chantelle

yes i can see with my own eyes that the swings are still there, and the little climbing frame! (at least it was there a week ago). I just wondered when we might see the new playground in all its glory.

sambobia, your argument only works if people see value in buying a house as opposed to renting it, which for any rational person means they must expect significant capital gains to make it worth their while. Sadly not everyone is sensible but there are many of us who actually can afford to buy in the area who would rather rent and save the vast difference. Your high demand, limited supply argument falls apart in light of the recent downturn - prices fell significantly despite high demand, limited supply and low interest rates. Funny, so many people in this country told me that could never happen. I am always sceptical of arguments that say basic laws of affordability don't apply.

we pay ?1,650 for a vast three-bed house, started renting it last year. A similar property on our street was listed on rightmove for ?650k last week (though I don't see it there anymore so either someone has vastly overpaid or the owner woke up to themselves). There is still a massive premium to buy that is utterly unjustified when prices are stagnant and vulnerable to further falls.

does anyone know when the new playground will be finished?

yes ED is great for location but who can afford ?500k plus prices? That requires a combined income for a couple of around ?150k. The only potential buyers are people with similarly overpriced houses who have benefitted from the not-yet-deflated bubble.

Hi Cate, that's my son's shoe!! I'm PMing you

ooh, saw this just now so obviously too late for today but thanks.

we are happy with our rear-facing car seat too (it's a maxi cosi), BUT it's complicated to attach and weighs a ton and our nanny isn't happy about having to move it in and out of her car every week.

Hi, I've heard about diddi dance and see they have a class Friday mornings for 2-4 year olds, but think maybe I read on this forum about a similar class starting at more like 18 months and also on Fridays? Any fun Friday suggestions for an 18 month old are also welcomed! thanks.

i hadn't even thought of tacking it on the end but my employer was happy to let me use some of the days as holiday later in the year and paid me for the rest.

my son is 18 months too and tbh i don't really care if he has one bottle a day. Is there any overwhelming evidence that it's such a bad thing? he will sometimes have a bit of milk in a soft or hard sip cup but those clearly hold none of the magic the bottle still has for him.

i think that's the bottom line - different things work for different babies, particularly in the first six months. I thought my son would never get on a good sleep schedule but over time each thing slotted into place. First, he finally succumbed to one long nap (compared to none or two brief and unpredictable ones), and then started sleeping 12 hours a night (around 12 months). At 18 months, he absolutely thrives on routine, and even settled right back into his normal hours within a couple of days of being in a 7-hour different time zone on holiday recently. I respect Gina Ford a lot, though I scarcely followed a thing her book said, and it doesn't bother me at all that she didn't have children of her own. My son's nanny has only the one child herself but 35 years of experience and I draw upon her knowledge all the time. Gina has worked with 100s of babies (including a friend of mine's) and I think she has picked up a trick or two along the way. There's no need to plug our babies into a one size fits all approach - we can all try different things to find what works, and share the experience.

My son fed way too frequently for the schedule to ever make any semblance of working for us, but I think she is totally reasonable in her methods and attitude, and accepts that people will use what works and discard what doesn't. I think Nick Clegg made his comments in a friendly, parent banter sort of way and then it stupidly was run as a story of national importance. Ask any parent about GF and you will probably get a bit of eye-rolling - even from her biggest fans. She has also written a touching book called, Good Mother, Bad Mother, about her own childhood and all the baggage mums are endowed with.

re: the question about seats and take-off and landing for the under-2s, we borrowed a special child seat belt from an American friend that can be used from the age of 1. On the airline we were on (Thai Airways), they don't even have the extension belts, you just hold the baby in your arms!

Hi, having flown my son to South Africa, U.S. and most recently Thailand, I'd say any time before crawling/walking is definitely good. South Africa was a doddle, he was 3.5- 4.5 months (we were there a month) and both flights were pain-free. He slept most of the time, in a bassinet on BA (the bassinets only go up to around the age of 6 months). Once on the ground, he would reliably fall asleep in his car seat or buggy so that we could go out to even extremely noisy restaurants at night. The only downside was I was breastfeeding and needed to stop whatever we were doing and find a private place every 2.5 hours, for about 45 minutes, which really cut into seeing the bloody country! That time we flew from Heathrow and they would not let us take through (emergency) ready-made formula in sealed cartons. The U.S. at 7 months was fine too, he was in a great seat-like thing attached to the wall on Virgin Atlantic that can accomodate ages up to 2 years or something like that. Meanwhile, Thailand with a 17 month old was an utter hell on both flights. He was overexcited, refused to sit in his seat (that we paid for - and it would have been far worse without it) and spent much of the flight either screaming or running madly up and down the aisles, stopping at times to try to make friends. On the ground, he was a pleasure and quickly got over any jet lag and well-timed onto a new schedule. he had naps in his buggy and if we wanted to have some privacy in the evening or stay out a bit longer, he would also fall asleep in the buggy out and about, then transfer to our bed later. So ... I think it's more fulfilling in general to take them when they're old enough to actually enjoy themselves, but the flights themselves are definitely easier when they are tiny.

