To ask what kind of social life you have?

[stuckindamiddle]

Posting here for traffic (and because I can never find the Chat thread on the mumsnet app...!)

I'm curious to know to what extent other parents have a social life. I mean, nights out with your friends, does your partner have the same, do you socialise with other couples / families and do you have any regular
activities - sport, choir, book club, politics etc.

Just asking as me and DH feel our social lives have taken a real dent since we became parents and would like to hope things improve as kids get older. I think the current situation isn't helped by us having no real couple friends where we now live (we moved cities just before we became parents), only one babysitter we can call on and also because we both
enjoy spending as much time as possible with DS and / or are pretty knackered most of the time still.

I guess a lot depends on how old your kids are, whether you have a partner or not, if you have access to reliable babysitters and how long you've lived in your area.

Please tell me how it is for you and give me hope!

For those with young children and limited funds, one of the best ways out of this rut is to socialise with other parents and include their children and alternate between homes. If they can sleep over, so much the better as you can all have a drink, although that sometimes means lots of children topping and tailing and the hosts sleeping on a mattress on the living room floor.

DH and I try to go out together regularly. Maybe once a fortnight. We go to the theatre a lot, and to comedy shows and gigs. We also go out to dinner.

We host friends for dinner, probably once a month, maybe go to their houses for dinner.

But tbh, DH and I would rather go out just the two of us.

On my own, I usually meet grilfriend's for coffee or lunch once a week. And a group of us go out for cocktails and dinner every six weeks or so.

DH meets his mates for drinks and dinner probably once a month. But he has to do a lot of socialising for work - at least one night per week.

We also, now the DC are teens, do quite a bit together - dinner, theatre, sporting events.

I've got a 15 month old. I dance twice a week and husband either plays cricket or football midweek. He goes to the football at the weekend or plays cricket. I occasionally go to the football or have a night out with my mates and we make sure we have 'family days' where the three of us do things together.

We also have excellent family support for babysitting so if we want to go out together we can. We tend to only do this for birthdays/anniversaries or weddings and we usually make a night of it and stay over when we do.

I go out with the ladies about once a week/once every other week.

Husband goes out with his friends once a week.

We normally go out with friends on Saturday night.

I occasionally invite people over for dinner, but find it very stressful.

I have a two-year-old and an eight-week-old. I just moved to a new area, so am really making the effort socially. I go out Wednesday evenings for dinner and drinks with one set of mums, coffee Friday mornings with another set of mums and Saturday night out with my husband.

I'm lucky in that both of my kids are excellent sleepers, and we muddle on through with sitting using a combination of family and trusted babysitters. I'm currently a SAHM and DH works full-time.

We're lucky, have two good groups of friends with children and we see one or other most weekends. One group the kids just tend to run around whilst we drink, the other group tends to be more grown up sit down dinners where we out the kids down to sleep. We have another group of friends where we are the only ones with kids, get babysitters for when we see them which is about every three months and have lovely restaurant dinners. There is another couple we socialise with every three months or so, again with children so we take them with. Nights out tend to be separate, him with his friends or me with NCT or work girls and roughly twice a month each. Other groups of friends we see less regularly, couple of times a year and what we do with them varies. Plus ex neighbours who we keep up with and family. One way or another we are socialising pretty much every Saturday and Sunday and many Friday nights too. The key is to keep it in someone's house and train your baby to sleep in a travel cot!

We don't go out very much as we don't have family around and DH does long hours, and to be honest, we would rather spend the money on good wine and food at home. Plus DS2 wakes up really early and sometimes in the night too, and I'd rather get more sleep. I probably go out twice a month with book club, or with friends, and DH and I together maybe once a month with friends. We do sometimes get a sitter for a walk in the afternoon at the weekend though! I'm a SAHM and although it's not the same, I do get to see some friends during the day. And quite often at the weekend, we will meet another family for a walk/bike ride, or all have dinner together. DS's are 3 and 7. We both get a couple of hours each at the weekend to exercise too.

I go out alot.
DS'S are 17 and 14 but even when they were young and babies I still went out a lot.
I go on weekends away with a group of friends
I have at least one holiday a year with friends
I go on holiday with DH and the boys at least 3 times a year.

I go to the pictures a lot. I go by myself, with DH and the boys, with one of the DS's or with friends. Depends what's on and who wants to come

I go mountain biking and hill walking mid week by myself and some evenings with DS2
I like having friends round about once a month
I go to a lot of gigs. Tonight me, DH and DS1 are going to the gym, then the 8.15 showing of a film just across from the leisure centre and then gong to see a gig that starts about 11.00pm

I know this sounds a lot but I pack as much as I can in to the days and evenings and always have. In about an hours time I will be out walking on the moors until about 5.00pm and then out with DH and DS to the gym.

I have a 4 year old and 7 month old.

The last time i had a night out almost 3 years ago but that suits me fine. I have no energy and tbh cant wait to take my bra off and put my pjs on

When dd2 is abit older my mum will have her overnight with dd1 so me and DH can have a meal out.

I have about 5 real friends and we see them maybe every week? We have pizza and film nights.

Depends. There's peaks and troughs. I was out last night and am out tomorrow. We (me and DP) were out the past two weekends for dinner (my mum babysat). We are away next weekend - my sister is taking the kids! DP goes out with his brother once a week.

I no longer really want to go out. I have been to enough bars/clubs to last me a lifetime. I partied myself silly in 20's/30's - no need to do it anymore.

I go to the movies occasionally when DC are with their Dad.

I would LOVE time to go to the gym more than anything. This is the hardest thing about being LP.

I am happy to socialise with other families, and I tend to do lots more during the day now with the DC and be knackered in the evening. Many of my friends have similar age DC which works well.

