ARF

My children are at Goodrich (the oldest in Year 4) and we have been really happy with the school. It is one of the larger schools in the area but it really doesn't feel like that when you're in the school. It's a friendly school with a great community and I think the size also brings lots of opportunities - and sets them up well for moving on to secondary (not that that will be on your mind yet!) I do agree with the other comments though - there are loads of good schools in the area so I don't think there are any bad options.

Thanks for responses. For future reference for anyone who comes across this thread, the visitor car park at the hospital was pretty much empty at 7.10am so we had no trouble parking.

I have to be at Lewisham hospital at 7.30am tomorrow and likely to be there most of the day with my daughter (age 6) who is having an operation. The nurse on the unit said that there is parking available and that it would be ?6 for the day as she is having a procedure. However, I can?t see any information on parking on the hospital website, other than to suggest it is very limited and costs ?2 for the first hour and ?1 for every 30 mins thereafter. Has anyone been there recently?

He's on a bin near the junction of Goodrich and Friern Road

Has anyone had Karndean flooring laid and if so who did you use and would you recommend them?

I have two children at Gumboots and am really happy with it. The garden especially is a fantastic facility and has lots of equipment. There have been a few temporary staff recently after some departures but there have been several new appointees and things seem to be settling down again. The baby room has a really nice atmosphere - several of the staff have been there for years and it's very caring. I'm pretty sure Gumboots don't do half days.

I logged on specifically to see if there was a thread on this and I am really pleased to hear that your dog was ok. I can quite imagine that your au pair was terrified. I was with a friend and saw some of the attack. It was awful and seemed to last for ages. We had three small children with us so didn't linger and several other people were there and trying to intervene. I can't believe the owner of the other dog didn't give her details to follow up with. I really hope you can track her down.

I second the recommendation to go along to one of the sessions at the velodrome. We too had a balance bike for our daughter which she was never that interested in and always preferred her scooter. She had probably been on it literally a handful of times before we gave her a bike for her fourth birthday. We went for a Frog bike from Balfes - cheaper then Isla bikes but still fairly lightweight and manouverable. We didn't get stabilisers. We took her out on it once ourselves - more or less just holding her on it the whole time - and then I took her along to a velodrome striderbike session on it. I was really after tips on how to help her but by the end of that session she was able to ride on her own. Starting, braking and steering took a bit longer to master but once she had got the hang of balancing and pedalling we could just take her out to practice. I was surprised how quickly she got the idea. I think the minimal time she spent on her balance bike must have still helped. And she probably took on board the advice from the staff at the velodrome more readily than from us...

The post office on Forest Hill Road do passport photos and have taken good ones of my children - one was 6 weeks and the other ten months.

We read I'm a Big Sister by Joanna Cole with our daughter, who was 2 years 4 months when her sister was born. I liked it as it plants the idea that a new baby needs attention and that the older sibling can help, but also that there are fun things that the sibling can do which a new baby can't. All very simply of course!

I had a recommendation for The Gardens dental practice but haven't got any further myself so can't speak from experience.

The sibling column is zero where all applicants were offered a place for that school so it's likely that it's just because it was immaterial to allocating places.