When did yr toddler start making friends?

[painfullyhonest]

My DD is 2.6 and very confident and friendly, if anything too confident as she will stop and chat to anyone.

She's at nursery, she has lots of people she likes to see but she doesn't have a friend ie. someone who she plays with. She has one good friend actually who she has known from birth but he's a bit younger and they already see each other regularly.

Am just waiting impatiently for her to find a little girl to play with - or a little boy - to actually interact with. She has just started to talk about the children in her nursery and I confess I'm a bit shy, I am not yet sure if she has "befriended" a child and whether they'd actually get on if I had them round, so am not feeling confident about arranging a playdate. Lots of the kids in her class seem a bit older, more mature and have siblings so mums don't seem to hang around to ask if we'd like to do a playdate etc.

Please tell me everything will fall into place soon!

Oh I'm sure it will, she is still very young and it does take a while for them to properly start interacting and playing with one another. She obviously doesn't have a problem with confidence so I'm sure it will come.

Try and encourage her (I'm sure you do) to play with other children and encourage her to talk about who she sees at nursery, and ask her who she plays with etc.

Hi, my DS is 3y8m and for the last year he's been at pre-school with 3 children (2G's, 1 B who he's always called his 'best friend') that he's grown up with as we all met at baby group. In November he was invited to a boy's birthday party that I've never heard of but apparently they both like making train tracks at school together and then in the last 2 months he's actually made 3 new friends, one of them this week. He asked me to go over to a boy with him and could I ask the boy if they could play together to which the boy happily said yes. Now they're good friends and regularly play together and my DS is spending less and less time with the kids he's grown up with. Not in a bad way, he still likes them, he's just found a new confidence and is enjoying making new friends.
Her time will come, don't worry xxx

Tks for posts. Millie, that sounds great, must be lovely to watch

It took my DS (now 4.5) ages to understand what a friend was or really even the fact that other children really existed (iyswim). He must have been 3 really before he looked forward to seeing a particular child at playgroup or nursery. Even now it's not that many. He knows everyone's name but is quite clear who does and does not play with!