Story and photo by R.J. Oriez
GUIDON staff

In November, Lisa Andrews was an Army spouse, newly arrived at Fort Leonard Wood, facing the usual challenge of meeting people in a new place.

Now, as snow is falling outside, her living room is loud with six toddlers coming and going from the toy room and five mothers trading war stories about potty training and moving into post housing while their spouse was deployed.

Andrews says some of it was her husband’s doing.

“It was kind of his idea to get me out of the house more when I first moved here,” she said. “I really wasn’t leaving the house because I was trying to get moved in and then get comfortable.

“I started the group so I could meet other parents.”

“The Group” is Parents and Playdates of FLW, a group she started on Meetup.com. Currently, there are 37 members and growing.

“It’s just a play group basically,” Andrews said. “We organize play dates for all the kids, little events, things like that.”

“Kids always needs something to do,” said Sarah Crandall, who joined the group with her son Matthew, 3. “With him being younger, and not in school, sitting around home just doesn’t get his energy gone.”

While the kids are playing, the parents get a chance to talk.

“It’s still kind of hard to meet other parents when you go to one or two events on posts,” Andrews said.

Vanessa Anderson has been a member for about a month with her daughter, Ellie, 3.

“It’s a good way to meet other women and get out of the house,” Anderson said. “Especially to be with other women who know what the Army is like.”

Meetup.com, the home of the group’s Web site, is a social network that helps people find other with similar interests in their area.

In order to become a member of the group, one first has to register with Meetup.com. Registration is free. Once someone is a member they can do a search for Parents and Playdates of FLW, or go to http://www.meetup.com/Parents-of-FLW/

Since Andrews marked the group as private, someone has to be accepted as a member before getting access to the group’s calendar of events and membership.

“Because it’s a private group, you have to log in,” Andrews said. “You can just ask to be accepted into the group. Then I go ahead and click ‘yes’ and that’s it.”

Now that the group seems to have a good start, Andrews is trying to keep it going.

“We’re trying to have two or three events a week,” Andrews said. “Just so everybody has a chance to come out.”