Wanted: Second Grade Class List

Playing with peers is overrated.  Over the weekend I brought my three children to an amazing kid-filled fourth of July party, full of people my children had never met.  We'd all assumed that they would pair off according to age.  Of course my five and a half year old would LOVE their five year old, of course my eight year old would bond with their nine year old.  And of course, we were all wrong.  My five and a half year old loved their seven year old who was over the moon at having such an adoring fan.  My eight year old was kind of curious to hang out with their twelve year old, who got to be an expert on everything and ignored the thirteen year old to hang out with this younger creature.

It got me wondering...and not for the first time...why do I always look to my children's classmates for playdates and out-of-school experiences?  The closer my younger daughter is in age to her playmate the more likely there is to be some enormous grabbing squabble or hideous competitive impasse.  My eight year old daughter was completely iced out by some mean eight year olds this year.  If she could have spent all her recesses with six year olds and thirteen year olds she would have been in heaven. And they would have enjoyed her company too.  She's mature and doting for the younger ones, and curious and faithful to the older ones.  Alas, the school schedule just isn't set up for that.  She has a lot to offer kids who aren't her age.  

So one child is entering kindergarten, and another is entering fourth grade.  I have a desk drawer full of kindergartner's contact info, and several years of papers filled with contact info for the kids who've been in my older daughter's classes for the last five years.  

In the last few weeks of school the mother of a first grader stopped me to tell me that her daughter had 'adopted' my youngest as the younger sister she didn't have.  We chuckled at how cute this little bond was, and then?  We didn't exchange phone numbers, and we didn't pursue getting the girls together outside of school.  And the next time I organized a playdate for my daughter I limited my calls to the kids her age, and then limited that list even further by assessing the various degrees of fighting that could be predicted by the various chemistry of these children.  I ended up with about three viable playdates, and two were out of town.  Now I feel like a complete idiot.  

What I really need is to contact that mother of that older girl who loves my younger girl, and arrange for our girls to get together.  And if I was really clever I'd just get my hands on the class list of those incoming second-graders and let my fingers do the walking.

An original post for nycmomsblog.  This mom's favorite things can be found at parentalapproval.blogspot.com.