To not organise playdates because I don’t want other parents to judge our flat

[FreeBeeBird]

We live in a lovely but small 2 bed conversion flat on a very affluent area.
I don’t know all parents in DC class but out of the 7 or 8 I know, only an other couple lives in a similar flat to ours, everyone else has a nice house. I’d like to more actively encourage playdates for DC but I am a bit concerned that other parents might get a bit snobby about our place and judge where we live. I know it’s stupid and I shouldn’t care but I do and cannot shake this feeling off. How do I overcome this!
AIBU to feel this way?

How will affect her DC? We never had all this " playdate," stuff when mine were kids. And it's a bit hard to have other people's kids over when you work full time ( no necessarily mon -fri) or have other commitments. And what about the kids who you don't have a clue who their parents are as the child comes in on school transport.

Ok, I guess kids are all different, we always had a social one who wanted friends over.

Good for you deciding to invite them over. Once you've tried it, you'll see it is fine and be braver about this. Good luck!

In my family we absolutely had loads of play dates as kids, every week! It was so important for cementing good healthy friendships. We do the same with DS; luckily DH hosts some play dates too and it may be tricky to fit in but you preplan. We have various play dates set out over the next 4 weeks, at dates that mutually work from messaging - and then other friends are lined up to go to the same summer camp on the same day so that the kids can play. Primary age can't organise their own stuff, they will say they have invitations to a birthday next week for a kid who isn't having a birthday until November... it's really up to parents to organise an hour after school or a weekend activity/ home play.

I’ve lived and work with all types and there’s one thing I can assure you from my experience is that only the people with ‘less’ who think about judgement. The people with ‘more’ don’t notice and don’t care.

Use the summer period to have park meet ups at first. Then you’ll get to know people better. Then invite the one that you feel most comfortable with to your home first. At the end of the day do you want to be friends with someone you think is judgy anyway?

Anyone who judges you for living in a flat is moronic. I don’t know why anyone would judge your for living in a flat that you have said is lovely and in an affluent area.

Unless this is the type of school where you buy your way into a minuscule catchment area. That might attract comment I suppose.

@paasll no it isn’t, we have plenty of lovely primaries within catchment

Go for it
I lived in a flat above a pub (various ones, we moved a lot) for my whole childhood and there were some.. concerned parents
Once they had been, it was fine and the bonus was being able to play in the pub garden on the play equipment!

The only time I've judged someone on a play date is when their (large) house was filthy, I'm talking mouldy plates stacked up, an overflowing cat litter tray, stains and all over the sofa and carpet, slug trails on the kitchen floor... I faked a migraine after half an hour as it was triggering my asthma. DC never asked to go back!
I've been to all sorts of homes including someone who lives in a mobile home in their grandparents grounds, the DC don't care and neither do I!

I don't judge people on the size of their accommodation; I take more notice of their welcome, manners, sense of humour etc. I can't be doing with snobbery. Also that they make the effort to reciprocate.

There was a mother at my dd's school who lived in a tiny flat and our dc were great friends. She didn't have a big space in which to hold a party but she invited friends to the local park, prepared a picnic and a treasure hunt with great care and imagination, and everyone had a fabulous time. Similarly, instead of playdates she took DC out to galleries and museums.

I honestly don’t care what kind of place my DCs friends live in as long as it’s not filthy or has dangerous dogs. I wouldn’t judge and would be happy to have play dates.

I honestly can't imagine someone judging you for living in a flat. Go for it and enjoy the playdates!

Honestly, don’t even think about it. We live in the ‘big house’ relative to all dc’s friends. I do feel quite awkward having people over as everyone makes comments about the house. I think they are just being polite and trying to make conversation, but I know they are also trying to work out how we afford to live here. 🙈 All of dc’s friends live in much smaller terraced houses and bungalows. It would never even occur to me to judge or think badly of them. I’m just grateful a friend has invited them over. You could also always offer to meet at a playground, especially if you can’t be asked with tidying.

Clean, tidy and well-kept trumps size of the home. Every time. I say this as someone with an above-average sized house that is never properly tidy - so I don’t host nearly as much as I’d like, but for opposite reasons. It’s open door for my kids’ friends though, I think that’s important they can relax and hang out together here (obviously a bit older).

