Pickle

I got breakfast in bed, chocolates and flowers, lovely. And then spent the rest of the morning putting on multiple loads of washing, ironing school uniforms, hanging washing to dry, hoovering and now looking after 3 kids while hubby goes on an 18 mile marathon training run. Yep, I'm definitely a Mother.

I'd be up for this too. Would you make sure that you have enough people the same size to ensure there are clothes available to buy with the tokens?

How have your friends children done so well in a nursery that is not yet/only just open? Little bit suspicious!

Bedtime, if I'm doing it single-handedly, takes me 35-40 minutes from start to finish for 3 kids, including a bath and breastfeeding my 13 month old, and stories for the older two. I'm completely of the no nonsense approach - ready for bed, choose one story each, we read it, light off and door shut at 7pm. They need their sleep, I need my time to relax and enjoy being in an adult zone for a few hours!

I've encountered this before too - someone that lives nearby and was paying to send her two older children (boys) through an independent school told me they were having second thoughts about whether to enrol their youngest (girl) in the same school as "it doesn't seem worth the money for her". Poor kid! But yes, it worked for the Middletons, and I hope that Wills and Kate have a boy so that I can educationally stalk them with my daughter ;)

At the end of it all, the kids had fun, albeit supervised by other parents there at the time rather than the people paid to do it, but it wasn't a good situation at all. I have seen nursery groups at the park many times and generally it makes me smile seeing the little ones in their vests trotting along like ducklings :) Lack of vests suggests it wasn't any of the well known nurseries in the immediate area, I've seen groups from those nurseries before and there were logos identifying where they were from. There are a couple in the parade of shops heading towards Peckham (near the Tesco, towards Rye Oak School), wonder if it could be them?

It was quite late afternoon, 4ish - absolutely no logos to be seen (if there were I would definitely have been straight on the phone to them!). There were, from what I saw when they got them ready to leave, 6 or 7 children and 3 late teen/early 20s girls with them,

Remember that warm sunny day we had on Tuesday? Already it seems like a distant memory. Anyway... I visited the playground and enjoyed the warmth with my kids on Tuesday. While there, I spent a lot of time supervising random small children (aged around 18 months - 2.5) who were taking delight in running down a big slide, playing in front of moving swings and climbing into baby swings wanting pushed with no apparent adult around to help. I asked a couple of them who was looking after them, but they were too small to answer. Finally one little boy pointed to a seating area where a group of completely disengaged young women were sitting engrossed in their smart phones. Eventually one of them dragged herself up off her backside, rounded up the kids, and declared it was time to get back to nursery. They didnt have hi-vis vests on like I've seen before in the park, so I have no idea what nursery they were from, but from a parents view I was pretty shocked at the lack of supervision for such small kids. This was Peckham Rye Park, so I assume it was walking distance from there. Really unprofessional :-(

Chips are one of the only things I've really missed being done the way I like them since I moved from NZ 12 years ago. NZ fish & chip shops cook them while you wait. In the good old days they were put in the same fryer as the fish/sausages etc which made them extra tasty IMO, probably not done now though I guess. When they were done, they were hooked over the fryer for a while to let the oil drip off. Golden colour, good exterior crunch, and fluffy inside. Here I find my local chippie is happy to have a go at cooking chips the way I like them (to him they are burnt), but they're not quite the same. Sometimes the chips at GBK are quite nice, other times a bit dry. Must admit to being partial to a salty skinny french fry, sometimes good old McD's hit the spot.

I've always been told that the digital ones you use under the arm are more accurate for use with small children - I think with the ear ones you need to ensure they're in a specific place to get a good reading. Just might be worth thinking about before spending so much money - our digital one (actually, ones... I keep losing them, buying a replacement, then finding the old one) was less than ?10.

Donate them to a school - great for kids to use to cover their uniforms when painting etc.

I don't think the meatballs are on sale at the moment due to their horse meat content :-/

MrsS, I'm happy to help with little things like that if you are around in the daytime?

The Scarlet Peacock run evening knitting, crochet and sewing classes (google should bring up the website). Also Moo Too were offering knitting classes a while ago and I imagine with their refurb they are probably still doing so. I saw someone recently offering knitting classes for kids on the forum, although I think they were 8 years and up. From my experience I think 5 might be a little bit young (I've been trying to teach my daughter and haven't had much luck, and I knit as a business), but it's never too early to start them finger knitting, which she loves. Good luck x

My friend teaches there, by all accounts it's a great school. I think they are rated outstanding?

Ah, fab - shows you how little I use the trains!

Greenstocking - Crystal Palace National Sports Centre has an excellent Olympic sized swimming pool and the rates for a casual swim, from memory, are very reasonable. I've never seen it really busy, and the size of the pool means that you always have space. Not sure how accessible it is by public transport though, there might be buses that go that way, but I'm not sure.

Ah Straferjack, so so true.

Hi James, I know it's been done to death, and there's probably nothing that can be done - but the dog poo situation on Upland Road (in particular between Underhill and Goodrich Roads, on the left hand side as you walk towards Goodrich School) is out of control. It's almost impossible to dodge on the way to and from school and would appear to be (from a brief comparison of size/colour) one or two repeat offenders. Really horrible. Any chance the street cleaning team could be sent out?

Good tip re: the sheepskin - we did that. Every kiwi baby has one don't they?

We always fly Singapore Airlines, must try the airbeds sometime! We tend to go straight there (with about a 5 hour stop in Singapore where we give the older kids chocolate and encourage them to run round like loonies), on the basis that we can hand the kids to grandparents when we arrive. On the way back to London we book ourselves into the transit hotel in Singapore airport and stay overnight which works well, and makes the arrival in damp dreary London a bit more bearable as we've had at least a little bit of sleep. I find that from about 7/8 months till 2 is a tricky time for the long haul flights, but once they get bigger it's a doddle. On our last trip at Xmas my 6 and nearly 5 year olds were in Cartoon Network heaven being allowed to watch TV for hours on end.

Ha ha, stalwart! :-) Yes, I've done it many times, these days with three children, so count yourself lucky that you've just got one to look after! Five months should be pretty straightforward, especially if not on solids yet (although even if food is involved it's still fine). Try to get a bassinet seat, take a few little toys (although 5 months won't require much entertaining). Jet lag - my kids have all been in routines, so I just switch to NZ time as soon as we land and do all nap times etc. at the right times. At that age it should just take a few days to adjust. Good luck!

If your child has not yet started reception, please don't worry. Concentrate on letting your daughter have fun, there's many years of education ahead and at such a young age she shouldn't be feeling like she has to do structured learning!

My initial thought is that you need to get daytime food sorted out. My daughter is also 13 months and breastfed. She has three solid meals a day (porridge or similar for breakfast, lunch typically protein/carbs with fruit, dinner the same as what we eat, followed by yogurt and fruit). I breastfeed her before breakfast, after her lunchtime sleep (really just a snack, I'm planning to stop this one soon) and at bedtime. She will have a mid morning snack of fruit, rice cakes etc as well as the things I've listed above. When she goes to bed at night I feel 100% confident that she has had enough food and drink during the day, so in the unlikely event that she wakes it is something else bothering her.

I've recently bought a copy of the Hairy Bikers diet cookbook, which despite the name is full of big flavours and hearty meals. Spanish chicken went down a treat with my kids, as did Jambalaya (chorizo, prawns and chicken). A few of the recipes from the book are online if you search. Trying a lamb tagine later this week from the same book.