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David fixed a leak on our flat roof today and has done a great job. He was really prompt at communicating, flexible and accommodating and a pleasure to work with. I would definitely recommend him and will use him again if we need to.

Jules-and-boo it is now possible to delay school entry by a year and still go into Reception. Most schools now start all the children in September unless their parents defer their start. I work in primary education and in my experience there are big advantages to being one of the oldest in the year. There are Summer born children who are ready for school and flourish but in my experience many do not find it easy and this effect can last well into KS2. The levels of maturity between children who are 9 months apart in age at 4 years old are quite marked. For many years the progress of summer born children has been a cause for concern with some studies even linking the effect to impact on degree results. MarianaTrench in terms of your daughter being premature it could be very beneficial for her to be with peers of her adjusted age rather than with those who would be a year older. My son was premature and he is much more in line developmentally with those who were born around his due date. It would be worth checking with the Southwark admissions team, but I can't imagine that a secondary school will want a child to skip Year 7 and go straight into Year 8, and if a child started at my school having deferred a year, I would not want them kicked out in Year 5. I am so glad that they have changed the rules on this as it can make a huge difference and if my son's prematurity meant that he would straddle a year, I would definitely be considering it. You know your daughter best. Is she at Nursery at the moment? How old are her friends? Astrid83 it could be helpful if you spoke to the SENCo at your your nearest/preferred primary school about how flexible they are willing to be with children with SEN. Starting with part days and deferring start of school are all options they could consider. If you are considering an Educational Health Care Plan you can specify how you would like your child to start school. We have a child who was part time until the first term in Year 1 as he is July born. He is now managing very well in school full time even though he is one of the youngest and has ASD.

Yes agree with the above - I loved the stretchy wrap with my preemie. He was just under 4ibs when I started using it and it was brilliant. I had a kari-me. Congratulations!

The Lahore Kebab House in Norbury is big enough to do this. Their original restaurant in East London has a function room. The food is excellent. http://www.lahore-kebabhouse.com/

We will be applying for a reception place for 2016. The expansion has been talked about as a definite for a while and was part of Southwark's school places plan so I am surprised to hear that it seems not to have been agreed at governor level. Hopefully Renata will be able to shed some light on it.

The small project is a great organisation and is grateful for donations. http://www.thesmallproject.org.uk

Hello Renata have you managed to get any more information from ivydale about the reasons the expansion won't happen on schedule? We are currently in a black hole for schools and we were hoping that ivydale expanding would give us a chance at one of our nearest schools.

I would agree with others and suggest you talk to the school about a dyslexia assessment. Touch typing is an excellent way of speeding up a child's writing and there are a number of apps and programs that you can download. Two that I have used with children are tux type (free download) and nessy fingers which there is a fee for. Often when children have physical difficulties with pen grip and control it can be helpful to look at their gross motor control too. Strength and stability in the shoulders is essential for writing as is the ability to cross the midline with control. Activities such as dance and gymnastics can be really helpful as well as Lego etc. Lefthandedness should not cause the difficulties you describe although sadly many left handers struggle because they are not taught good habits with their pen grip and there can be lower expectations of what left handers are able to achieve in terms of neat handwriting.

There is - it's run from the PRUH site. The person to contact is Karen Lewis on 01689864924 or email [email protected]

Really sorry to hear you're having such a hard time. She is on a list of breastfeeding support contacts that I was given last week on the postnatal ward at Kings. Claire Kedves 02032993833 or Joanne Joseph 02032999000 ext 32659

Congratulations on your twins! We reused the small bottles and teats that I was given to express into while my son was in SCBU to begin with when we got home. I think we still have some of the teats if you would like them? Once he was a bit bigger we used tommee tippee just because it was the one my partner picked up in Sainsburys! Worked well though! Baby was on Nutriprem 2 for about a year which our GP advised us to do so then we just moved onto normal cow and gate so I can't offer a recommendation for organic formula.

A friend has stairs like these and has fitted sheets of perspex to the horizontal bannisters. It has the advantage of not blocking light or affecting the look of the stairs and then you could fill in the screw holes when you leave and touch up the paint.

I can currently do both too, looking forward to meeting everyone! Tally: 11th Oct - 9 people 18th Oct - 7 people

I'm sorry I couldn't makke the meet up on Saturday, I bumped into Tomo at the playground on Sunday and she said how lovely it was to meet up. I work full time so can't manage weekdays, but am around with toddler most weekends or could do toddler free evenings if anyone fancies that?

I also had this after the birth of my son. I ended up having a vitamin D deficiency which can cause all sorts of symptoms which I had just put down to being a new mum and then going back to work. I didn't go to the docs for ages as I didn't think there was a medical cause but the doctor was very understanding when I did finally go! And the vit D made a dramatic difference very quickly.

Hello I'm also expecting my second baby (on Feb 9th). I agree SJK, I joined a group when my son was born and it was a brilliant way to meet people and eat cake! Would be lovely to meet up with others.

There is some NHS advice as I was given a booklet when I left hospital as I mix fed my son pretty much from the off due to a number of issues. It might be worth asking your Health Visitor for a copy? I found this on the NHS site though which might help in the meantime http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/pregnancy-and-baby/pages/making-up-infant-formula.aspx#close It took a while for me to trust that I was making up the formula properly and I did use pre made formula too. I used cold water sterilising in milton because that was what I had started with in hospital but beware that if you leave the bottles in the solution until you need them it strips the measures off the side which adds a whole new layer of complication to the process!

LondonMix Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I?m not sure its on purpose. When people devised > fair-banding, think tanks thought it would really > lead to more comprehensive schools. It never > occurred to them that less able students (and > their parents) would actively not apply to high > achieving schools. > > Fair banding only skews to high-achievers if low > achievers don?t apply! > > I think this is a unique cultural issue in the UK > that needs to be addressed at a more fundamental > level. > > Anyhow, now that schools recognize that lower > achieving pupils actively shy away from high > achieving schools relative to their high achieving > peers, the system needs to be tweaked to reflect > this surprising ?self-exclusion? done by low > achieving families. LondonMix do you have any data on this? My own experience of working in a primary school with a high proportion of children from disadvantaged backgrounds was that they did apply to the local high achieving school as their families were just as aspirational as the "high achieving families" but that the complicated admissions forms and additional tests that were required as part of the process were what tended to trip them up. I would also argue that fair banding also works in the reverse to the way you describe it. Given the pressure on school places at high achieving schools this causes more families who are able to afford to move to be closer to the school or get their child tutored in how to take the tests to apply means that the higher bands get proportionately more applicants and therefore are offered more places. Fair banding skews to support a more able intake if the school can attract them. The local secondary school above also operated 9 bands but they were equally distributed and this meant that our pupils had a better chance of getting in if they were in the lower bands as there were so many applicants in the higher bands. This would not have been true if they had operated fair banding.