Spooner

me too - subject to costs & times fitting around children. great idea

hi bea what age are your classes suitable for? a friend went to one - she loved it but said her 18 month old was the oldest. i have sometimes lively twins of 22 months. thanks

the hovering over your house certainly doesn't make for a good night's sleep. was it seriously someone on the tracks or is that a joke that's lost on me?!

does anyone know if this is still on? it sounds great thanks

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Hi everyone Thank you very much for your replies - none of my friends seem to struggle so it's good to know we are not alone. Many made me laugh out loud. We now have flashing toothbrushes and now 2 sets of clean teeth (well as clean as them chewing the brush gets them but I'm not pushing it to begin with). They were so pleased with them that they insisted on sleeping holding onto them. So far so good but we've got the Gruffalo trick up our sleeves if we need it.

Hi everyone Much of the time my 20 month old twins won't let me clean their teeth or even get the brush near their mouths. They seem to go through stages when one will let me do it for a couple of weeks but will then refuse it for a spell. I've tried in the bath, brushing mine at the same time and brushing their cuddly toys' 'teeth'. I may be over-reacting but I've started having recurring dreams of their teeth all turning black! Any tips very gratefully received. Thanks

This sounds absolutely brilliant but unfortunately I am outnumbered by children. Please repost if you ever run it at a weekend as I imagine a lot more people could come as they'd be 2 parents available rather just 1 during the week.

Hi Our whole timetable of playgroups and classes largely seems to be stopping for a month over Easter leaving with me with 2 nearly 2 year olds with a lot of energy to get rid off. Does anyone know of any good toddler friendly things to do in the area besides the park and Peckham Pulse? Many thanks

That's a great suggestion. Goose Green is the only risky one we've found in the area as it's near the road. Great playground but there's a lot of human traffic coming in and out of it and of course the road traffic right there. I'm happy to get on the case if anyone knows who I should contact. Otherwise I'll just try the council.

Not wishing to moan but...... I cannot understand why a select few parents don't shut the gates at playgrounds. Their own children could get out along with anyone else's. It only takes a nanosecond to shut the gate but makes a much safer environment for everyone to enjoy. As a parent of more than one toddler, the playground can be full on enough without one or both of them rushing off out the open gate. Am I missing something?

I can't get hold of Kelly and I need a spray tan imminently. Has anyone found anywhere else that does a good one locally?

this sounds too good to be true! how can it be free? is it laid on by the council?

Ikea high chairs get my vote - so cheap, not offensive looking and you can take them away in the car with you pretty easily. they don't fold flat but you well find this isn't an issue as you end up leaving it out. i seem to spend much of the day feeding with the children in the high chair. on the upside, it does take up less room than others so you may not mind leaving it out. we thought we'd start off with an ikea one and send it to granny's if it didn't suit us. it never left our house and granny has 2 more expensive and not as good models.

I'm absolutely amazed that Pugwash's fightback didn't deter this rotten guy from ever trying this again. Awful that it happened to both of you and hope you are ok.

So you got the same explanation as I did. I did ask if you could put them in for the morning or afternoon free session that they mention as being 8-11 or 3-6. I was told that you have to pay for the whole day still so if you just used 3 of your free hours one day you'd be paying for the rest of the day on top of that. Their approach did surprise me as it works out very expensive and seems to be only really suitable for parents who actually want their children there all day long. I was kind of hoping that I'd been given the wrong information as I've ruled it out on this basis and this basis alone as it was great apart from this!

I wish I had known that they can't make you pay for more hours when I visited Bright Horizons this week as that is not what they told me at all. Katiesa it would be great to hear how you get on. Thanks for that article too Fuschia. I wonder when the following bit will come into effect this year as that will change things for the good: The Code also confirms that from 2012, parents will also have the right to spread the free entitlement over a whole year. The Government said this would help parents balance childcare with employment or training and enable them to budget.

