Let them be.

So, we get together with friends every Friday night for conversation, food, and drinks. I've felt a little bad as a new postdoc in the lab, "U", very much wanted to join in but as she had a 13 month old, coming to our apartment between 8pm and 1am wasn't really feasible. Now it is summer time and we try to hold our weekly meeting at a local park. U mentioned that she and her son would come and I told her that would be great. I said I was sure the L and M would love playing with the little boy. At least that was what would happen in my mind. L and M would be darling little surrogates to the little one, talking and playing gently with him while all the adults chatted and admired what friendly children I have. Of course that didn't happen. They barely even looked at the poor little guy. I tried to coax them in the "right" direction, suggesting playing in the sandbox with him. No dice. There were other, bigger kids in the park and these were English speaking kids to boot. I fretted about it a moment. Then I remembered another blogger mom who wrote about a very similar thing: accepting your kids for who they are, imperfect and wonderful. Who cares if U felt the boys were ignoring her little one. In fact I doubt seriously she gave it a second thought. It was ME who wanted this idyllic scene, the boys were perfectly happy. U and her son also enjoyed themselves. I sat down at the picnic blanket, grabbed a glass of wine and relaxed while L and M ran with the big kids.