When Caitlin had her 4th birthday party, I had invited these particular two friends of hers.
The first is a friend over a year older than her. Their Mummees have known each other before they knew their respective husbands, and naturally when both had daughters, they play when the adults get together. The second is a classmate she gets along well- she talks about her all the time after school; at parent teacher meetings the teachers have even complained that these two chatterboxes had to be separated!
If I can categorise these 2 friends- one is while in school-mode, the other is outside of school-mode; if you know what I mean. It’s not that Caitlin is or acts differently in and out of school, but she only sees these friends in respective surroundings and circumstances.
So this party was held in an indoor kids’ gym, you know- steps and rubber balls and slides. And these two friends were present.
Being host we arrived early. Caitlin was off to the gym. Her friends started arriving, and quickly joined in the fun. This was also the first time I watched Caitlin playing host, unprompted. Let me rephrase that: This was the first time I had to prompt her to be a host. But it was all good; after all, in a place like that, one (kid) would not really need much urging to join in!
Soon, both of these friends were present. And since both didn’t know each other, they were demanding the attention of Caitlin.
While Caitlin was quite happy following either one of them, the other was starting to feel neglected in that Caitlin either didn’t heed her plea to “come over here..” or didn’t hear her at all. When she played with school friend, the other was feeling left out and cried. So when we asked Caitlin to also include the other, somehow the first one then became somewhat left out too. Caitlin, in all this time, was busy accommodating one or the other!
So the tears were flowing, complaints being raised with the mummies, and Caitlin seemingly needed coaching.
But even I was at a loss somewhat. Naturally I was thinking in adult-mode: Can’t we all just join in and (learn to) get along? Hot Mummee and I were saying things to all 3 girls to try and pacify and solve the “issue”. “Why don’t you include the other…”, “Why don’t all 3 of you play together…”, “.. they don’t know each other, so you (Caitlin) have to try and get them to play together….”
While it is somewhat amusing to see this little dilemma, how would you have settled this triangle?? 
They seem to start having best friends at this stage so your situation is tricky, and compounded by the fact that they think like little kids and not adults. I’ll get back to you on this one once I’ve recovered from A’s disgusting behaviour today (no thanks to sleep deprivation)…..
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Wow… this is a toughie.
I think she will have to rough this one out… until she and her friends are a little more mature.
From my personal experience as a child, and also observing other kids, especially girls, it’s hard to include and involve everyone unless the individual parties are willing to just join in and not wanting to be invited and coaxed over and over again (a certain temperament need more coaxing than others).
I think this is why you’ll have more emotional issues like jealousy and insecurities to deal with in girls.
It’s basically how the brain work:
The female brain sees everything as a whole, like a spring extended, a spiral line.
The male’s brains puts everything into small or large circles depending on priority, i.e. work, a goal, leisure, etc.
Hence, man can be more logical, see things in separate compartments, can change subjects/ thoughts easily and not let emotions come in the way of reaching an objective.
The woman, for her, her world is like an apple pie. It’s good when you get a bit of everything in one bite: the crust, the sauce, the fruit, the spice, the tiny bits of nuts; warm enough to the tongue but not scalding hot. Every bit is important to make her world perfect.
… Errrm, so I digress. Sorry…
So coming back to Caitlin and her two friends,
doing a three-some outing might do the trick, or may be disastrous.
If the latter is the result, she would just have to play with them at separate occasions until they are a little older and more mature in dealing with themselves and things that threaten their perfect little world.
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I think what the adults tried to do to solve the “drama” is pretty much all that one can do. Spending more time trying to console and make it work amongst the girls took away the fun and great time Caitlin could have had on her bday. The girls will have to work it out themselves!
Anything different from what the adults had already done??? I think maybe introducing the two girls and having them do a trendy hand-shake or pinky-bonding (whatever the trend is now) will help in the beginning. This is a terratorial thing! Instead of “telling” the girls to play together will be a waste of time since kids their age now is not willing to “share”.
Can’t blame the kids as at times… even adults girls/ladies behave with such jealousy. Go figure!!!
oh….reckon if I was there, maybe I would have played with the one that was being left out and try to get her involved as well.
Don’t know really…..so you see…my friends all consist of 2-3 year olds too! I hardly have time to talk to my adult friends these days.
But having said all that, none of the mummies should have complained and Caitlin definitely need not need coaching. It was just one of those incidents that could not be avoided!
Boys would have just knocked each other out silly!
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