Hi Katiesa I was very keen on the Bright Horizons nursery but found the policy of only full days doesn't really suit us. Different nurseries work differently with the most flexible having a minimum of 3 hours a day vs some that require full time attendance. Bright Horizons charges for full days whether your child attends all day or not. When you get the vouchers I believe that they allow a maximum of 6 hours per day out of your free allowance of 15 hours. That means that your child would need to attend 3 days a week and pay something on top of your free allowance as they'd only get 6 hours free per day and that only applies for 38 weeks of the year. They have a sheet which says how much you would pay per month when your child qualifies for 15 hours free a week. As you have to commit to a nursery year round I imagine you would end up always paying for the school holidays unless your chosen nursery only runs in for 38 weeks per year (eg school nursery).

hi I hired a Medela Symphony from Medela themselves - they are based in Manchester and a number I had for them is 08709505994. It was ?40 per month so pricey but I had already got through 2 of the Medela Mini Electric Breastpumps which now cost nearly ?100 each. Medela were very helpful and said if I was expressing the whole time that the mini ones were not suitable and a hospital grade one was much better. If you are actually breastfeeding much of the time then buying a mini electric one may be cheaper and suitable for your needs. I definitely recommend some expressing so you can have the odd night when others feed your babies. Heaven! It sounds like you are extremely organised already and a mum may well be much better and certainly cheaper than a maternity nurse. Make sure you have lots of DVDs or series to watch on TV whilst you feed. Best of luck with it all.

Congratulations! Having twins is amazing. I found breastfeeding the hardest part of it. Join the Dulwich twins club if you haven't - very useful to meet other twins' families and they do expectant parent talks. I managed tandem breastfeeding until my boyfriend went back to work at 6 weeks. I found getting them both to stay on without anyone else there to pass them to me absolutely impossible. I didn't have a double feeding cushion though and this would have helped enormously. My maternity nurse advised from very early on that she recommended twins mums purely express and then feed it in bottles. I really wish she hadn't encouraged me to give up on actually feeding from the boob as if you can crack this it is by far the best option - although it does limit you to the home mainly. I ended up purely expressing for 6 months and giving them a combo of breastmilk and formula. It took up much of my time as you sit there expressing 6 times a day and then you still have to feed them plus do all the sterilising of bottles! It is sort of like doing both breastfeeding and bottle feeding in terms of workload. I rented a hospital grade Medela pump which was brilliant and had a most ugly bra with holes in that you could use to pump hands free. If you end up bottle feeding, putting them in bouncy chairs is great as you can tandem feed. I was SO glad to give up the expressing after 6 months and still don't know if I would do it again. In my opinion the NHS is so pro breastfeeding to the point of being blinkered that you feel this immense pressure to give your children breastmilk. However, I found the midwives to be so busy that you don't learn how to actually do it in hospital so it is all talk and little support. If it isn't working for you get help early on so you can get the swing of it asap. Pay for a maternity nurse (not mine!) or if you can't manage that ask your health visitor. Try not to worry or feel guilty whatever you do and if you manage to purely breastfeed your twins you deserve a massive pat on the back!

Thanks so much for all the comments. I never expected such a flurry of suggestions. I now have a long list of local places to try. We ended up persuading some Claphamites out of their hood by tales of how good Angels & Gypsies is. I've been there 3 times previously and loved it. However on Friday it was just slightly above average but for the same high prices and I was left with about 4 dishes of EXTREMELY garlicy prawns that I'd raved about to eat all by myself. It's a good job I spend much of the time with the children at home as I stink!

Oh I hope it passes soon, remembering all well how stressful it is, especially when poo is flying everywhere. It is probably just a phase but if our experience is anything to go by, if they are usually fine about having their nappies changed, the change is because something hurts. Even if the bottom doesn't look too sore, it seems it can be very. Once we hit a certain level of nappy rash - when the screaming starts as you begin to vaguely approach the changing table - we find the best option is a shower down each time. It is time consuming but it seems to be the least painful way to get all wee or poo off. Wet wipes even fragrance free seem to be very painful. The shower is then followed by lashings of Metanium. All this is done with singing and even food or milk bribery if really bad. I try and avoid it escalating into too much of a fear for them as then that can be the issue after the sore bottom goes away. The nappy lady sounds intriguing although I think holding mine down in that position would stress them out further!

Hi We are pretty new and don't get out much due to children. We have a get out of jail card for Friday though and wanted to eat locally somewhere of medium price range that has a good atmosphere but no needing to shout given it is the weekend. Any suggestions gratefully received. Thanks

We had the fake window cleaner asking for ?10 up front in December. He was so believable as a person, it was just the asking for money a month before the job that had alarm bells ringing. We also get daily calls from charities which may be legitimate but is even more annoying and intrusive than the charity people with the clipboards trying to grab you when you walk down the street. At the risk of upsetting genuine callers and neighbours, we shall be stopping answering the door.

I have had a quick look at this and wanted to congratulate you - it is and will be very useful indeed! Well done