Sanne Panne

Gave daughter hamster cage and supplies, now ready to go buy the actual hamster. Where in (South) London should we go?

There was definitely a lot of action around Village Way 30 minutes ago.

One of the best things I discovered in 2015 was Krav Maga at Urban Fit and Fearless. Krav Maga is an army method aimed at quickly "neutralizing" an attacker irrespective of size/strength. Patrice's classes focus on dealing with urban violence (e.g. being grabbed from behind, held down on the street, being punched etc) and are great fun and serious at the same time. They're a combination of a pragmatic workout to provide realistic exhaustion and focus on technique. Classes are currently held at Bellenden Road on Wednesdays 7:30-9:00pm and you can drop in. More on the site http://www.urbanfitandfearless.com/

I highly recommend my tennis coach Alessandro Ranzani. He turned me from an absolute beginner into a passionate player who's on the courts 3 times a week. He teaches adults as well as kids and recently taught my nephew more in one hour than he learned in the past two years. Alessandro is a professional coach and plays tennis at a high level himself. He teaches all levels (from beginners through to very advanced), develops individually tailored training programs and is genuinely enthusiastic. His site is www.ranzani-tennis.com, email [email protected] and mobile 07466-753163. He's independent so you can play at your preferred court if you have one.

I have one in Y2 and one in reception and they both absolutely love it and so do I. Lovely staff, excellent class management, high teaching standards. This is always very subjective though so I can only speak for myself.

My daughter does Taekwon-do at Best Leg which teaches at the Jags Sports Club on Saturday afternoon. I really like the teacher. Let me know if you want more detail and/or can't find them online.

We stayed in the Perigord Vert part of the Dordogne (North) and it wasn't too touristy at all. Beautiful and quiet, and at driving distance from the charming and more touristy villages. Rented a house via owners direct.

Thanks for the advice, I ended up doing it myself. Too many solids in there to filter it so I emptied the whole pond, separating solids and water and saving the newts and the nicest plants. Refilled it with tap water and now letting it rest for a while before I put some plants in and eventually the newts. Fingers crossed. Will never let is get as bad as it was when we moved in. Love the tip about the straw! Will use that for maintenance. Will also keep Gary's number in case I can't get the pond to "live" again.

Looking for someone with the materials and knowledge to empty a small pond, clean it and either refill it or advise us how to get it back to a clean pond state (avoiding complete takeover by algae etc). There's no precious life to be preserved besides 2-3 plants and some newts that we have a bowl for. Please reply or PM if you can do this or know someone who can.. thanks!

I am always asked for the birth certificate when entering or exiting the "other" country. Wondering if UK border control has the parents' names logged when they scan the childrens' passports because they never ask me if they're mine when I leave the UK with them... (my passport is EU but non-UK and my kids' passports are British AND they have different surnames).

Talk to a legal advisor before you change locks, however much my instinct would tell me to do such a thing. I know in the US things like this can work against you as you're supposedly not trying to resolve the conflict rationally, and technically denying your partner access to the child before any decisions have been made.

The gym is good and it's never too busy there. If you're planning on using multiple facilities, e.g. gym, aerobics classes and the pool AND you don't mind the fact that you can't use it between ~7am-6pm on weekdays during term time, it's not a bad deal.

Want to go back to rowing... I'm experienced (did it for 10 years) but would need a bit of a refresher as I haven't sat in a boat for 15 years. Are there any rowing clubs that are easy to get to from ED? Driving or public transport, no real preference. Thanks!

Is there any local or somewhat local pharmacy that's open after big Sainsbury's closes at 5pm today?

Thanks for the tip! I will contact him. Looked at the website last week but wasn't sure it would truly work for beginners who want to draw all kinds of objects... but it sounds like a "custom" approach is possible. Thanks again.

Looking for an evening art class, preferably hand drawing / sketching. Not quite into painting (yet), mostly want to learn to draw well. Not focusing on any particular type of object so portraits or live models would be too specialised. Any recommendations? Thanks!

Are you sure your child is going to blue class, not red? In any case it's a great nursery with minimal staff turnover, the only leavers seem those who don't return from maternity leave as it probably doesn't pay enough. Having had one child there a few years ago and another one there now I've dealt with the same core staff (and a couple of new joiners to allow for expansion ) for nearly 4 years and many of them had been there for a long time when my eldest first joined . It's very personable, high quality care.

Another recommendation for Christian here. Office/shop on Pellatt Road.

Yes have excellent experiences with Russell Perring as well. Has loads and loads of very good local recommendations.

Looking for a van to hire for a move from SE24 to SE22 for Sat 30 November and Sun 1 December (ideally 3-4 hour slot on each day but we're flexible). Nearest free zipvan is pretty far away and I'd prefer something a touch bigger anyway so we don't need to drive so many times. Not too keen on Hertz style prices, just something that doesn't have pieces flying off as we drive down the road. All recommendations and offers welcome! Van with man fine too but we're 2 adults (who can drive a van) looking to keep the cost limited so we can technically do without the help - but again open to both options especially if the with man option is not more expensive. Thanks a lot.

Taekwon-do at Jags Sports Club is very very nice. Great teacher.

How about everyone pm's me their email addresses and I'll set a group conversation up.

Hi, I'm Dutch (left NL only 10 years ago) and am moving back to ED from Herne Hill next month. Have two girls 3 and 5. We have a Dutch nanny so the kids are fairly fluent although they definitely prefer English. Would love to meet up with you all! I do work full time but have the occasional half-day off - I'm sure we can organise something.

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Experience with introducing the "switch" when you've already allowed them to become picky: after initially going down the pasta-pesto and fish fingers route and scratching my head over why I did eat salad and soup at 4 without being forced by my parents nor left with eating disorders as a teen or adult I bluntly switched to the "this is dinner" attitude (not a confrontational "eat this or you'll get nothing" but an informative "this is dinner, it's delicious") 18 months ago when the smallest was 1.5 and the eldest 3.5, and it worked pretty much immediately and they really enjoy mealtime.