Pickle

I too gave up on Sainsbury's home delivery after numerous problems with orders (missing items, orders not arriving, bizarre substitutes... sorry, we don't have chicken today, but have some delicious smoked salmon roulades instead...) I've used Tesco for years, generally they are very good and I've felt they are improving all the time - now do 1 hour slots like Ocado, bring shoppping into your kitchen etc etc. I've had occasions where they've been late but have always been phoned to warn me. Sorry to hear about your experience today Fuschia, what a nightmare. Don't know whether it makes a difference, but I always get my shopping delivered early in the day (generally sometime before 9am) - in the past any problems I have had were with late afternoon/evening deliveries.

There's a thread over in the business section about this: http://www.eastdulwichforum.co.uk/forum/read.php?30,560558

I was thinking this afternoon that games would be ideal for our long plane journeys (next one is in just under 4 weeks time), so might look into a Leapfrog handheld as an early Xmas present. He is also very into numbers/letters, so in that respect I think the games are great. I guess like everything it's a matter of getting the right balance.

This afternoon, in search of something to entertain my nearly 4 year old, we stumbled our way onto the CeeBeeBees website games section. Two hours later we emerged, having filled in a record amount of time with not a single winge, moan, or TV request. Brilliant. Obviously our first foray into such a world was longer than we would generally spend on something like that, but what's everyone's opinions on these things? He amazed me with the speed at which he picked up each game, working the mouse etc., which are good skills to learn (he's never used our laptop before). The games he seemed to enjoy most were Numberjacks, which was educational, a Mr Tumble maze game, and the Come Outside game. In my mind I'm trying to convince myself that 2 hours spent playing "educational" games on the computer is much better than 2 hours watching TV?! While he could do some himself, some required help from me, but all required him to think/interact more than he would sitting on the sofa watching Lazy Town. We were outside all morning (just in case you start to think that all we do is sit inside!), it was an ideal way to fill in a lazy afternoon inside. Would be interested to know if anyone else has tried these games and what you think. I don't think computers were even invented when I was 4, so this isn't something I can ask my Mum about!

We used Magic Stars for our son, they worked a treat - he has a really sweet tooth and will do just about anything for chocolate! Not so good for my daughter who doesn't like sweet things (not sure she can be my daughter?!), and we struggled a bit with the poo side of potty training. She declared she didn't want nappies anymore over summer, which was fine (she was just over 2), and from day 1 the wee side of it was a piece of cake, hardly any accidents. It took her about 3/4 weeks to master making it to the toilet for a poo, it was almost as if she couldn't quite judge when it was going to happen. But one day it suddenly seemed to make sense to her and we haven't looked back. I was in a bit of a quandry, as there was no way she would let me put a nappy back on (I big girl now Mummy), so thankfully she worked it out as I was getting a bit bored of cleaning up! Good luck.

Love it, second chuckle of the day courtesy of the EDF :)

Brendan Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I saw some of this last weekend and there's a > pirate! Have you guys seen the pirate? > > When's it on again? I didn't know they had > pirates. Ha ha, thanks for giving me a laugh Brendan :))

You sooooo don't have to be Paula Radcliffe to do BMF - it really does cater for everyone. There's a real mix of abilities at every class I've been to, and it's amazing how quickly you adapt to it and build up fitness. I wore gloves for the first time this morning, as last Wednesday it was verging on a frost and while the rest of me was toasty warm my hands were bl**dy freezing. Of course this morning it was positively balmy and I didn't need them (although they did help to keep my hands dry). It is honestly really good fun. Hard work, yes, but I absolutely love it. Every Wednesday morning we have a great guy called Richard as our instructor - he is really friendly and not at all shouty/scary like I imagined them to be. They also do "Walk Fit" classes now, for anyone not quite brave enough to try the full on BMF class. P x p.s... if anyone fancies joining me for a run, I go at about 6am and run for 30 mins (pace is about 10 min miling)

Yippee! Glad to have managed to help :)

I do have a Trunki, however we won't be taking it this time as I don't want to deal with the arguments over who gets to ride it (and taking two isn't an option). So this time we will be attempting to travel light - both children will have little backpacks containing their toys, I will have a single rucksack with food, books, change of clothes. The bonus this time is that I don't have to worry about packing nappies (albeit apart from a couple of pullups for sleep times), so that saves us a lot of room.

We've done the trip to NZ many times, I'm going again in a few weeks (flying out with my nearly 4 and 2.5 year olds by myself - aaaaaagh!). Little toys like small Playmobil sets, travel colouring books (the Colour Wonder ones are good), stickers, pens & paper, a few favourite books. My daughter entertained herself last time (she was 20 months) by pressing all the buttons on the control panel for the inflight entertainment system... DVD player is a must, we use ours as backup once they're bored of the programmes on the plane. Lots of snacks, and a supply of small toys that your child has never seen before that can be produced at strategic intervals over the course of the flights. Good luck!

