redjam

Cuppatea, you're so right. Drives me nuts the amount of guilt that gets dumped at mothers' feet. Yes, of course, if you're glued to a phone constantly while your neglected kids tug sadly at your hem then you're a Very Bad Mummy, but really, I imagine it's only a small percentage of parents who are guilty of truly excessive phone use. Most of us are a mix of good, bad and average parent throughout the course of a day, and in general I'd agree with Pickle and CharlotteP and say that most kids have never had it so good (in fact I'd say that - to generalise wildly - children today have more attention heaped on them now than at any point in history). These kinds of articles just seem designed to make us feel bad about ourselves. Enough already!

The Musicians' Union organize occasional 'Learn to Play' days, during which your child (and you!) can try out different instruments. We went to one near the Oval last year and it was brilliant - my daughter was able to try out the violin, the trumpet, the clarinet, the flute and the guitar for herself, as well as hear the wonderful musicians give demonstrations of how it 'should' sound. The instructors were hugely inspirational and it was all free. I'd really recommend it if you're not sure which instrument your child might have an affinity with. As a result of this session my daughter decided she wanted to learn guitar and has been taking lessons for three months now (she's seven). She's keen but I wish I had an answer about how to encourage her to practise! Nunheadmum you're so right about how kids just don't get the idea that they can't be perfect immediately and they have to, you know, WORK AT IT. But of course the great thing about the guitar is that you only need three chords and you can play loads of pop songs...

I'd highly recommend Vintage Vacations (www.vintagevacations.co.uk). They have a field full of super-cool old Airstream trailers. We went there with a bunch of friends and had a fab time with the kids running in and out of each other's trailers all day and long evenings round a campfire for us after they'd gone to bed. There's no pool - it's all very rough and ready and you have to be into the dodgy 50s aesthetic - and I'd imagine if the weather was crap then the holiday would be doomed, but we had a brilliant time. I think they have other properties on the Isle of Wight too.

If you want another option, there is also a large and impressive playground at Highbury Fields, right opposite Highbury & Islington tube station (one stop away on Victoria line), with all the lovely cafes on Upper Street to visit after. Coram's Fields is also nice, though I got a bit freaked out about the amount of sheep poo on everything last time I went - they just wander about freely. Bring some wipes! The playground area is not quite as good as the one in Highbury Fields, in my opinion, but it is a peaceful, chilled-out little oasis in the centre of London.

Fab ideas, thank you!

My youngest daughter also went there a few years back, then we moved her too (to Blossoms Montessori, which I'd wholeheartedly recommend). I know some people who were happy with Cherry Tree, but personally I think there are better nurseries out there...

Have you tried feeding more frequently so that it's easier for your baby to latch on before you get too engorged? Also make sure you're wearing a very supportive bra between feeds. It does normally go down within a few days so don't give up - but I'd second the advice to get checked out by a doctor asap if you're feeling feverish. Good luck, sounds tough...

That's a great idea, thank you - I have actually been there before and it's exactly the kind of thing I'm after, so I'd be happy to go again. But if anyone has any other suggestions, I'd be interested to hear. There must be more than one decent pub within an easy drive of south London! (There's clearly a gap in the market out there...)

Can anyone recommend a good country pub or restaurant within, say, one and a half hours' drive from East Dulwich? I'm celebrating a family birthday on Sunday with my parents and kids, so I want somewhere where the food is a bit more special than the usual country pub grub (i.e. not prepared centrally and heated up in a microwave), but not anywhere stuffy with swagged curtains and disapproving locals. Ideally somewhere in a pretty location where we can go out for a walk afterwards - Kent, Surrey, that kind of area. Just tried the Parrot in Surrey and it was fully booked so am now having a mini-panic I've left it too late to find anywhere nice... Can anyone help me out? Thank you!

