redjam

Anyone seen if the PO is open today?

Shelly2106 you are correct - the Eco Friends group from Charter ED run a regular gardening session at the Physic Garden on the first Saturday of every month, run by a very dedicated group of parent volunteers. It's a lovely asset for the area and the plans are for it to continue and thrive once the final phase of the new school is underway. It's not ignored at all, Monica!

I think nannyshares can be good for this - if a nanny already has a full-time job with a young baby, it's relatively easy for them to take on another child on a part-time basis after school (and makes more financial sense for them than just taking on one part-time child). The forum is a good place to start, or put the word out among other parents with younger kids, e.g. at your child's old nursery, if they have one. Best of luck...

My knowledge of nursery fees is v out of date but didn't want to read and run. Short answer is - yes, you will be able to find affordable childcare in London. Lots of us bring up our kids here and we're not all millionaires or enjoy free family childcare! I'm not saying it's not a struggle for the first couple of years (it gets easier at the age of three as the 15-hour free childcare kicks in then) but there are lots of other options apart from expensive nurseries. Have you looked into nannyshares? This is what I did when my kids were babies and it worked really well for me. Or how about a childminder - many of them take babies and they are considerably cheaper. Both these options tend to be more flexible than nurseries too. You can get a list of registered childminders from the council, if I remember rightly, and you can browse direct ads for nannyshares on places like Gumtree, childcare.co.uk - and on here of course. I just posted an ad on here and found a share family/nanny that way, which saved paying an agency fee. Also bear in mind that you can ask your employer to pay some of your wages in childcare vouchers, which can save you a lot of money in tax. And you may well be eligible for child benefit too. So these are small things that help. Looking back on it now, those first few years were a bit of a struggle and yes, you do sometimes feel like you're paying for the privilege of working. But you muddle through and it definitely gets easier financially as your kids get older - and it means you've kept your job too (much harder to return to work later if you've given it up to stay at home). I'm sure other people will have more up-to-date advice about local nurseries but definitely don't feel you need to leave London to bring up your baby! Good luck...

So I'm confused - are these people smashing windows for fun or are they doing it to nick stuff? One poster above said they didn't steal the iPod or small change that was left in sight. So is it just mindless vandalism?

Really timely and practical post, BlueOrchid, thank you. Great advice about keeping an eye on potential situations when out and about. Hope the boys you know aren't too shaken up - it's such a horrible thing to happen.

I feel really sorry for your friend's child - how awful. But I feel very sorry for the waiter too, and by extension the cafe. If a toddler is allowed to run in front of a waiter carrying a tray of hot drinks then an accident is entirely inevitable. It doesn't sound like the management handled the aftermath well but the waiter was kind to give you ?20 out of his own money when it was hardly his fault. In the circumstances it seems harsh to hit the cafe with a huge legal bill if you sue them. What would you be suing them for, exactly? Transporting dangerously hot drinks? None of this is to belittle what was clearly a traumatic event for all concerned, but I'm just not sure how you can justify heaping all the blame on the cafe here.

I've got one child at Kingsdale and one at Charter East Dulwich. Both kids are happy at their respective schools and I feel we made the right choice with both of them. They are very different in terms of atmosphere (the size difference being the most obvious but lots of other different strengths in various subject areas too) so you really need to visit them to see which one suits your child best - my two daughters are quite different which was why my youngest one didn't automatically follow the oldest one to the same school. Overall there are pluses and minuses for both schools but I'd happily recommend either. (I remember doing a long post pontificating about these pluses and minuses in response to another thread on the EDF a while ago if you can be bothered to track it down.) Warning: the Kingsdale headteacher always makes an endless, cult-like speech at their open days but try not to let that put you off!

The waste in the NHS is extraordinary. We have a big plastic boot and crutches left over from when my daughter broke her leg and the hospital staff just looked at me blankly when I asked where I could return them. Then I had a minor foot op last year and the specialist told me they have to throw away the (metal) surgical instruments used after every single patient as they didn't have a proper sterilising machine. I was astounded. The doc was from Australia, if I remember rightly, and she said she was horrified by this too, as they would always sterilise/reuse back home.

What a shame. Makes my blood boil that landlords are happy to see a thriving business go under due to pure greed. Especially if - as so often happens - the place ends up lying empty afterwards as they can't find anyone else to pay their inflated rents. Hope the Brick House people pop up in ED again after they've had time to regroup. ETA: Cross-posted with above - quite agree JCR53S!

Ooh, exciting. Who's doing it, EPB? Always thought that wall was ripe for some art.

Not paranoid. I had a similar thing a year or so ago. Didn't think to do anything about it at the time but then found out the neighbour across the street had been burgled the same day, so I wish I'd acted on my instincts. Report it to the police.

Thanks for the update on the Maudsley site, rch, sounds like a great initiative.

