nylonmeals

My 3 year old, who wears a nappy at night, will only poo in his nappy. He quite happily pees during the day without any problems, but he seems to hate the idea of doing a poo on the toilet. So basically he just waits till nighttime and the nappy. He's still quite young but I was wondering if any of you had had similar issues with your little ones and any tips on taking away the toilet poo fear or if I just leave him.

(oh and she did an hour booking too)

We had Juggling Joolz who was much cheaper and excellent Joolz S-H Big recommendation!

Despite having lived in London all my life, we have just found the amazing Puppet Barge for children. It's a beautiful old canal barge that is moored either at Richmond or Little Venice and is converted into a small puppet theatre. I took my 3 and 4 year old boys to see The Town Mouse and The Country Mouse this weekend and they were mesmerised, they just loved it! http://www.puppetbarge.com/Temporrarynotice.htm Their xmas puppet show is a Christmas Carol http://www.puppetbarge.com/NextShow.htm A really big recommendation. I know its not local but it's lovely and hugely unusual.

Ours moved at a similar age - we had to stairgate his room at first to stop him wandering around the house

We've been recommended this bunk bed site in the past http://www.thekidswindow.co.uk/html/results.asp?subcat=670 but have not actually ordered from there (yet) Some looked great though

Another option is Camberwell Leisure Centre - we were there for their kids gym class and just signed up for swimming at the reception. I have memories of queueing in the cold, early hours of the morning when my son was a baby to get a place at Peckham Pulse - dreadful. This was so easy and the lessons are about ?5 and seem really good!

We had a week in a 3 bedroom cottage for ?450 in Feb half term. Nothing like ?1200 The website says "Our cottages sleep between 2 and 8 people and prices average ?30 pppn off-peak and ?40 pppn peak" You check availability and prices at the top of the home page. Be really surprised if it was that much. They aim to be cheaper than Centre Parcs.

We had a fantastic week at Gladwin's Farm on the Suffolk/Essex borders. 90 minutes drive, beautiful countryside. Wonderful 22 acre farm with animals (kids collected eggs for breakfast, fed animals etc), woods perfect for den making, play barn with soft play, ping pong and wii as well as indoor heated pool, tennis court, playground and sauna for grown ups, + each cottage has a private hot tub. 7 cottages, all lovely converted stables/out-houses. http://www.gladwinsfarm.co.uk/ We will be booking again. Just lovely.

Great great city farm with a fabulous cafe! Thanks for the holiday links!

Ruskin Park paddling pool (and the new-ish Ruskin Park Cafe) all in full working order!

I "third" Whippersnappers. It's not cheap but really well thought through as a class and works great for siblings of different ages.

Our little one is at a french nursery in Herne Hill (husband is french) and we're really happy with it. We certainly haven't seen any forcing of toddlers into desks, crying children and empty playgrounds with no toys as the article suggests. I've seen a bunch of happy, calm toddlers doing their toddler-thing which seem for the most part to be things like painting, exploring, cooking and dressing up. Not so different to the UK. There is a clear structure to every day but I don't think that's so unusual compared to decent English nurseries.

Agreed - its fab. We had a great morning with 3 and 1 1/2 year old, plus there's Giraffe for lunch next door and a lot of fair type rides by the river and street artists. A really good day out. Closes on 29th I think

Joolz sounds great - thank you!

There have been a couple of threads on this subject, but I am under very clear instruction from my soon to be 3 year old that he would like a "balloon man" at his birthday party next month. Any recommendations?? Thanks all

The cafe in Tate Modern also has a great deal where every grown up lunch gets a free kids lunch (pasta, fish fingers and chips, mini hamburgers etc) Actually makes for a reasonable cheap day out!

Second vote for Cafe Prov - big toddler toy area away from other non-family eaters. Makes life much less stressful for everyone!

6 grown ups and 5 little ones stayed at this old oast house in kent last weekend - about 1 1/2 hours from here and beautiful. castles, steam trains and the beach at camber sand not too far away http://www.english-country-cottages.co.uk/cottages/potts-farm-oast-POOB/?gclid=COL4587XkLQCFe_MtAodagYANQ&clickcd=23200 no pool or anything though but games room lovely set out and v big rooms have a good weekend!

Thought that this was a pretty good review of the Leapfrog and the VTech Innotab which seem to be the head to head competitors http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/reviews/tablets/3415162/leappad-2-vs-innotab-2-childrens-tablet-comparison-review/ Both sound pretty good!

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/foodanddrink/recipes/8773657/River-Cottage-Baking-recipes-Individual-cakes.html?image=3 These veg patch fairy cakes are always a huge hit in our house - you'd never know that they were parsnip or courgette!

We go to St Phillip and St James in Herne Hill - the 9.30am is packed with toddlers (and kids of all ages) Really family friendly http://ssphilipandjameshernehill.wordpress.com/

I am amazed that there is so much Harris Academies negativity - The Harris Academy in Crystal Palace is (I think) something like the fifth-most over-subscribed state school in the country. I think that there are 15 boys applying for every place. It's meant to be one of the best state schools in South London.

Vertbaudet which is a French kids clothing and furniture store had some nice things - worth a look at their site http://www.vertbaudet.co.uk/baby-bedroom-furniture.htm It says Baby Bedroom but I think its Baby/Toddler

We went thru the same thought process as you and ended up with the P&T Sport (from the Forum) as seemed to be the lightest and it was perfect for us. Our age gap was 20 months as well. That said after about 6 months of it being really useful we ended up storing it in the shed and using our old Bee but with a Buggy Board as at 2 1/2 years our son didn't want to be in any buggy at all. So know all we use is that!