I'm a freelance editor and work from home during school hours, so I'm always there for pick-up/drop-off. It's effectively working part-time, 9.15 to 3.15 every day. Inevitably I do end up working quite often in the evenings and weekends when I'm up against a deadline but for me it's worth it as I really like being there for the kids on a daily basis. This is especially as they get older and they need me for 'mummy stuff' like emotional support, arranging playdates or helping with school projects, which is harder to farm out to a nanny unless you are particularly lucky. The downsides? Holidays are a nightmare, as I find it hard to turn down interesting projects. And if either child is sick, my husband and I have unseemly wrangles about whose work is more important that day. Most of my clients know not to phone me after 3.15, but I still get the odd person wanting to discuss the finer points of a manuscript while I'm trying to make tea and sort out a Lego dispute. Oh, and the days go REALLY quickly and it can be a wrench to stop and switch to mummy mode when I'm in the middle of something very absorbing. That said, though, I'm finding this balance better than when I used to work full-time three days a week. So I'd say go for it. Good luck!

How funny - just stumbled across this thread after (yesterday) booking the Princesa Yaiza for our summer holiday! Lovely to hear the good reviews of it. How much am I looking forward to sizzling by a pool this summer...? We have also been to the Abama in Tenerife which was very swish and lovely - fantastic pool, beautiful hotel and right near a great beach. The breakfasts were AMAZING (I do appreciate a nice hotel breakfast). The kids' club was very quiet when we went and it didn't seem particularly exciting (more colouring and Lego etc than organised activities) but it was off-season and just after it had opened so it might be different in busier times of year. It's also a bit in the middle of nowhere so you'd need to rent a car if you wanted to explore outside the resort. That aside, I'd definitely recommend the hotel itself.

I had this problem once - lots of very fat and sluggish flies suddenly started appearing on our downstairs windows, as if from nowhere. It's the grimmest thing, and I still don't know why we had them or where they were coming from (presumably something nasty under the floorboards). I got some flyspray from AJ Farmers and went beserk with it - though be warned, as Otta said they all fly up at you when you do this which made me shriek! Got rid of the problem very quickly though.

If you've got the space inside, have you considered getting a cardboard playhouse? We bought one from the ELC a couple of years ago, but there are several on Amazon. It's loads cheaper and the beauty of it is that you can take it down and fold it away when the kids get bored of it, then put it up again later. Ours is still OK, a bit scruffy round the edges but the kids don't care. And they love 'decorating' it (i.e. graffiti-ing all over it). It fits rather nicely under the eaves of our loft. We've also got one of those rosebud dolls' houses that they sell in Soup Dragon. It's lovely and my youngest (age 4) still plays with it (as do I, when no one is looking!).

Yeah, I specifically requested a 160 l smaller green bin, as mentioned elsewhere on the forum, but the message didn't seem to have got through to the guy at the council, who said they didn't exist. But he was friendly and otherwise helpful, so I mustn't moan. In any case, I'm now worrying that my new smaller brown bin (when it arrives) will be too small - I've just seen a neighbour's and it does look smaller than I'd realised. The two options seem to be an unnecessarily huge brown bin or this miniature caddy. Sigh. But oh yes, I've just remembered, I mustn't moan...

Yes you can carry on using your blue boxes (even your blue bag too, though they won't be able to replace it if you lose it as they are phasing these out). I've just phoned the council and they are taking away my huge new blue bin because there's no way I'll fill it, even with fortnightly collections, so I will carry on using my stackable blue boxes which fit much more neatly behind our hedge. I am also getting a smaller brown bin, hooray! Hopefully the view from my front window won't be quite so dominated by huge plastic bins in a couple of weeks. (Unfortunately I couldn't get a smaller green bin, but two out of three aint bad.)

littleEDfamily I am sooo with you on this re Oliver James. Ditto plimsoul re parenting being over-analysed and over-debated.

Sorry, to me the word 'vulva' sounds too adult and medical coming out of a small child's mouth. It's like if a child talked about their anus instead of their bum, or defecating instead of pooing. Technically correct, of course, but just ... weird. But you're right, Saffron, different strokes for different folks!