For those affected, this is from the power company: As of 18:36 here is a summary of the issue - The cause is to safely repair a fault on the underground network in the Ulverscroft Road area. The current status of the issue is that our engineers have successfully found the fault and are in the process of carrying out repairs, it is a priority for us to give you a timeframe for your power to be back on. As soon as this is available, we'll let you know. We'll be in touch when we have more information.

It was insanely loud and late for those of us with younger kids. As a PR exercise for the school it did seem somewhat ill-judged!

What school does he go to, kpjigsaw? My daughter started a lunchtime D&D club at Charter ED and I know there's one for Year 7s at Kingsdale too. I did look into local D&D clubs for kids (outside school) when my daughter got into it but didn't manage to find one, unfortunately.

Don't want to derail the thread but could you tell us more about this, RCH? When is this happening? I'll be very happy to see the space being used more productively as it's such a prime spot and I've literally never seen anyone go in or out of the existing building. What's the plan for shops? Is the frontage going to be improved at all? And yes, to answer your question, seems like a great idea for police to have an office there if that is what they need. rch Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Also, now that the former Maudsley offices at > 20-22 Lordship Lane (by Goose Green Roundabout) > are being converted into a community hub with > workshops and pop up shops, there is a possibility > that a private room in the back of the building > could be provided for police officers and also > council officers (i.e. housing, park managers, > wardens and other departments) to use to take > breaks and catch up with paperwork and emails > while they are in the area, rather than hiking > back to Peckham or Tooley Street on foot or by bus > and then back to Goose Green ward again. > > This would mean that police would save a lot of > time travelling and therefore could spend more > time on the local streets. They could also arrange > meetings with residents in the meeting rooms that > would be available. > > Would residents support this possibility?

Oh but the bones of that house are lovely. You could make something gorgeous. If I had that kind of money...

Hi Greengage, sorry to hear about this and I'm sure you will get lots of helpful recommendations on here. You sound like a lovely concerned parent. However, I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that if your teen normally seems happy and this is out of character for them and a one-off, is it really necessary for them to see a counsellor, especially as they've asked not to have any fuss made? I'm just thinking back to my own teen days, when I did all sorts of crazy shit, mainly because I was a teenager and at that age you're just experimenting and are so heavily influenced by friends (and these days, social media). I would have been mortified if I'd been forced to 'talk through' any of my issues with a counsellor - I don't think I could have articulated anything because, at heart, I didn't have any real issues beyond normal teenage angst. It would have just made me think there was something really wrong with me. Obviously you know your own child best (and my thoughts about it would be very different if you'd said they were generally unhappy) but I just worry that as a society we pathologise normal feelings of sadness, stress or thrill-seeking - all of which teenagers clearly have in abundance. Obviously you'd need to keep an eye on them and if it happens again then that's a whole other story - but I feel there's almost a peer pressure amongst teens at the moment to show how screwed up they are, so it's no wonder that essentially happy kids might get caught up in this and want to try out something like self-harming to 'join the gang'. If it's a one-off experiment, maybe best to leave it alone. Anyway, just my two cents'-worth and I certainly don't want to minimise the distress this must be causing you. Good luck with it all whatever you decide to do.

Hi there, not sure if this is the right place to post but I'm having some problems with my private messages - I'm not getting my usual email to say if one has come in, and I don't think my outbound PMs are going out properly either. I realise everyone is probably on holiday at the moment but I'd be grateful if someone could investigate at some point in case I'm missing something obvious. Thanks very much :-)

Can't really see anything to get outraged about with these plans - they look pretty good to me.

Fully three-quarters of my teenage daughter's friendship group are 'going out' with other girls or identify as queer/bisexual/whatever. I'll probably be shot down in flames for saying it but I expect most of them will grow out of it in a year or so. Or not - fine either way of course! But it definitely seems to be a trend among that year group. I too have taken the 'that's nice dear' approach (completely agree with your post, Curmudgeon) and we'll see where it all ends up. It's great that it doesn't seem to be a big deal at school any more - among girls at least, might be different for boys, I suppose. I'm sure you're right that we live in a bubble in London, OP, but certainly things have changed to an astonishing degree since I was at school (where literally nobody dared to come out) so I do think the younger generation are way ahead of us on this.

We had one appear on our front window sill the other day. Very surreal photos attached. Our cat was NOT impressed.

Ooh, that looks GOOOOOD...

I generally like trying new places but there are certain restaurants I go to regularly either because the kids like them (e.g. GBK), the food is great (the Palmerston RIP) or I like the atmosphere (Yama Momo or Meat Liquor). But I do think the Peckham restaurants are more interesting so tend to go there - maybe familiarity breeds contempt, I don't know. Bonne Bouffe was perfectly nice but the one time I went there was hardly anyone else there so sadly that put me off going again - I hate sitting in half-empty places. So sometimes I think restaurants get into downward spirals for no good reason, which is a shame.