There is this dual group thing starting to happen at my daughter's preschool -- kids with working moms are scheduling playdates for weekends and kids whose moms stay at home do this during the week, after leaving school at 3pm. The kids my daughter seems to be friends with have working moms so we're ok in terms of scheduling -- but this got me thinking that as the kids get older their social interactions might be guided by how their moms work.

Have you found the same in your daycare/school?

What an intriguing observation. I think you're onto something here. I belong to a moms' group here in Florida and I've noticed that since many events are scheduled during the week, full-time working moms tend to drop out eventually. The organizers have responded to this problem by deliberately scheduling more weekend events, and they've recently started scheduling a playground meetup at 5:30pm every Thursday in the hope that working moms and dads will feel more welcome.

My daughter is only 15 months, so we don't do a lot of playdates right now. I did join a mom's group here that consists of all types of moms, but most of the playdates are during the week. Weekends are 'family time' so most SAHMs and the working moms with different schedules don't do weekend events. I hadn't thought about how this might affect my daughter as she gets older.

I don't think it has too much impact once they are in school, because both stay at home moms and working moms tend to like to have their weeknights to get readyfor the next day of school/activities/work, so most things will be scheduled on the weekends. I think it will all even out as the kids get older and they will hang out with who they want to...not based on their mom's schedules.

I have noticed that the SAHMs and working moms don't interact much at my Mom's group. I used to attend a chapter that was on a weeknight, and mostly working moms attended, but I started to realize that I was too tired to get out of the house at that time every month. So now I attend a meeting during the day, with mostly stay at home moms and moms who work part time. So I guess for now babyjama will be interacting with kids based on the moms' schedules...hmm...it's interesting to ponder.