V. interesting article. It's so maddening there's not a word for girlie bits that's as socially acceptable as 'willy'. We say 'ninny' or 'girl's bits' here, though my youngest just calls it her 'bottom' and doesn't differentiate between front and back. In any case, they know it's not the scientific word but I've explained it's just the 'friendly' word we use in our house and left it at that. I couldn't go for the proper names though - I heard a (possibly apocryphal) story from a friend who was at a playground when a three-year-old fell off a roundabout and shouted, in piercingly clear tones, 'Mummy, my vulva hurts!' That just sounds so odd... Incidentally, when I was a child, my mum was so hung up about these matters that not only was there literally no word for female or male genitalia - it was never mentioned - but also we didn't have words for poo and wee. So I went off to school age five and couldn't understand why everyone fell about laughing when I talked about 'pushing' and 'wetting'. The lesson is: whatever terminology you use, the important thing is that you do talk freely as much as possible!

No, you're right, it's not harmless - in fact I meant to go back and edit my post to say 'intended as harmless fun'. But I do sometimes think that going straight in to the school isn't always the best thing to do (unless of course you are talking about very serious verbal or physical abuse) as in all honesty if the teachers get involved then it almost certainly will escalate the situation. I was just wondering whether there were any coping strategies that could be explored by the child to deal with the problem on his own before calling in outside help - though of course, if they don't work and the problem continues, then it's right to go to the school and report it.

Personally I'd advise humour as a way of getting round this problem - it's amazing how laughing along and making jokes yourself (against yourself if necessary) can defuse a situation. If you look like you're getting very wound up, the bullies will sense blood and keep needling away, whereas if you can act like you honestly don't care and have a sense of humour about it, it really takes the wind out of their sails. So next time they say something, perhaps he should just laugh along and say, 'Yeah, actually it's my life's ambition to work in MacDonald's, I've been dreaming about it since I was a boy - but I'm worried the burger flipping will be too hard for me' and pull a dumb face, or something to that effect. See what happens. I'd try that before either going to the teachers or (worse still) getting into a fight, as both those approaches hugely escalate what is essentially a bit of harmless fun. But I do sympathise - teenagers can be little scrotes to each other. Good luck.

The Mag has a lovely room upstairs. You can hire it out for parties but you need to supply your own food.

I think maybe your lack of replies is because 'babysitter' implies evening help, whereas it sounds like you need someone during the day? Broadly speaking you've got the option of a nanny, nannyshare or childminder, all of which you can advertise for on here in the classifieds section (or you can read adverts from prospective childcarers). The best recommendation is of course word of mouth - do you have any other mummy friends who might have nannies/childminders who are on the nanny network and might know of someone who needs a few hours' extra work a week? Alternatively you could try contacting Joanne Bleau (joanne.bleau@southwark.gov.uk) - she runs the Southwark Council service for people who need odd hours of childcare. We found our brilliant nanny through her as I only needed a few hours' childcare a week. The other option of course, if you really only need a couple of hours a week, is to team up with a friend in a similar position and take turns to look after each other's babies. Whatever you do, good luck!

Gosh, I now feel like a very permissive parent in that my (just) four-year-old goes to bed at 7.30 and my six-year-old goes at 8pm, often slipping up to fifteen minutes if my day's going to hell in a handbasket (which it often is). I thought I was quite strict! But then we're all relatively late risers, so I'd rather have an extra fifteen minute lie-in in the morning any day of the week...

Very tricky. There have certainly been times when I've given time outs to my kids and they've screamed blue murder for a good ten minutes, and I've always had a slight paranoia someone would call social services on me! OK, the actual time out is never as long as ten minutes and they have to stay in their bedroom and not in the garden, but still - what you've described could just be within the normal realms of discipline as opposed to abuse. I'd so go very carefully before you steam in on this - it's a very big accusation to say that someone is abusing their kids so you do have to be pretty sure of your grounds. Interested to know what other people think.

Ooh, like the belt idea, Goodliz!