Often I will go to a (child free) friends across town, where we can all stay the night. The DC go to bed and I can stay up late with lovely friend who is gourmet cook and drink fancy wine. I love doing that.

I guess this is one of the advantages of having DC late - I was 40/43 with mine.

Hardly any social life here. Two kids (8 and 6) one with ADHD and one with ADHD/autistic traits. We don't live close to family and while people do make vague offers to baby sit here, a lot of them won't do it or won't do it more than once.
Like the PP I don't miss pubs and clubs, I've done all that, but I do miss the gym in the evenings, cycling, having a quite pint in a nice pub garden and having friends over to eat. My DH is an excellent cook, and we used to have people round a lot. He gets very stressed with the kids though at the moment.
About once a year my mum has kids overnight.
We do go round a few friends with the kids my 8 year old gets very hyper in the evenings and it's not always much fun tbh

I see lots of friends in the day, with children in tow, seldom go anywhere at night, and have had one venture out with only my dh (to a wedding, home by 7pm) since I had ds1 five years ago!
I don't quite know how it got to that point. We don't have any family local and I didn't want to leave ds1 when he as tiny, then ds2 came along, I started to go out a bit more when ds2 was over one, but then had (a surprise) ds3. Ds3 is still a baby, so I don't want to leave him yet (but can take him with me to some evening things) but three children seems like a lot to leave, for example, my parents would be happy to look after one, two at a push, but say they don't feel happy with all three. So my social life is on hold for a bit longer.
Dh seldom goes out in the evening either,but does escape on work trips for a week or so quite frequently. From my perspective, that seems like a social life, but that might not be accurate!

I think once I start going out a bit, I'll realise how much I've missed it, but for now Im sort of out of the habit.

I found that my/our social life went in waves after DC - having 1st baby I met a whole lot of new friends - NCT tea group and class with some crossover meant over the next 5 years there were coffee mornings, nights out, weddings, Christmas drinks, and 40ths galore! As well as birthday parties for the DC where parents socialised with a glass of wine too.

School brought another round of meeting people and the PTA was good with social events for parents.
Always had difficulties with babysitting as dh at that time worked long hours and was away sometimes.
Later on after dc2 I was working and met more new people, quite a sociable crowd.

Big change came when I moved to a new area when dc2 was 3, and working 4 days per week with limited school contact I found it took 2 or 3 years to really find a new circle of friends and go out regularly. I am now in a book group and a sports team, as well as a few other things going on. Have good babysitters but usually have to pay, so the limits are always financial more than anything else. I am now a single parent with no financial input from ex so irony is I have the potential for social life but basically skint so have to say no to at least half of opportunities!

Forgot to say dc are 14 and 9.
What I find most difficult with older ones is keeping in touch (other than Facebook, the odd catch-up on the phone) with - I mean properly seeing - old friends who don't live nearby. Clashing commitments of dc make getting together at weekends really difficult.

I go out a lot more now my kids are 9 and 7 than I did when they were under 4. When they were little I lived away from my home town and found it very hard to make friends. Moved back when eldest was 4 and being near my friends made it a million times easier. My best friends are still the oldest ones.

I go to aerobics once or twice a week in the evenings, DH does his hobby once every fortnight, I have a monthly girls night (dinner at someones house) then there are various birthday nights out, BBQs with friends or dinner out with school mums which equate to around one night out a month or so.

I am happy with that :)

Kids are 2/5

Dh does a lot if biking/training maybe 2/week then I got to the gym. He plays footy and I have book clubs and choir. He is also on a community thing.

Then we probably go out out 3/4 a month as a couple to dinner parties, pub, cinema, meals, parties. We have a large group of friends and we are very social but it's taken a while to cultivate and get to that stage.

We also go away just us 1-2 times a year.

I have been to enough bars/clubs to last me a lifetime. I partied myself silly in 20's/30's - no need to do it anymore.

This, although it was just in my 20's. I prefer to go to a crafts class or something now! I'm wondering if I will have a return to partying when my kids have left home?

A social life isn't just about clubs and bars though is it.
I like them occasional but to me a social life is about having. Downtime away from the house or domestic stuff.
That's way I included going to the cinema, meals out, meeting friends, mountain biking and hill walking as part of my social life

DH plays sports 3 or 4 times a week and goes out with his friends once or twice a month. I'm going out for the 3rd time since DD was born (6 months) next week. DH has arranged for MIL to have DD so he can also go out. At the moment I mostly socialise in the daytime, with DD with me, but that'll change when I go back to work.

I am a single parent to 8 year old DD and work full time. Luckily, I have friends and family who are keen to babysit, so I have a pretty good social life.

I go to the gym 2-3 times a week, and have a weekend night out about once a fortnight with close friends which usually involve drinking and dancing. On top of that, I have a couple of friends who I meet for dinner once a month or so. In the school holidays, DD usually comes with me. I also have every Tuesday evening free as my mum likes to pick DD up from school and look after her for the night. I sometimes meet friends for a drink but don't always go out, sometimes I use the time just to relax at home or to get some housework or studying done.

I also have nights out with work friends every couple of months or so, for leaving drinks/Christmas/start of the summer holidays.

About once every 2-3 weeks I have friends come round to mine after DD is in bed for dinner/drinks/a good catch up.

I know I am very lucky to have so much time to myself, DD is currently the only child in my family so my parents and sister love to have her over as often as they can.

One child, aged 7, DP and I go out together most Fridays and Saturday nights, usually with friends either for dinner or out for drinks. We also hold a couple of big parties a year. We are very sociable though.
We usually go out separately maybe once or twice midweek too, with friends/work colleagues. Plus we often meet friends for Sunday lunch/sports/whatever.
We probably should go out more as a couple but other than that am pretty happy with our social life.