How To Find Community & Make Mom Friends

Finding ‘mom friends’ has proven to be a lot more difficult than I thought. Only one of my close friends was a mom when I had Piper and I’ve had to put energy and effort into finding other moms to connect with the past two years. It’s been challenging at times but proven to be invaluable and so worth it. Today I now have a handful of amazing mom friends who I depend on and count on to get through this journey of motherhood, I truly feel like I couldn’t do it without them! There are many ways to connect with other moms in real life- and I’ve found my online mom communities to be just as valuable. It’s one of the reasons why I started The Mama Notes Facebook Community! So here are a few ideas for making new mom friends of your own — and I also highly suggest reading the book The Mommy Group: Freaking Out, Finding Friends, and Surviving The Happiest Time Of Our Lives.

 

Classes:

It’s never too early to start taking your baby to classes! It’s a great way to get out of the house and connect with other mamas. We did a free baby class at the library when Piper was pretty young and since then I’ve always tried to have her enrolled in something or regularly go to the free library classes offered every week. I will say that in my experience you still have to make a conscious effort to connect with moms during these classes and put yourself out there. We were recently invited over for a playdate

Peanut App:

Think Tinder for meeting mom friends. Genius, right? I haven’t tried it myself but I really want to after we settle into a routine with the new baby and I’m on maternity leave. (There’s also a similar site that I haven’t heard as much about called Hello Mamas)

Form a Mom Group:

This can be harder but also more rewarding. I’ve hosted a few ‘bagels & babes’ at my house for local mama friends I’ve connected with from different parts of my life as an opportunity for us to get together and relax with our kids too. It’s also fun to plan outings without kids!

Find local motherhood groups:

I haven’t done this myself but I know it’s an easy way to meet other mothers, there are stroller walking groups, exercise groups, our local community has a “mom group” – I’d start with Google and see what you can find.

Put Yourself Out THERE:

This is actually really hard for me personally, but in order to make new friends you have to put yourself out there. Piper really enjoys playing with a little girl in her soccer class and last week her mom invited us over for a lunch play date. I thought how admirable that was and how I’ve never done that – such a simple gesture but an easy way to meet new moms.

Join a Facebook Community:

Facebook has proven to be soooo helpful for me in motherhood. Though I haven’t formed any serious off-line friendships from these groups (yet!) I’ve greatly valued the support and advice that these moms have offered me in some of the more trying and frustrating moments of motherhood. Here are some of my favorite communities for motherhood on Facebook.

Obviously I’m a fan of The Mama Notes Community – it’s still on the smaller side so everyone is really active and your questions will always get answered, sometimes when I post in larger groups I’ll go days without a response. I get asked a lot and it’s free to join to any mama!

I love Solly Baby Village for baby related questions though it’s pretty large!

Highly suggest finding a breastfeeding support group where you live, I love my local Milk Makers Group (set up through my hospital) for anything breastfeeding related — I relied on it so much during the first few months of breastfeeding Piper.

I recently joined a Work At Home Moms group and it’s been fun to be in a group with mamas with the same working situation.

And… finally not to get political but I do really enjoy the posts other mamas share in Parenting During A Trump Presidency.