One of the hardest things for me in the early days of parenting was finding other mom friends and dad friends. There was so much overwhelm with the new baby, so little support for going back to work, and so few hours in the day.
Over time, I’ve learned how to build friendship networks and community support, but it’s taken a lot of trial and error. This week, I interviewed Beth Berry all about finding friends and building community.
In this thread (leave a comment!) I’d love to know from you all: how did you build your village of support, if you have one? What support systems to you rely on—from food to babysitting to friends to in-laws to grandparents or co-living arrangements?
What are the best ideas you’ve seen around building a village? Share your ideas below (even your wish list!) so we can generate a thread of ideas for each other.
After interviewing so many people about this, I've been able to collect a lot of ideas about building your village from various sources:
Angela Garbes writes about super-fun kids nights, where you collaborate with a few other families to create a standing weekly or monthly kid playdate at rotating households. One family is in charge each week, the other grown-ups get to go out and have some time to themselves. That way, if you have three families, you get two babysitting sessions for each kid fun night that you host!
Shama Hyder talks about having a super-early morning nanny to help with the mornings so she can actually sleep in -- they come and let themselves in with a special access code and they do all the baby stuff so she can sleep in until 10am or 11am (her preferred schedule is to work super late in the evening until midnight or 2am and then sleep in late in the mornings).
Sarah Peck, the host of the Startup Parent Podcast, shares how when people offer to help, that the default is to say "oh no, it's okay," but actually if you say YES to help, this can be a great way to initiate friendships and longer-term relationships.
Courtney Martin has written about how she lives in a collaborative community, and they have shared meals specific days of the week. Every Friday is a communal meal -- swoon!
Some parents I know also collaborate on rotating dinners, so that you make double the meal and put half of it into leftover containers and swap the leftovers with another family so you have something "new" for the next day and you don't have to do as much daily cooking.
Share what you've learned, built, or tried when it comes to community building on this thread →
We really lucked out in finding our village. We built a house in a pre-planned neighborhood of 18 houses back in 2018. Turns out that lots of people do this when they’re ready to “start” a family. We now collectively have 18 kids 7 and under. A few houses have older kids which is great for babysitting, win-win! The kids all play together, we do egg hunts and trick or treating, have a block party and pool parties, take kid classes together, and random Friday pizza nights. My son is the only only child, so it’s been a huge benefit to us since he doesn’t have cousins or other friends with kids that are close by.
I found out I was pregnant in Feb 2020, so right before Covid became a thing. Even with social distancing so many of us were pregnant and taking walks in the neighborhood and could at least have shouting conversations from across the street. Highly recommend considering a new neighborhood for those who are able, it’s no guarantee but we’ve been so blessed with ours.
This is so amazing. EIGHTEEN KIDS. That's a village right there!
My oldest is 7 now, and we are just tilting into the stage where I can tell the 4.5 year old and the 7 year old to go outside and play and they ... they do. It's so different than toddler-hood.
But also, toddlers and preschoolers can be so much more fun when there are groups of them and you can play zone defense with other parents instead of 1-1 with each kid.
I'd love to hear more stories about what it's like to be in this community! And do you mind sharing where (roughly) in the country you ended up landing?
We're in central NJ, kind of farmy suburbs. It's especially nice now that all the kids know all the adults, it makes it so much easier for any of us to keep an eye on each other's kids when we're all playing outside together. Once they know your name, you'll be on the list of people they can go to when they need something, or to tell a story to, or tattle because yeah that happens too.
My delayed response is due to doing so many things this holiday weekend, and I literally don't think I even left the neighborhood! So just as an example: Fri night we hosted game night in our backyard with our next-door neighbors on both sides, just adults after the kids went to bed. Sat morning we invited both neighbors back over, with kids, to go swimming, one family already had plans, so we invited over another family. Five kids, ages almost 2 to 4.5 played together in the pool and had ice pops. My son, 2.5yo, was finally willing to try his swimmies since the 4yo had hers on. Sunday we recovered hahaha. Monday was the annual July 3rd party that one of the neighbors hosts, so almost all the neighbors were over there with kids. Another pool so that keeps the kids pretty occupied. When it got dark, all the kids sat on the front porch (this was an amazing photo) and watched the fireworks that the grownups responsibly set off in the street. Then Tues we invited a family over to come swim for the day and grilled some burgers.
There are downsides sometimes though too. Because we can all see each other's houses, it can sometimes make people feel left out if they see others hanging out without being invited themselves. That can extend down to the kids too.
But there's other benefits too. One of my neighbors had a water leak and their basement flooded recently. They borrowed water vacuums from us and another neighbor, since theirs was actually lent out at the time eek. I installed a Little Free Library in front of my house so that the kids (and adults too) can swap books with each other, encouraging reading and discussion. It's been really cool! As I learn more interests that each kid has, I can pick out books that target those interests and then they feel really special.
For me, I still have a friend that I first met in kindergarten and she lived down the block from me. On this dead-end block we had so many kids around my age and we'd play kickball and My Little Ponies together. I didn't think the world was like that anymore, but it feels like I found this special little pocket where it still is :)
Finding a village of people during the pandemic? That was... impossible. We need a separate support group for moms who gave birth in 2020-2022. I don't know if I know what it's like to have babies and toddlers without social distancing and complete isolation.
