When my wife and I moved into our house in 2009, we were the youngest couple by far in our section of the neighborhood. There were no little kids to be found. When we had kids five years later, still no other kids for them to play with. We don’t have a traditional “block” because our street wraps around our entire neighborhood. Therefore it is hard to really get to know anyone unless they are close by us. I saw other friends with an amazing group of neighbors that they hung out with all the time. Not us.
Fast forward to the last couple of years. Our neighborhood has changed over and we started getting younger families moving in. Through sports and some neighborhood activities, we finally started meeting some other families. Now we have built some really amazing friendships that go beyond just our kids hanging out. We now have a neighborhood group that all love to hang out together. The kids run around like crazy while the adults chat, have a drink, and play some games. It is so nice to be able to do that, and then just walk home. It is fun for the kids to be able to have kids to meet them at the park or have play dates together.
The other huge benefit has been the ability to car pool to all of these different activities. We have three or four families that our kids participate in the same sports. This allows us to be able to carpool so we can all be where we need to be. This morning my daughter had dance and my son had basketball. I took him to basketball, and our neighbors took my daughter to dance so my wife could come watch basketball. Next week we will rotate so that the other families can go to their other kid’s sports. This also helps when we can’t be there to get our kids off the bus. Our neighbors will grab ours and keep them until we get home, and we will do the same for them.
I love the friendships that we have made in our neighborhood lately. Not only does it give us some fun people to hang out with, but also it gives us options to help us out when needed. Complete game changer.
A Second Inside My Brain 
Having this type of neighborhood is a game-changer! I was able to raise my three boys in a similar place. Many evenings were spent with kids playing and adults chatting. I miss that!
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I love that your neighborhood is starting to fit in with your family! How fun for the kids to have others right next door or down the street.
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This is literally us! We moved into our neighborhood about 3 years ago and we are the youngest on our block. We dream of young families moving in with young kids to make get togethers and play dates as easy as crossing the street! Hopefully it won’t be long!
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What a huge gift to have a community that helps and supports each other.
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That’s so nice! We just started kind of talking to some people in our neighborhood last fall, but there are not a lot of younger kids directly near us. I think we’re in that phase you were earlier where some families are starting to move in, but there’s still a majority older empty nesters.
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Such a wonderful thing to have in your neighborhood
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