{Friendship Friday} How easy is friend dating when you're at different life stages?

I know this is a day late but it somehow didn't feel right to just move on past and ignore my friendship friday thoughts!


So you all know I love the back and forth banter after you leave a comment on the blog. Well, in one such exchange someone mentioned that she wonders if other women also have a hard time with one aspect of the friendship thing - actually having friend dates when you and your friends are in different life stages.

She is the only one of her friends who is married and with kids.

Let's face it - kids throw your whole life up in the air and you just grab a few balls here and there and try to juggle them.

Here are my experiences:

When we were child-free (and we were without kids for a LONG 14 years, most of those years by choice), we still made plans with our friends who all had kids. Except for two couples, which I'll talk about later.

The difference was that all the couples with kids except for one had kids who were older and more independent.

The one friend couple with smaller kids parent very differently to how we thought we would parent (and that's a blog for next week :)) and so after one too many instances of having to DEEP clean after they left on a Friday night, we decided to not have them over anymore and instead meet at a restaurant or at their house.

That worked well for years and when their kids were older they started coming over to our place again :)

The other two couples without kids were in the same position as us then so there were no issues. But now, it's a problem for us.

Couple 1
This is a couple I wrote about previously who fight loud and about sex in front of us. D said he's not paying good babysitting money to be stressed so now she and I go out together without the husbands. Occasionally they will pop past for a quick coffee and that is fine but not a full-on date night.

Couple 2
This couple is super structured and incredibly OCD. They are very good uncles and aunts to their nephews and nieces so I thought they'd be okay with our two. BUT (I've never written about this here) I got a bad vibe the last time we were together at their house (late last year). I just don't think they were prepared for the busyness of two-year-old twins and I honestly think they were glad to see us go.

Of course this breaks my heart - we've been friends for 12 years! They didn't ask us back (!!!) and I actually reached out to invite them here for lunch soon. In a strange twist of fate, they may be doing to us what we did to our other friends. Ha!

Other couple friends
Our other friends are REALLY easy to get together with because their kids are either grown up enough to take care of themselves or they're already out of the house :))

So those are the couple friends.

Of my friends where I am only friends with the girls, there is only one I can think of who doesn't have kids.

My blog friend, F.

  

I invited F to my infertility support group in Feb and then I suggested a movie in March.

She was totally game and the plan was set about a month in advance, only nearer the time we both felt like speaking more so we had supper instead.

I must say, it is lovely meeting up with friends without babies because the planning is simple and uncomplicated.

You guys know I prioritise friendships so D and I chat about when he needs to be home on time and off I go. I prep the kids in the morning that Daddy will put them to bed and that I'll come kiss them when I get home and that's what we do. Easy.

Somehow (and this is a topic for yet another blog post) I feel no guilt whatsoever leaving the kids at night because they're meant to be sleeping. But on a weekend I very rarely leave them alone and instead make "family dates".

F was late so I took a little walk and had to take these pics

Yes, all the cool and stylish people thought I was weird taking pics

I chose this restaurant totally based on how pretty everything was - look at those blue chairs!

our view looked better in person

gorgeous skies. Fortunately F is weird like me and didn't mind me taking these pics

So F and I had a lovely supper a few weeks ago. 

To summarise, I'm currently finding it easier making plans with people in different life stages than us (no kids) and I suppose if we host all the time or go to a child-friendly restaurant, things with our other couple friends will go back to normal :)

What about you?

Have you found it easier or more difficultto make plans with friends in different life stages?

PS Rachel from MWF Seeking BFF   talks in her book about one friend date exactly like this. In her example, it didn't work out because they were far too dissimilar. I think that person's name was Julie. Will one of you (I'm pleased to say there are about 5 people besides me who read the book - Sweets, Helene, MandyE, Rebecca, April, anyone else?) correct me if I'm wrong? Thanks :)

 PPS if you want me to talk about a particular friendship aspect, please leave a note in the comments or email me.