THIS. This is so important. I keep hearing from people who became parents in the pandemic about how they don't know what the early age(s) of babies and motherhood would be like without the pandemic. I want to make a separate community thread on this -- what are you grieving if you became a parent in the pandemic.
After interviewing so many people about this, I've been able to collect a lot of ideas about building your village from various sources:
Angela Garbes writes about super-fun kids nights, where you collaborate with a few other families to create a standing weekly or monthly kid playdate at rotating households. One family is in charge each week, the other grown-ups get to go out and have some time to themselves. That way, if you have three families, you get two babysitting sessions for each kid fun night that you host!
Shama Hyder talks about having a super-early morning nanny to help with the mornings so she can actually sleep in -- they come and let themselves in with a special access code and they do all the baby stuff so she can sleep in until 10am or 11am (her preferred schedule is to work super late in the evening until midnight or 2am and then sleep in late in the mornings).
Sarah Peck, the host of the Startup Parent Podcast, shares how when people offer to help, that the default is to say "oh no, it's okay," but actually if you say YES to help, this can be a great way to initiate friendships and longer-term relationships.
Courtney Martin has written about how she lives in a collaborative community, and they have shared meals specific days of the week. Every Friday is a communal meal -- swoon!
Some parents I know also collaborate on rotating dinners, so that you make double the meal and put half of it into leftover containers and swap the leftovers with another family so you have something "new" for the next day and you don't have to do as much daily cooking.
Share what you've learned, built, or tried when it comes to community building on this thread →
Something else I would add to this -- voice note threads and text threads with other moms so you can text anytime and talk through things.
We really lucked out in finding our village. We built a house in a pre-planned neighborhood of 18 houses back in 2018. Turns out that lots of people do this when they’re ready to “start” a family. We now collectively have 18 kids 7 and under. A few houses have older kids which is great for babysitting, win-win! The kids all play together, we do egg hunts and trick or treating, have a block party and pool parties, take kid classes together, and random Friday pizza nights. My son is the only only child, so it’s been a huge benefit to us since he doesn’t have cousins or other friends with kids that are close by.
I found out I was pregnant in Feb 2020, so right before Covid became a thing. Even with social distancing so many of us were pregnant and taking walks in the neighborhood and could at least have shouting conversations from across the street. Highly recommend considering a new neighborhood for those who are able, it’s no guarantee but we’ve been so blessed with ours.
Also, local MOMS Clubs are great too!
This is so amazing. EIGHTEEN KIDS. That's a village right there!
My oldest is 7 now, and we are just tilting into the stage where I can tell the 4.5 year old and the 7 year old to go outside and play and they ... they do. It's so different than toddler-hood.
But also, toddlers and preschoolers can be so much more fun when there are groups of them and you can play zone defense with other parents instead of 1-1 with each kid.
I'd love to hear more stories about what it's like to be in this community! And do you mind sharing where (roughly) in the country you ended up landing?
We're in central NJ, kind of farmy suburbs. It's especially nice now that all the kids know all the adults, it makes it so much easier for any of us to keep an eye on each other's kids when we're all playing outside together. Once they know your name, you'll be on the list of people they can go to when they need something, or to tell a story to, or tattle because yeah that happens too.
My delayed response is due to doing so many things this holiday weekend, and I literally don't think I even left the neighborhood! So just as an example: Fri night we hosted game night in our backyard with our next-door neighbors on both sides, just adults after the kids went to bed. Sat morning we invited both neighbors back over, with kids, to go swimming, one family already had plans, so we invited over another family. Five kids, ages almost 2 to 4.5 played together in the pool and had ice pops. My son, 2.5yo, was finally willing to try his swimmies since the 4yo had hers on. Sunday we recovered hahaha. Monday was the annual July 3rd party that one of the neighbors hosts, so almost all the neighbors were over there with kids. Another pool so that keeps the kids pretty occupied. When it got dark, all the kids sat on the front porch (this was an amazing photo) and watched the fireworks that the grownups responsibly set off in the street. Then Tues we invited a family over to come swim for the day and grilled some burgers.
There are downsides sometimes though too. Because we can all see each other's houses, it can sometimes make people feel left out if they see others hanging out without being invited themselves. That can extend down to the kids too.
But there's other benefits too. One of my neighbors had a water leak and their basement flooded recently. They borrowed water vacuums from us and another neighbor, since theirs was actually lent out at the time eek. I installed a Little Free Library in front of my house so that the kids (and adults too) can swap books with each other, encouraging reading and discussion. It's been really cool! As I learn more interests that each kid has, I can pick out books that target those interests and then they feel really special.
For me, I still have a friend that I first met in kindergarten and she lived down the block from me. On this dead-end block we had so many kids around my age and we'd play kickball and My Little Ponies together. I didn't think the world was like that anymore, but it feels like I found this special little pocket where it still is :)
Finding a village of people during the pandemic? That was... impossible. We need a separate support group for moms who gave birth in 2020-2022. I don't know if I know what it's like to have babies and toddlers without social distancing and complete isolation.
THIS. This is so important. I keep hearing from people who became parents in the pandemic about how they don't know what the early age(s) of babies and motherhood would be like without the pandemic. I want to make a separate community thread on this -- what are you grieving if you became a parent in the pandemic.