move here.

How does that work? How do new homebuyers know which of their neighbors is working 2 or 3 jobs and expecting others to watch their kids?


When we bought our house, what we KNEW was, it was a 'hot' neighborhood in a good school district, close to shopping and convenient access to the highway. I suppose we could've looked to see if we had any convicted sex offenders in the neighborhood, but we didn't.


Never thought to ask around about problem parents. Not even sure how that would work.
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Old 05-16-2018, 09:03 AM
 
Location: Wisconsin
19,480 posts, read 24,963,132 times
Reputation: 51106
Quote:
Originally Posted by HokieFan View Post
(snip)

Another thing is, this sounds like it's a daily routine, a pattern. You've noticed it. What if someone with ill intentions toward children has also noticed this routine.
Excellent point.
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Old 05-16-2018, 09:11 AM
 
Location: Foot of the Rockies
90,316 posts, read 120,193,363 times
Reputation: 35920
Quote:
Originally Posted by HokieFan View Post
I concur with this advice, OP.

I recently read an article about a 4-year old dying in a house fire. There was a miscommunication with the two adults in the house - each thought the other was home - the mother left to walk her older child to school, during that short time, the house caught on fire and the little girl died.

Another thing is, this sounds like it's a daily routine, a pattern. You've noticed it. What if someone with ill intentions toward children has also noticed this routine.
First I want to say that was more than a "miscommunication". Did the mother think the father was home, after he'd already left for work? I always knew when my husband left in the morning.

Secondly, this brings up a good point. A parent left their 4 year old alone, to walk their other child to school. Who knows how long of a time this really was? It seems the house would have had to be on fire when they left for the fire to get that bad that the kid died while they were gone. For all the people here who think the parents must have arranged for this woman to stay with the kids and she's the culprit in all this, people do think it's just fine to leave young children home alone! These kids are old enough to talk. If the person hired to stay with them wasn't staying when she was supposed to be, it would come out.

Last edited by Katarina Witt; 05-16-2018 at 10:25 AM..
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Old 05-16-2018, 09:41 AM
 
Location: Canada
6,615 posts, read 6,488,205 times
Reputation: 18433
No, something needs to be done. Those kids might get hungry and try to cook something.

My Mom used to have a job where she had to go knocking on doors to talk to adult students to find out why they were missing school.

On one such occasion, she knocked on a door and a five year old let her IN. (he did NOT know her whatsoever)
She followed him into the kitchen, explaining why she was there and where is your Mother?

"Oh, mommy's not here he replies" as he climbs up on a chair at the stove and stirs a pot of spaghetti while his little sister (around 2 years old) watches from a chair. Just then, in comes the next door neighbor lady, saying she is watching the kids until the mother gets home from work. WATCHING THEM??? HOW is she watching them when she's next door at her own house? My mother told her that she HAD to stay there and WATCH the kids, not leave them alone to cook their supper.

She also pointed out that this five year old let her into the house and didn't know her from a hole in the wall. The "sitter" said she would stay with them from then on.

How long had this situation been going on? It's scary to think about it.

She reported this to the principal of the school and I'm not sure what he did with the information.
-----------------------------------------------

OP, you really need to talk to the father and tell him our daughter will watch the kids until he gets home. They are TOO young to be left alone. They could die in a house fire or let a freak into the house. BTW, why should your daughter do this for free? They should be paying her at least a bit of money for the responsibility of watching those kids.

If he doesn't agree, call the Children's aid on him.
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Old 05-16-2018, 10:27 AM
 
581 posts, read 452,965 times
Reputation: 2511
My thing is this, let's say the father says he can't afford to pay the daughter. So now this girl's stuck watching his kids for free? How long do you think that will last before a 16 year-old gets tired of being used as slave labor?

I understand why people would want the OP to inquire about the situation, but I wouldn't offer childcare services to a bunch of strangers. Especially the kind of people who see no issue with leaving pre-schoolers unattended.
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Old 05-16-2018, 11:24 AM
 
Location: Full time in the RV
3,417 posts, read 7,750,955 times
Reputation: 3331
I agree the OP should talk to the parents but not offer the daughter as a sitter.

There is a lot of what ifs in this thread but I'll share a true story about my second cousin while his parents were both home.

He was four and each parent thought the other was watching him. He actually went out into the yard, pulled the ladder to the side of the above ground pool, and jumped in, drowning. He was revived but lived for seven more years in a total vegetative state.
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