Yesterday my DS who's 5 was playing w/ some neighborhood girls who are about 8. DS loves when the girls come over. However, yesterday after a while they left and went to another child's house. We won't let him go away from home w/out us watching. He was crushed and just cried his eyes out saying why won't they play w/ me? DH was upset for DS and really didn't know what to tell him other than the girls are older and can go to other's houses. I was at the grocery when all this occurred.

My question is was there a better way to handle it or something else we could say? Really there's not a lot of neighborhood kids around. Our neighborhood is families but it seems that home is just a place where they sleep. That is really sad to me because I had a wonderful group of neighborhood friends in the small town I was raised in. Is is just the society we live in or is it just living in a city? TIA for any help! :-D

I don't have any answers am affraid but am glad you asked the question will be good to see what ppl say , cos we are just starting to have that with our dd nearly 4 and the girl nxt door is 8 and i don't mind when i can see and hear what's going on , but she has come out with some things that i feel are too old for my dd. we have said the same thing that she is too young to play out away from us, but she does not really understand.

Well, when my kids were that age, they didnt leave my site!! They were aloud to play outside our house but where we were living when they were that age, I didnt trust anyone! It was just a rule and they knew it and they didnt argue or really get upset. I think a couple of times they, or one of my girls may have gotten upset bc an older friend left after playing but I kind of just let her cry it out. I mean what can you do. I actually found it funny bc poor thing was just outside crying her heart out shouting 'NICOLE!!!!!' over and over... 'why wont you play wis me???!!!' Im the kind of mum who thinks that kind of thing is a little cute and...funny. Im mean tho..:twisted:

LOL Gen. I am the same way. It's hard not to laugh when they are being overdramatic like that. (I usually try not to let Timmy see me laughing though lol).

I agree that these things just happen. Where we're at now there aren't really any kids Timmys age, and I wouldn't let him out of my sight to play with them if there were. He has friends though. Kids at awanas, and his counsins who are around his age. I would just let him play with your family or friends kids. Or set up play dates with kids from your church, or just let him play with them there.

What I would tell him is, "sorry hon, but they can't stay and play forever, they have other things they need to do too."