Anyone else with one DC doing much better friendshipwise than the other?

[Flyonthewindscreen]

I've been feeling concerned for a while that my DD (Reception)is doing better friendshipwise than my DS (Y2). My DD has a number of close friends, 2 of them live on our street and she is often invited on playdates. My DS does have a few friends, gets on generally well with his class but doesn't seem that close to any of them and has fewer invitations.

My DS has always been a sociable child so I feel this situation stems from our moving house and school while he was in reception. We live in a village where most children go to the playgroup together before entering the nursery class as pretty much the same group and then staying together in the same class until high school. While we moved in time for my DD to join the playgroup and become part of the "group" early enough, my DS seems to have missed the boat a bit. He still says he preferred his old school and friends .

I've done as much I can for him in terms of inviting anyone he shows an interest in for playdates, making sure I'm known and friendly to the other Y2 parents, etc but now am in a situation where I'm deliberately delaying returning DD's playdates/inviting DS's friends multiple times without reciprocation so it appears to them that they have roughly the same amount of out of school social life. Is this the right thing to do?

Would be grateful for any advice...

hi Kam - my DS (5) has always found it loads easier to make friends ever since toddlerhood than my DD (7) who is the classic introvert, and anxious with it. when they started at a new school earlier this year she actually really leant on him socially and this happened at their previous school too. i have worried a lot about it in the past but she has come out of shell loads this year and they now have roughly the same number of playdates - hers from a smaller more select pool of friends, his from a seemingly endless pool of mates that i can barely keep track of!
i must say that sometimes i feel i am constantly inviting people round with less reciprocation so i know how that feels - i think in our school the mums aren't as into the whole playdate thing as i am (i love having kids around and find it actually makes my life easier in terms of entertaining the kids - even if the house gets trashed ) so i put it down to a school culture thing. the mums are lovely and very friendly but i do find it tends to be me making the first move a lot. but the kids are happy and that's the main thing. is that a factor for you at all do you think - the 'culture' one i mean?

A lot of this is to do with personalties I suspect. My ds is an introvert and takes a long time to form strong friendships whereas dd is an extrovert and makes it her business to make friends with new people she meets more or less instantly. Your post stuck a chord as it could have been me when they were small. I think the way boys play tends to lead to them having less close friendships than girls too - boys seem to go around in big groups & play footie etc. whereas girls are more likely to have 'best friends'.

The age difference between mine is the same as yours and ds is also the older, but they are both teenage now, both happy and both have good friends. I think you are doing the right things, though I wouldn't overdo the delaying dd's friends' invites - just make a bit of an extra effort for your ds; he'll get there in the end.

Thanks for your replies - Katie there is a quite a strong 'playdate culture' at our school but obviously varies according to different parents circumstances (SAHM/WOHM, etc), so am not sure whether DD's more frequent invitations are down to her or luck that her friends mums are in position to have kids round frequently. Snorkle, I will carry on making extra effort for DS although it leads to complaints from DH about constant unreciprocated trashing of house by small boys