Moving closer to grandkids

I would really appreciate your opinions on this.

We are thinking of selling our bungalow and currently live about 45 minutes from our 3 sons. We love helping out with childcare and maybe look after one grandchild once or twice a week at the moment which is fantastic.

We have a newly born GC and would like to help once a week with daycare for him too but don’t think that’s going to be possible because of the responsibility of driving the baby from our home to theirs. 45 minutes in the car feels like it poses too much risk as we get older and our driving abilities may not be 100% sharp. They’re pretty good, don’t get me wrong, but I don’t want to put the baby at any risk on fast roads.

So, the question is whether to move to an area which is very close to son’s families or stay where we are, nearer friends. Or we could move somewhere in the middle and be 25 minutes approx to visit both friends and family.

My concerns about moving too close to family is that we may be ‘put upon’ for help with too much childcare, DIY etc. They already think it’s great/funny that we will be able to spend more time helping them out.

The thing is, we do value our quiet time together and generally like a quiet life, to be honest. On the other hand we love our grandkids and are very lucky that they bring us a lot of joy. On the other hand we really like our friends (and neighbours) company and don’t want to lose their friendship.

Just wondered what it’s like for grandparents who live round the corner from family? Or what other people’s experiences are of moving closer to family and away from friends?

Thanks very much for reading.