You say you've just switched to a bottle... maybe try a slower flow teat? It could be that he's taking the volume of milk a lot faster than previously when he was breast feeding, so it's just a bit much for his little tummy to take? Worth a try. P x

What an amazing person you must be to juggle being a Mum to a small child and volunteering in an orphanage, fantastic! It sounds like the root of your problem may be tiredness - I know in our household dinner is a nightmare if the kids are tired, so we tend to eat at about 5:30pm (earlier when they were smaller, they're 2.5 and nearly 4 now). I'm also very strict with the "don't eat it, don't get anything else" approach, something I swore I'd never do after being subjected to it by my very strict mother when I was small - I've now accepted the fact that I have turned into my Mum! Try not to give in too easily, small children are cunning ;-)

We've got a microchip reading cat flap - well worth the money, I'm sure we were feeding all the neighbourhood cats at one stage before we got it! We've had it for a couple of years and never had any problems with it.

Oh how I wish I could hang out with my parents on a regular basis. They are in New Zealand, hubby's folks are in Scotland (although they have only been to visit us a few times since we had children - we don't have a good relationship). On the plus side I only have 4 weeks until I get to go home for Xmas and will spend 5 weeks with my parents. I thought nothing of moving to the other side of the world when I was a 20-something singleton with nothing but money, men and nights out to think about. 10 years on and things have changed, it would be fantastic to have my parents close by.

Not for me admittedly (I would feel old and frumpy if I wore the same clothes as my 2 year old and her dolly!), but it did make me smile :)

Heating on all night? Seriously? We've never had to do that, even in the depths of winter the kid's rooms don't drop below about 15 degrees, which is plenty warm enough combined with a pair of fleecy pj's and a 2.5tog Grobag or 4 tog duvet. Our heating is on until 10pm, then comes on again at 6am.

Cher will do well. Not my type of music at all (I'm faaaaaaaar too old!), but I do find her very watchable and like her attitude. Can't help but think she's going to age badly if that's how she looks at 16... Aidan scares me with his mad eyes. Matt Cardle is likeable but the older blokes never do any good as the voting public tend to go for the young girls/boys. Does anyone else notice that one of the young boys in the boy band has a real "stage school" air about him? The others do their best to look broody and sexy, then there's the blonde one who seems to always be doing jazz hands and cheesy grins - hilarious. He'll do well in the West End!

John went, it was between him and TrayC. No great loss, nice enough guy but not a particularly strong singer. TrayC is an excellent singer but I don't like her, seems a bit smug (perhaps not anymore now that she's been in the bottom 2).

I'm not a full time working Mum, but my weeks are mad and I manage to fit in exercise. I have 4 hours in total a week where my kids are at creche, and work an 8 hour a week part time job from home (so have to fit it around kids). Two evenings a week I'm out at rehearsals, two evenings hubby is out at sports practice and I use the time to work. For me the only way to fit it in is to exercise early in the morning... which was great in summer but admittedly these days it's getting harder to drag myself out of bed. I run at 6am two mornings a week, and do a British Military Fitness class on Wednesday mornings at 6:45am (this only works as hubby goes in to work a bit later so that I can fit it in). Weekends are generally full of concerts for me and hockey for hubby which limits what I can do, but we take the kids to Little Kickers on a Saturday morning in West Dulwich and I run there and back (or nowadays hubby can be convinced to take the kids there by himself so I go for a run while they're there). So many people say to me that they can't fit exercise in to their day and then go through how busy they are. It would be easy for me to make the same excuses, but I made the decision that it's important for me, so I fit it in. Running the streets of East Dulwich at 6am on a cold Autumn morning is actually enjoyable once I'm out the door - it's just the getting out of bed that's hard! You've done brilliantly with your weight loss, you must look so different to the last time I saw you! P x

I'd be up for the 12th too

Mmmmmmmmmm. the banana bread recipe is a winner! Delicious. I'm sure it does keep well for a couple of days, but I doubt it will last that long (off to cut myself another slice, kids happily munching away)

Thanks for sharing the banana bread recipe Cate, we've just filled in 20 minutes mashing bananas and having a fun time mixing and it's in the oven now. Seems too easy to be true, 49 minutes until we can test it. Now I'm off to de-flour my kitchen...

Hurray for honest people, well done Mitch!

Gwod, I tend to agree with you (*ducks head*). I stopped using the parent and child bays quite a while ago, certainly before my daughter was 2, as I figure people with smaller children (i.e., non-walkers) need them more than me. We park along the far side edge near the nursery and my kids know that they must walk with me, holding my hand, until we're on the path by the supermarket. They are 3.5 and 2, and we've been doing this for at least 6 months. Helps that they know if they behave they'll get chocolate buttons... ;-)