People who mind don’t matter, and people who matter don’t mind. If a parent judges you on your house, you don’t want to know that parent!

You don't have to host at home if you don't want to. You can organise days out instead.
But there's no way you'll be judged on the size of your home. Why would someone with one child need to live in a six bedroom mansion? If anyone wants to be snobby then you don't want to be friends with them anyway.
The only time I would ever judge the home of someone with kids is if it was literally a health hazard and totally unclean and dangerous. Even then I'd be worried about them rather than nasty.

I feel similar in that I just can’t get past the psychological barrier of people judging my home. A friend and an aunt both made derogatory comments about our home and it’s made me so self-conscious about it that I can’t bear anyone coming here ever since. DS(9) has had a friend around twice, and another friend stayed over twice when they were younger. I feel so guilty that I don’t encourage him to invite friends over.

Our house is clean and relatively tidy but needs a new kitchen and bathroom and the conservatory is getting towards the end of its life span.

As pp have said try and fight the barrier, don’t be like me!

I say just invite them in and get it over with. My experience is that people breathe a sigh of relief when they see my slightly shabby house, because for some reason they expect me to have a bigger house and more money. Nobody has ever turned their nose up, and they no longer feel they have to make a big effort when I go to their house, so everyone is more relaxed.

Keeping people at a distance is much more damaging to relationships than letting them see that your home is smaller than theirs (unless you have a murder wall or a load of swastika cushions I suppose).

I pay attention to whether a house is clean, safe and hosts are sensible. This is all that matters for playmates

If you don't reciprocate, invitations will fizzle out

I think this is the best approach. I had a brief spell of this when DC were much younger and were at a nursery with a lot children in affluent families (it was a nursery near work rather than home so big mix of professions in centre of a city). We lived in a tiny flat in a dodgy area while some friends had big houses in nice areas. I just went ahead with play dates anyway. We never did parties at home though (after the first one) but that was mainly because it was so chaotic and we had an awful downstairs neighbour. We're now in a home that was smaller than some of DCs friends but bigger than others. I have got over any comparison and my DC grew up knowing people live in different homes and the ones they liked to go to and the ones they didn't has NOTHING to do with the size of the home. And now all these years later I can't imagine I ever cared what someone else thinks about my home!

You won’t be judged for the size of your flat, but you won’t be popular if your daughter goes to friends’ houses and you never reciprocate.
I live in a village with a huge range of income. My house is a standard semi, my kids friends over the years have lived in tiny flats and mansions with swimming pools. Never really given it much thought. Everyone knows that some people have more money than others.

We live in a rented flat above a shop. We love it, mainly because of the location (we are less than a 10 minute walk into the city centre) and the fact that our DDs can each have their own bedroom - if we'd gone for a house in the same price range it would have had to have been a 2 bed.

I had some similar concerns to you OP when we were first living here, but over the years our home has become the main 'hang out' for our teen DDs and their friends. They both have decent sized bedrooms and we even have a large roof terrace, so plenty of space for sleepovers and parties! It's not a mansion, our furniture is a bit of a mish-mash and compared to many of their friends, we're certainly not "well off", but the teenagers all seem to love coming here, and that's what matters to us; our DDs being happy. Please try not to worry, kids are more interested in having fun than how much your home is worth!

If you're worried their house is going to be much posher than yours invite them first, then you won't actually know until you go theirs and then it will be too late to worry.

Agree.
When my kids were little, my main priority was that they were going somewhere safe, where there’d be a parent present, parent would be kind, preferably there wouldn’t be a scary dog, there wouldn’t be a bullying elder sibling, my kid would be fed something they’d eat, they’d be told where the toilet was etc. Never once did I worry about the size of the property.

When my kids came home from play dates, the ones they’d enjoyed the most tended to be the ones with the most involved parents. When they’re little they like parents to play with them. DS1 said his best ever play date was with a poor family in a small flat, where the Mum played musical statues and sleeping lions with them, and gave them home made Hungarian cakes!

Loving all your replies, thank you so much.
As I mentioned, I think our flat is lovely, well maintained, decorated with love and care and in a lovely location, it’s just that 90% of other families seem to be in 3bed semis and more. It’s a fairly affluent area, we have a good income now but were late FT buyers and it’s all we could afford.