fretful
They spent a lot of time complaining fretfully about the children's behaviour.
As he talked, he fretfully rubbed the tips of his fingers together.
"They don't want people to come here," said Betty fretfully.

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Anxious and worried
(all) hot and botheredidiom
aflutter
agitated
angsty
anxious
frightened
fuss
get in a sweatidiom
goosey
grim
preoccupied
prey
prey on sb's mindidiom
prey on something
queasily
worried
worriedly
worrier
worrywart
wound up

Examples of fretfully

fretfully
The shrewd face jerked fretfully, and the lips were opened for a retort, checked by a gloved hand laid upon the forward child's.
From Project Gutenberg
But there is in resignation a further good element: even real goods, when they are unattainable, ought not to be fretfully desired.
From Project Gutenberg
He sat up, blinked at the sun, swore fretfully, and pulled his blanket over the ornamental splendors of his head.
From Project Gutenberg
Incontestably the racing, the horses lining fretfully and scrambling through the muddy pools, left me cold.
From Project Gutenberg
He twisted fretfully in his sleep; the body tried to rise, anticipating nature even when the mind could not.
From Project Gutenberg
Two big blue and green flies were buzzing fretfully against the panes.
From Project Gutenberg
A lamp with a tin reflector jarred fretfully upon a shelf, and the floor creaked.
From Project Gutenberg
The old man pushed his spectacles up on his forehead fretfully and regarded the girl impatiently from a pair of near-sighted blue eyes.
From Project Gutenberg
He rubbed his forehead fretfully as he looked her over.
From Project Gutenberg
He rubbed his hand fretfully over his forehead.
From Project Gutenberg
She wanted to refuse, but he was so fretfully demanding that she could only obey him.
From Project Gutenberg
She was slow in her movements and answers, speaking in a whisper and sometimes a little fretfully.
From Project Gutenberg
There were snores from two, that was clear, and still another man talked and muttered fretfully in his sleep.
From Project Gutenberg
She looked at him archly, half veiling her dark eyes with their lustrous lashes, while her horse pawed fretfully at the bank.
From Project Gutenberg
The boy's mind centered fretfully on his lost medicine chest.
From Project Gutenberg
These examples are from corpora and from sources on the web. Any opinions in the examples do not represent the opinion of the Cambridge Dictionary editors or of Cambridge University Press or its licensors.