mettelw

You can give your old textiles to H&M in Brixton (or elsewhere) and they will give you ?5 voucher for each bag and they reuse the textiles in their ethical clothing range (or so they say). I give them textiles that could not be sold in a charity shop because they are too old or there are holes in them etc

My daughter broke her arm and needs physiotherapy to regain full mobility. We can't get an appointment at King's until later in May so I'm looking for a couple of private appointments for her before that as her mobility is quite limited at the moment. Does anyone have any recommendations for a good physiotherapist with experience of working with children? Any recommendations gratefully received! Thanks!

I'm looking for recommendations for a good optician to take my daughter to - preferably in the Herne Hill/Dulwich area. Thanks in advance for your recommendations!

Hi Reren My au pair is still keen to get in contact with other au pairs. Does your au pair have an email address my au pair could contact her on?

I've used aupairworld.com and been very happy with the results. Thanks Peachie Pie, will tell my au pair about the SE London aup iar facebook group.

My new au pair started this weekend and she is keen to get to know other au pairs in the area to meet up with. Her name is Julie, she's 20 and and she's from Denmark. If anyone is an au pair or has an au pair who would be interested in meeting up with Julie I'd love to hear from you! Thank you! Mette

Well, I can only relay what the guidelines provided by the agency we initially used, was. And certainly, from what I understand from our au pairs, no au pair they know of is earning more than ?100 a week (and I do make a point of asking once in a while to validate that we are paying a fair rate)except in a particular family where the au pair has sole care of the children for several days and nights on the trot because of the work the family does and and in this case the au pair does work more akin to that of a nanny.

My daughter is 4 and we are thinking that she might be interested in joining the beavers/scouts or whatever its called at her age group; somewhere where she can enjoy/experience outdoor activities, hikes etc. Is there such a thing in East Dulwich/Herne Hill and are there any recommendations that you can give me? Thanks!

The guidelines our agency provided was that an au pair works 25-30 hours a week plus two evenings babysitting and that the minimum rate is ?65/day in London. We've paid our au pairs from ?85 (if they were straight out school ( A-levels) and had no other experience than light babysitting) to ?100 (where they had more experience and/or qualifications e.g. nursery nurse degrees etc). We've never paid for their flights to / from their home country.

Agree with the overall positive comments about King's, certainly my maternity hospital of choice and absolutely the best place to be if things go wrong. I have had 2 children there - first one (December 2008) where our experience on the labour ward was really great, the post-natal ward was incredibly busy and the midwives had to go upstairs to help on the labour ward so there wasn't much time for supporting the post-natal ward. With my second (August 2011), we had a less positive experience on the labour ward (came in for induction in the morning, held in triage until 22:00 where my labour started spontaneously, did not have a great raport with the midwife to put it mildly, the doctors on the other hand were great, but fortunately the birth took 2 1/2 hours, so wasn't there too long), the postnatal ward was fantastic. Had lots of help and support, felt incredibly well supported by the midwives and the other support staff there, a huge difference to my first birth. I think they have listened to the issues that have been raised about the post natal wards and also apply quite a strict 'catchment area' so that they don't become so busy.

Our lovely Danish au pair has just arrived and is keen to meet other au pairs in the area. Do you know of any au pairs who might be interested in meeting up or is the East Dulwich au pair group still meeting (and if so, where and when, so I can direct to the right place)? Thanks in advance for any tips or contacts to make her feel more at home here! Mette

Vi har startet en gruppe for danske boern og foraeldre her i sydlondon. Planen er at moedes ihvertfald en gang om maaneden i et offentligt lokale (i oejeblikket ved Kent House station) og synge, lege og laese lidt paa dansk mens vi faar en kop kaffe og et stykke hjemmebagt kage. Med tiden haaber vi at blive nok til at kunne arrangere noget dansk undervisning. Hvis du, eller nogen du kender, er interesserede i at vaere med kan vi kontaktes paa [email protected] Britta og Mette We've started a group for Danish children living in South London. The plan is to meet at least monthly for play and stay sessions during which we'll sing some Danish songs, read some Danish books and let the children play and make friends. There will also be coffee and homemade cake. We hope to be able to get enough children together to provide Danish classes for the children. If you, or somebody you know, would be interested in joining the group, please contact us on [email protected] Britta and Mette

Snowboarder Sorry, wasn't as clear as I should have been - I just meant that you might try to let your son sleep as much as he needs to in the afternoon, not waking him up, to see if that improves his night sleeps too. The thing about the clock wasn't an instant success - it took a couple of weeks for her to understand what was going on and in the beginning she'd repeatedly call me and ask me to 'make it daytime' so I'd say it is worth persevering for a little while to see if anything changes. Also, we tried not to be too ambitious in when we'd set it to switch to 'daytime' - she would normally wake between 6:15 and 6:45 so we set it to 7:05. Good luck!

