To ask more experienced parents about girls playing with “boys’ toys” at nursery

[StupidNurseryQuestion]

DD(3) is about to start nursery. It’s attached to the school that we hope she’ll go to in the future too.

My secret midnight worry about nursery is that she is simply not interested in traditionally “girly” toys at all. She has a toy box full of cars and a ride on car; a road map and a garage; and DP’s 30 year old brio, and that’s what she plays with. Dolls gather dust and the Belle dress she swore blind she wanted from Tesco hangs in the wardrobe with the tags still on it! When she watches tv, she only wants Thomas or Blaze and the Monster Machines.

Now I don’t care what she likes/plays with, so long as she’s having fun and learning, but I DO want her to be happy at nursery. I’ve taken her for several play dates recently where the other little girls have dollhouses and fairy wings etc, and DD just looks blank and asks where their cars are. Meanwhile when they came to us, they clearly had zero interest in the cars that DD really wanted to show them One of them wanted to play “Frozen”, because she’s Elsa mad, and I realised DD had never seen it. Tried to show her - she wouldn’t even watch the opening scene before demanding Blaze again (I was quite disappointed as I’ve never seen it either!).

So my question - is this likely to cause any issues at nursery? I don’t want her not to have little friends or anyone to play with because she’s not interested in the same sort of toys/games. Am I overthinking it? She is PFB - as if you couldn’t tell ! - and I just have this image of her being left alone in the playground. Do lots of other little girls like trains and cars? Do the kids all just play together in a big group? Please say they do and that I’ve just been unlucky with the play dates so far!

My DS is 3 and loves playing with baby dolls and his friends are all girls. He does love boys toys too but who cares and the nursery doesn’t as long as there happy

Lots of very interesting stuff here thank you so much.

The PP who read my question as one of concern about making friends is absolutely right. I couldn’t care less if she likes cars (that’s why I keep buying them for her!); I just saw her little face on the play dates when she asked where the cars were and the slightly older girl, dressed as a fairy, said scornfully that cars were for BOYS and ran off. And then we had something similar here with a different friend’s daughter, who told DD that her cars were “boring” and demanded that they play “frozen” - DD looked so bewildered and then came to sit on my knee.

God, i’m going to be an absolute wreck when it comes to stuff like parties and friendship groups aren’t I? Where are the grips?!

She is very young not all girls like fairy wings and frozen although you need to keep reinforcing that some girls love all that stuff it is hard though but she will make friends andfor a few years it might be boys.

It is actually a good thing she’s going to nursery. She’ll make friends and you’ll be able to organise play dates with kids she likes to play with, whether they are boys or girls. My three year old DD is very girly, loves princesses, fairies, the colour pink as well as Batman, Spider-Man and goes straight to the motorbike on fairground rides. She did jump around in the room at nursery this morning going ‘POW! I’m BATMAN!’ in her pink unicorn dress. I’m sure your DD will find likeminded friends, boys and girls

I have a 3.75yr dd who goes to nursery, she has an older brother, she loves cars and the construction area and all her nursery “best friends” are boys. As she has grown through the year her make believe playing has increased substantially and she loves houses and cars.

Have you seen the little helper 3D playrugs? You get houses, cities etc so could combine people and car play