thanks for all the feedback, and it's encouraging to hear good comments about Bellenden. I also take to heart the advice about looking around - that does seem crucial.

Katsu- yes I was horrified to see the figure because i had read the ofsted report too and it didn't seem that terrible. However I have no faith in Ofsted anyway! As far as I can tell they give too much credit to schools with children starting from a low base - such as not speaking English as a first language - and then the improvement they make from there, rather than bottom line achievement. I think it was in the Sunday Times last week, a former inspector talking about how schools are judged almost solely on their plans and intentions, not the reality. I'm no expert on this though, and don't think test results are everything, but am just another mum trying to make my way in a minefield. Toast - I did see that but don't have a lot of faith in Labour either, or that the situation will be sorted when the 2008 baby boom is starting reception. Smiler - I wouldn't be the first to do it ...

Hi, i know there have been lots of threads on this but wanted to start a fresh one after reading that our closest primary, Bellenden, ranked the second worst in all of London for maths and English test pass rates (around 29%). We rent our house, but want to stay in the area long-term and have our now 16-month old son attend school here, and wonder if it's futile to move around Adys Road and hope to get into St. John's and St. Clement's if we are not CoE, etc.? we are currently only 600m away but I suppose that is way too far! We are also considering going private, but discovered that the Villas has shut their nursery waiting list and will only reopen it to babies born after Sept. 2009 - does anyone know if this means we will have no chance of getting into the school, having not even had the possibility of applying for nursery? any advice welcomed.

joining in late but just another mum here who really loves being back at work, though i do have those moments of self-questioning and hearing those echoes of people who say "they're only young once." My son is 16 months and I went back four days a week, five months ago. We have a fabulous nanny, shared with another child slightly older and it is all going incredibly well. i really think everyone is happy, though I know there could be issues later when he is old enough to have a (vocal) opinion about it. I'm glad to be working, I love my job, and if I decide later to be a SAHM, that's a possibility too. Most of all, I treasure that I do have options thanks to my husband's job and our fairly conservative attitude toward spending. crystal - i was worried too about working after broken nights but happily my son's sleep improved hugely from one year on, and now I don't even see him in the morning because he sleeps in until 8am or later!

Hi, we just had that too, around 8pm, near to Bellenden. Needless to say we said we were not interested.

can someone tell me what the hours are? do you pay to use it? - clueless mum new to the area

we didn't bother, just put baba on the sofa. A breastfeeding pillow can be quite handy to put around the baby and guards against any unexpected rolling.

sledge - that sounds awful!! we moved a couple of weeks ago and are taking our son to nursery near Waterloo three days a week until his nanny share starts soon, and I've found it an absolute nightmare dealing with him in his sling on the bus. (he throws massive tantrums as he gets bored and hot) He's much better on the train (from Peckham Rye to E&C) because at least it's very fast and then we're on the move walking or taking a short bus ride. I wouldn't want to do it long term though, that is for sure. He's 13 months. haven't dared to use a buggy because of the steps issue, and not wanting to deal with possibly not getting on buses because they're full. if we weren't doing a nanny share, i'd find a local childminder.

i would definitely be thinking teething and would try some calpol. i'd also be thinking i'd want to see if she could self settle at all if you didn't rush to her, because clearly no one is getting good sleep on that kind of schedule. i do recall my son going through a particularly difficult sleep phase around 7-8 months. it's when i reached breaking point and put an end to night feeds and within a week or so he was sleeping through without waking at all (for the first time). I really think he'd gotten in the habit of waking a few times in the night, though what you describe sounds rather more than that. good luck and keep in mind it will get better.

factcheck please: > Actually, some random (nutcase) guy made an offer 15 years ago to make these payments if someone was found to have been acting in self-defense whilst shooting an intruder. Did he ever make such a payment and is he still making the offer today? very doubtful. This is such a typical example of some crazy report on those crazy Americans and their guns that has little basis in fact.