A-fucking-men. I have two toddlers. I watch them closely enough. They are safe. They are fine. My mom, a boomer extraordinaire, has flipped out on me on multiple occasions for letting them be in the yard by themselves, because "Weirdos are out to abduct cute blonde kids." Never has she stopped for even a moment to reflect on whether the weirdos are actually out there and if they are, are they really more interested in blonde children than any other type? They are stuck in that mentality and there's no way out. Eventually they will all be gone and I hope we can disinherit their tendencies toward paranoia.
I wholeheartedly recommend Lenore Skenazy's book. It's funny. We let the kid stay home when we go running or whatever. I've let her be by herself in the house for, like, 90 minutes while I was out dropping off a package. She has at least three different ways to get ahold of a half-dozen adults. For her to not be in communication she would need to lose an iPad and a laptop or have wifi go out, at which point there are two or three neighbor kids she could run to. She's eight. And we're terrible parents for doing that to her. I was latchkey from kindergarten onward. No one was home until 6:30pm. Most of my friends were in a similar situation. Often times we'd just go get into trouble and no one said a fuckin' thing.
You are excellent parents for fostering a sense of responsibility and emotional strength in your daughter. My Dad, a long time public elementary and middle school teacher gave my wife and I a copy of Skenazy’s Free Range Kids before our son was born. We laughed an scoffed at it initially. Skenazy is brilliant. She makes the fact based case of how poorly developed so many of our fears are. Toddlers in the yard are more likely to have a tree fall on them or get squished by a meteorite than abducted by the scary man in the van. Put the guns away folks. That boogeyman doesn’t actually exist and you’re teaching your kids to make habits of anxiety producing thoughts. I think I’ll read it again.