How do I make friends with the other parents at nursery?

[Marzipanni]

Evening everyone.

My daughter is three. I’m a SAHM and she’s been at home with me full-time so far, but has just started nursery one morning a week. So far, she’s doing really well and has settled in brilliantly (bearing in mind that we’re only two weeks into term!)

The main reason I put her in nursery is that she’s finally starting to seem interested in other children and wanting to socialise. She’s the only child in the family (apart from her brother, who is a newborn) and my friends’ kids are all much older, so I’m really keen for her to get out there and make some friends of her own.

I feel like it would help if I made friends with the other nursery kids’ parents. But there’s really no stand-around-and-chat time at drop-off — my daughter and I get there early, but we’re the only people who do; everyone else seems to turn up exactly as the doors open — and at pick-up, the other parents stand around on their phones and I feel too awkward to interrupt and try and chat to anyone.

My daughter has never been on a play date, or been invited to a birthday party or had one of her own. I’ve been taking her to toddler groups and stay-and-plays very regularly since she was tiny, and have made my own ‘mum friends’ there, but she’s never gelled with any of the other kids. They’ve never been quite the right age.

I’m being careful not to put any pressure on her or make her aware of this being ‘a thing’ for me, but I’m so anxious for her to make some pals and I really want the other parents to like me so they’ll think to invite my baby to their baby’s birthday parties and stuff! (Can you tell I was a weird, lonely kid and have become a weird, shy adult?)

What should I do? How do I make friends with parents I hardly ever see and who don’t seem super social?

Ooh, there actually is a little park very close to the nursery… we don’t go there often as we don’t live super close by and there are better parks much nearer to us, but I’ll start taking the kids up there at the weekends to see if we serendipitously bump into anyone she recognises… brilliant idea.

Most people who use nurseries work & are juggling very young children, they may just not have time.

I think your daughter might struggle to make friends of her own in nursery if she's only there one morning a week

You might be better off putting her in a regular ballet, football, gymnastics class etc and chatting with the parents there

Most people who use nurseries are working. They don't have time for playdates and making friends.

I would’ve thought this was definitely the case in nurseries with younger children, but this is a preschool nursery inside a primary school with just once class of 3-4-year-olds, so I would also have thought that at least some of the other parents would be like me, enrolling their children for socialising purposes and to get them ready for school.

We’re thinking of increasing her hours next term, but even then won’t increase it by much, as she’d never been anywhere without a parent before nursery and we don’t want to push our luck!

I agree about increasing her hours. Even two or three mornings a week is going to give her a much better chance to settle in and make friends.

My eldest is at private nursery, 3 days a week and is 4 and it's only in the last 18 months, play dates and parties have materialised. Remember even if you aren't friends with the parents, your daughter will still benefit from the social aspect of nursery as well as building her own confidence

Depends a lot on your area I’d guess. I don’t know a lot of non working parents around us but regardless, nurseries usually insist on more time than half a day a week. Our old nursery (for childcare) now only does full time places and the school nursery runs school hours. If you’re not able to get her in for more days, I’d definitely look for clubs and activities she can do so she’s more able for school next year and knows more kids.

Put her in 5 days a week it will help her make friends.

Don’t let your past define you! Honestly, you’ve got to stop thinking of yourself as the weird shy one (if you still do). I was also virtually friendless at school and a misfit but I’ve overcome it as an adult.

Be friendly towards other parents at the library / playground / nursery / school. Read up about starting conversations and start interacting with people who seem friendly. Some people are completely closed off - obviously that’s fine and just leave them to it. Other people are glad of the conversation and I had several play dates come from what started as small talk. Also - there’s no need to rush it, sometimes it takes a few months of just smiling at someone or having a few nice words before it develops into a play date.

Don’t take it personally if people don’t talk to you. They will have their reasons and it most likely won’t be anything to do with you.

Say yes to party invites. They usually start from 3 or 4. When you go, be willing to chat if the chance arises. Think of a few easy things to say before you go or just comment on what the children are doing or how fun the activity looks.

As has been said, it will be hard to make friends if your daughter is only going 1 morning a week. But you can still try to be friendly and also look out for people in a similar situation at other places. Library and playground worked for me.

My kids both went to the school nursery and stayed at the same school for Reception. They didn't make proper friends in nursery. There were kids they liked playing with but they basically played with whoever was at the same toy area as them. I chatted to some of the parents at drop-off/pick-up, but it didn't develop much beyond that. My DD had 1 party invite, none for my DS. They both made lots of friends in Reception, as did I. The classes were mixed up and children joined from elsewhere. The kids were a bit older and the parents were a bit more invested in making friends.

Honestly WhatsApp group chats can be the bane of many parent existence. I'm the least antisocial person there is but my nursery one is constant mute as rather than it being for parents to arrange playdates it's just used for people to moan about lost jumpers and repeated calls for volunteers to help with "maintenance" projects.

And I think you're overthinking parties. I just asked nursery for a list of people they played with, wrote out invitations and nursery gave them to parents. The thing is if she's only in a morning, she may not get invited to many parties.

I don’t think it’s typical to be friends with parents at nursery. But if you want to talk to people without being too weird, host a birthday party or send a note in for a friend with your contact details to ask if the friend would like to meet in the park for a play date.

Don’t be offended though if people aren’t interested. Most people who use nursery work. I did NOT want to be meeting up with nursery mums in my non-working hours. I wanted to be having family time because we missed out on it all week. A lot of parents will be in the same boat. You will be much more likely to meet other parents at groups you go to outside of nursery hours.

If it’s you who wants friends, you’re much more likely to make your own friends via hobbies, work, things you do without your kids because you actually have things in common with those people.

Conventional wisdom in early years is that less than 2 days a week is tricky because it’s so little they go through the separation anxiety over and over again each week because the nursery environment never becomes a true safe space. That’s what my friend who runs early years settings told me anyway and it seems to make sense. Also think how much free time you’d have if you put her in 5 mornings!

ETA: where you live are there many SAHP? In our school nursery most of the kids are collected by nannys or childminders. I only know 1 SAHP in the whole of my daughter’s school class. It could just be there’s not many people in your situation.

I think if you are only there one day a week, no one knows you. Also dc don’t really show any interest in playing cooperatively until around 4. It’s unlikely she would demonstrate she wanted to play with others at 3 so she’s not going to make friends and tell you about them. Maybe in YR, but even then, you need to be in the driving seat with inviting dc to play. At the moment though, you only appear once a week. School is every day so it’s different.

I’d up her days to be honest. Will she be starting school this time next year? One session a week isn’t much.