I live in a small neighborhood in a small town. If you work from home no one knows because, well, you don't come out. If you tell the neighbors you work in IT they will assume you run a porn site like the guy down the street and then try even harder to avoid you. If your neighborhood has other young families things may improve unless they are super religious and then they will insist on interviewing you and grilling you on God and Country. Get a dog because it forces you to go outside and it is a friend magnet in the neighborhood. They will assume if you like animals you're ok. The other option is to find friends outside of the neighborhood. Is there an art gallery? Coffee shop? Bridge club? Book club(although the religious freaks run the one in my neighborhood)? To be honest I don't try to meet new neighbors because so many are either immoral or too moral. Nothing normal is really available. I think the problem with any small town is it's lack of diversity.

Anonymous wrote:I work from home in our new small town in Georgia, and the grown ups I sometimes talk to are: our nanny (half my age), our mother's helper (younger than the nanny), wives of people who work with DH, a couple of moms from the kids' Sunday School and Music Together classes.

This is not so bad for me because I am a major introvert, and actually like having online friends more than "real life" friends.

I find that online friends have a tendency to turn on you, probably because it's easier to say things to someone online than in real life. So I'm really looking for real life friends.

I do talk to our sitter, but it's not exactly the intellectual conversation I'm craving. I should probably get to know the wives of DH's coworkers.

I work from home in our new small town in Georgia, and the grown ups I sometimes talk to are: our nanny (half my age), our mother's helper (younger than the nanny), wives of people who work with DH, a couple of moms from the kids' Sunday School and Music Together classes.

This is not so bad for me because I am a major introvert, and actually like having online friends more than "real life" friends.

How about library book clubs?

Oh, well if you have a child, I think you're in luck. Bring that child to the playground and chat up the moms like crazy. Meet the moms from daycare. Everyone wants new friends for their kids. Invite people to playdates. Serve cute and healthy snacks.

Anonymous wrote:
Yes, but I am trying to make things better.

http://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/413226.page

It sounds like your attitude might need an adjustment though. And I'm not saying that to be mean. But if you expect everyone is unfriendly, snobby, and judging you, then you're setting yourself up for failure. I can almost guarantee that you are seeing and interpreting things that aren't there because you are still unhappy about the forced move. Which is completely understandable.

Yes, but I am trying to make things better.

http://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/413226.page

Anonymous wrote:DH picked it.

I think that's your bigger problem, that your husband moved you there without you agreeing to go.

DH picked it.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You may be running into problems because people in the small town may not understand the whole "work from home" full-time thing. They may just think you are a snobby stay at home mom. They don't see you out working at the walmart, right? So, you may want to tell the people you do meet (at church) that you were lucky to keep your full-time job and work from home, etc.. etc... but it is hard to get out.

This is probably true. The few people I've had conversations with have even been pretty snotty about me working at all. Those who weren't snotty about it think I sell Jamberry. Really, I work in IT so working from home is a lot more normal to me than it probably is to others.

We've been seriously debating switching churches for a while because of the social situation, but we're now in a heavily Baptist area, and we are not even close to Baptist. I'll poke around church some more, but it's uncomfortable admitting how isolated I am.

Any advice on the unfriendly neighbors?

Why are you living in this area? It sounds like you really dislike it. If you're going to be truly lonely and unhappy there, I would strongly reassess whether it's the right place for your family.

Anonymous wrote:I'm from a small town.

I would go downtown for lunch at the same place every day. Sit outside and make it clear you're not in a hurry.

I like this!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You may be running into problems because people in the small town may not understand the whole "work from home" full-time thing. They may just think you are a snobby stay at home mom. They don't see you out working at the walmart, right? So, you may want to tell the people you do meet (at church) that you were lucky to keep your full-time job and work from home, etc.. etc... but it is hard to get out.

This is probably true. The few people I've had conversations with have even been pretty snotty about me working at all. Those who weren't snotty about it think I sell Jamberry. Really, I work in IT so working from home is a lot more normal to me than it probably is to others.

We've been seriously debating switching churches for a while because of the social situation, but we're now in a heavily Baptist area, and we are not even close to Baptist. I'll poke around church some more, but it's uncomfortable admitting how isolated I am.

Any advice on the unfriendly neighbors?

I'm 14:51. Have you spoken with the neighbors? In my town, we always were friendly with our neighbors, even when we didn't love them. What's the benefit to being unfriendly with neighbors.

My advice is to always have at least 3 questions ready to ask your neighbors when you see them. Let them feel like they're helping you get settled. Everyone likes to take someone under their wing. Just little stuff like where's the best place to get your hair done.

We now live in a small town of roughly 2500 people. There is a small neighborhood listserv, a small but active moms group, aNd other small special interests groups. Some are run with other neighboring towns since we are all so small! I also joined a weekend gym class for myself.

My 2 year old is in preschool/daycare and I arranged some play dates through there.

It takes work and some internet searching, but it wasn't as bad as it initially seemed.

Anonymous wrote:You may be running into problems because people in the small town may not understand the whole "work from home" full-time thing. They may just think you are a snobby stay at home mom. They don't see you out working at the walmart, right? So, you may want to tell the people you do meet (at church) that you were lucky to keep your full-time job and work from home, etc.. etc... but it is hard to get out.

This is probably true. The few people I've had conversations with have even been pretty snotty about me working at all. Those who weren't snotty about it think I sell Jamberry. Really, I work in IT so working from home is a lot more normal to me than it probably is to others.

We've been seriously debating switching churches for a while because of the social situation, but we're now in a heavily Baptist area, and we are not even close to Baptist. I'll poke around church some more, but it's uncomfortable admitting how isolated I am.

Any advice on the unfriendly neighbors?

I'm from a small town.

I would go downtown for lunch at the same place every day. Sit outside and make it clear you're not in a hurry.

Next step, figure out what clubs there are in town. Are there any that you might be good at? In my town, there were a bunch of volunteer types of clubs. Do you have a skill you could volunteer with the high school? Do you have any interest in trees that you could volunteer with some kind of tree club (mine had something like that)? If all else fails, there's probably something like a Lions Club that I think you can join.

Find ways (clubs, volunteering, seeing the same people every day at lunch, etc) to meet people, even if they're not people in your demographic. Once people realize they're around, they'll be eager to introduce you around. In my town, people were always excited to be the discoverer of new friends and people want to be the one to connect you to the right circle.

My town was not particularly religious and I'm not Christian so I don't know much about how to get involved through churches, but I do know that there are frequently strawberry festivals and ice cream socials and chamber music concerts and sometimes those are open to the public. Go.