Cait.Hewitt

Will give it a go now. Thanks Huguenot.

Hello. Have emailed Admin a couple of times to ask for a change to my username, having finally understood the potential issues around using my real name online. But no response. Is there anything else I can do, e.g. closing my account and reopening one with a different name? I can't see how to do this.

Thanks so much for all the advice. I think I'm now sold on the idea of a front seat, even though bike shops seem to disapprove I actually thought I had made a decision on bike (which needs replacing) plus seat, till I learned today that front-mounted seats shouldn't be fixed to aluminium alloy stems, as these stems are liable to suddenly break, so I'll need to rethink my choice of bike. But it's all getting gradually clearer!

Thanks for the tips. I posted about this on another forum too, and it seems as if my best options are either a front seat and rear panniers or a rear seat and front panniers. I must say I've always preferred the idea of a front mounted seat, but people in bike shops have advised against on the basis that it affects your balance too much so makes you unsafe. I would ordinarily look for everything secondhand before buying new, but I read that with car seats it's not advised in case there had been a road accident making the seat unsafe, and wonder if the same is true of bike seats, so might avoid ebay.

Hi. I'm looking for a rear child seat that I can use at the same time as panniers. Does anyone know if this is possible? Plan is to cycle the first 5 mins with my one-year-old in the seat (or probably walk it till she's a bit bigger, to be honest), drop her off at our nannyshare, then cycle on to work. Need to be able to carry a laptop and a few papers, keys and money etc, and also waterproofs just in case. Ideally I'd like to be able to use rear panniers, but BC Bikes have advised that this wouldn't be possible with the seat in position, and that I should consider a backpack - possibly one that would convert to a pannier once the child seat was removed. Does anyone have experience and/or suggestions? I'm really missing cycling, and public transport to and from central London feels slow and unreliable by comparison, especially when I'm itching to get home to see my little girl!

My nearly-ten-month-old got her first Bookstart books today and already loves them. It made me wonder whether there is some kind of subscription service that will send a recommended age-appropriate book once a month. It might broaden my horizons and would make a great first birthday gift from her grandparents! We've been getting library books, which are great, but I'm guessing we should really get some of our own too. Any ideas?