My daughter is 2.5. She still has her nap in the afternoon for approx 2 hours. It's quite early though - she'll start asking for bed any time between 12 and 13 and really needs to be down by 13 (which is a change from when she was a baby when she'd nap later). I let her sleep as long as she wants to (although not beyond 17:00, should she for once have had a late nap start). This obviously puts some restrictions on what we can do in the PM but I value the time she's asleep so much!! We start our bedtime routine at 18ish and she's normally down at about 19:00. I think all the sleep literature that I read when she was a baby said to let them have good sleeps during and a good sleep during the day would lead to good sleeping patterns during the night. Not sure this is transferable to toddlers, but it seems to work for us. And not sure how it would work with a baby routine as well, this is something I'm going to experience for myself pretty soon.... We've had problems with her waking early (6ish) but now use one of those day/night clocks that 'switches the sun on' at 7am and she is usually very good about staying in bed until then (even if she's awake, chatting/singing to herself). I wasn't sure whether it would work but she seems to have accepted it fine. At 7 she'll then shout 'It's daytime mummy' until we come and get her up, bless her!

Paper and pencils does it for our daughter - for us to use for her entertainment, not just for her own drawings (it's amazing what you can draw when put to the test!). We also bring a number of story books and a book of songs/rhymes and figure that people on adjacent seats would rather hear children's songs than a screaming baby. Your child may be a bit young for it but we also bring an iPad with games and dvds for her to watch (a great treat as she is not allowed to watch that much tv at home). Can't advise on the jetlag I'm afraid as we've always gone within a timezone or two.

We went on one in March with our 2.5 year old daughter. We all (including my daughter) loved the children's club (used it every morning) and would go again just for the facilities and the level of care that was provided to our daughter.

I weaned my daughter at 5 months with great success. She was giving off all the text-book signals that she was ready to be weaned - she could sit up, she was very interested in my food, she was taking a lot of milk, she had a number of teeth coming through etc etc. She loved her food from the off and we've never had any problems whatsoever with her being fussy or not eating enough or not liking to be spoonfed (in fact she would practically bite my hand off she was so eager to get to the food!). I used the Anabel Karmel books for inspiration for different puree combinations etc and when she was 6 months we moved to quite chunky purees and then on to more solid food. Trust your own instincts, you'll know best when your baby is ready.

Legalalien, what a great idea. I wish there was a way to arrange such 'exchanges' - rather than relying on bumping into somebody on mumsnet if you don't happen to know a family that needs help. Baddy-nan - I disagree that it is distasteful, helping out another family is exactly what we should be trying to do. No government will be able to eradicate poverty, and even if it was, this would take years and years. In the meantime there are children going without appropriate clothes, why shouldn't we help them (in a way that enables these families to maintain their dignity)?

Thanks for this, sounds good - I'll look into it! I was also thinking of trampolining or a more formal gymnastics class - still not sure whether she is old enough if anyone has any advice?

My daughter is coming up to 2 1/2 years and is absolutely fearless, physically, and loves nothing more than to climb, jump, cling, etc etc. We think that she might love a gymnastics class, but are not sure whether there will be any classes / sessions for her age group and a search of the internet has not thrown up a lot of local stuff. Any advice or hints on classes/clubs would be much appreciated!!

We've just had a lovely new Danish au pair join us and both she and we are keen that she makes some friends locally. She is a lovely, lively, outgoing girl. However, as she is our first au pair I don't know whether there are good places for au pairs to meet up. Any tips on how to facilitate her getting involved would be much appreciated!

Ask your midwife, she'll be able to give you the details. And yes, they are usually around 19:00 in the evenings.

My daughter is in a nursery in Herne Hill but the things we looked for were the things that ryedalema mentions. In addition, we looked at how much the children get out and about (integration into the local community - trips to the park/library/local schools/trips on trains but also involvement in 'the outside', not only outdoor space - at our nursery, for instance, the children have their own little garden where they grow vegetables and they sleep in the shade under the trees in the summer when it is very hot). Something else that I like about my daughter's nursery is that the children mix across age boundaries. Obviously, the babies have their own room, but in late afternoon all children are in the same, large room and this has worked very well for my daughter who loves spending time with the older children. Obviously, if you have a shy and sensitive child, you'd want to look for the opposite. However, most importantly, try to get a feel for whether the children are cared for and 'loved'. We didn't enroll our daughter in some nurseries where the focus was quite 'school style' in favour of nurseries where the focus was on freedom to play and lots and lots of love. And yes, you should start getting on the waiting lists now, however bizarre that may feel! Good luck!

Gosh, you are better prepared than I was - I somehow couldn't start looking for nurseries until my daughter had been born. Anyway, Nellie's Nursery has a two year waiting list (certainly that's what I was told last summer) so now is not too early to get on the list there. Good luck!