alieh

I completely love Dorees at Znips near Victoria. She is the only person I've found who understands how to layer and shape my hair without making it choppy or with steps.

Those kind of evening wake ups seemed to be linked to over-tiredness for us. Has he had bad naps/early starts/late bedtimes recently that might have built up a bit? In our case usually solved by a few nights of earlier bedtimes, but every child is different so may not work for you!

Same here! They have refunded my line rental cost from when it started until it is fixed...still waiting!

We've used sitters.co.uk in this scenario - they can usually send people at 3 hours notice or less.

We used to live on Pellatt Road very near to the sorting station and did find it quite annoying. There was often noise of van doors, drivers chatting, and sometimes loud music blaring inside the vans very early in the morning. I think the noise was concentrated in the driveway on Pellat, so might be okay on the other side by Crystal Palace Road?

Wow! That is a great response Clare, thanks! I wasn't trying to criticise in my original post as I understand you can only cope with so many parents at a time. It was just a rant at the situation, really. But that is great that you've been so accommodating.

Many thanks Clare from Goodrich! I will try to snag a spot on one of the added tours and we have also been participating in activities like summer fair, tabletop sale, etc to get a feel for the school. I also managed (thanks to a PM from a kind forumite) to get a spot on the Horniman Tour this morning from someone who had to cancel. Who knew there was a black market in primary school tour places?! Thanks again everyone!

That's really helpful everyone thanks! I knew it would be stressful getting a place in one of the local schools, but didn't know that competition would extend to the tour!

I think this is just a moan rather than seeking advice, but.... I really believe what everyone says about not relying on OFSTED reports and test scores to judge primary schools and that you need to see the school to get a sense of whether it will be right for your child. But at this point I can't even book a tour to view any of them! Goodrich is our closest - I called a month ago and the tours were booked until 28th January. I tried again today same thing. The application deadline is 15th January. Hmmm. Tried to book a tour for Horniman Primary. No tours available whatsoever. I've been looking on the school websites for details of open days for probably a year now - never saw anything. This is giving me a slightly ominous feeling for what it will be like to engage with the school once my son starts reception! Perhaps just a word of warning for parents looking for places in local schools beyond 2013 that even though you can't apply until the January before your child would start in reception, you should try to get a space on a tour much before that.

I might go for it this year too! With my nearly 4 year old and nearly 2 year old. I love the look of the Kinderhotels but can't tell if it is a bit too Disneyland/kid-focused?? But good to hear from someone's experience that they are as good as they look. I will check Mark Warner too. Any other tips of where to start welcome! This is probably the last year we can get away with going not in the school holidays.

Would you like to go with a WWII theme and be his and hers naval officers?? We just went to a party 2 weeks ago with this theme and have full outfits. My husband's was a fairly cheap polyester thing from an online shop but it looked the part once all put together. Mine was a proper WRNS jacket, proper WRNS officer hat, I bought a badge and lapel pin too. The only thing is I wore my own black wool skirt. I am a size 10/12 and my husband is maybe 5'9" tall. I was going to sell them on eBay at some point.

I agree with Chippy Minton in that even if you agree with the idea of this being a means tested benefit (though there are lots of arguments in favour of there being some universal benefits, especially those related to children) that it is actually incredibly administratively costly to manage and monitor means tested benefits and sometimes the cost of doing this outweighs the savings for the government. This point seems to get lost in most of the debates about this issue.

I paid for this once but never again as the normal priority boarding was fine. But we have done a lot of travel so are quite used to the whole thing. If you think it will ease any anxiety about the trip then go for it.

I meant to also say that I was reading that Healthy Sleep Habits book again last night and there are loads of studies from other countries. Sleep patterns do vary so much. For e.g., in (I think it was) Japan many children of 3-6 years old will have a long afternoon nap and then go to bed very late (like close to midnight). So shorter night, longer nap. Still similar sleep overall. I think that's the key - figure out the approx. amount of sleep per day that they need. Say it is an average of 10-14 hours/day around ages 2 or 3. Gauge by their mood and the averages if you think they're getting enough or not (if they're getting way below 10 hours/24 then it probably isn't enough I guess?). And then figure out how to chop this up best based on their natural patterns, your schedule, what you can live with, etc. Long nap and late night, or no nap and (hopefully eventually, once they get into pattern!) longer night, etc.

Just to be clear that I don't lock my son in his room at night! I agree that would be extreme. But we do have a stairgate and it has helped a couple of times for bedtime antics when he can't stop himself from running all over the house. We've only had to use it once or twice at bedtime where we say "if you keep coming out we'll need to close the gate"....keeps coming out....close the gate for a couple of minutes and tell him it's time for bed....climbs into bed...go in and kiss him goodnight and leave gate open for rest of night. He has absolutely no barrier from coming into our room multiple times/night (in bad patches) to let us know that A. he has lost his cuddly toy B. he needs a wee and C. he is tired (my favourite one!). I would be quite alarmed though if he was downstairs on his own in the middle of the night, but he is 3.5 so old enough to really get up to trouble (i.e. tall enough to reach anything on worktops, open fridge, etc.)! We know from all these sleep threads that all babies and children are totally different, so all you can do is keep track of what works for you and share ideas in case they might help someone else. We've had limited success with wake to sleep past the baby stage because I think the problem is that they do wake up a bit/stir between sleep cycles (that's not a problem obv) and the question is how much they want to involve you in these wakenings! If they want parental involvement every time they stir, then wake to sleep won't really change that. We go through periods where he is much happier to sleep through on his own, and others where he feels the need to trot into us a couple of times a night. In our case it is very linked to overtiredness. Positive encouragement (stickers, rewards) and Gro-clock work quite well now too but probably only since about age 3.

That sounds horrendous. Poor you. No wonder you want some help! We found that getting sleep advice from a consultant was so helpful, even though it didn't tell us anything we didn't already know we were just too tired to execute a coherent plan on our own. If it's co-sleeping he's after could you have a go at full-time co-sleeping for a period just to get him into a more normal sleep pattern? Any kind of sleep training is going to be near impossible when he's this sleep-deprived/over-tired. So you go to bed with him at whatever reasonable hour works for him/you - if he's not napping, I would think he would need to be asleep max 12 or absolute max 13 hours after waking up for the day? My son is a chronically early riser so I put him to sleep at 6:00-6:30. Even 6:30 is often too late and leads to night-wakings and 5 am starts. I have given up fighting to get him to sleep-in later. If he is going to be awake by 6 regardless, at least I can get 11.5-12 hours sleep into him by doing super early bedtimes. Could your husband take over full-time co-sleeping with toddler and leave you to deal with baby? We also have a stair gate on our son's room - we almost never actually have to close it, but just use it as a bit of a threat "i.e. if you're not going to settle in your bed we're going to have to close the gate because it's not safe for you to be roaming the house alone when we are sleeping."

If it's partly that he's out of routine and not well could one of you sleep in with him on a cushion or mattress for a night or two? This sometimes works for us because we can shush/reassure as soon as he stirs before he gets too upset. The only thing that works for us for overtiredness these days is super early bedtimes. My 3.5 year old was asleep by 5:45 pm one day last week! Hope it's just a blip and that the GP can help if necessary.

Thank you for all these tips! gebbjane, I just looked and the Hall Place/House of Fairy Tales thing seems to be fairly accessible by train. Bexley station is 30 mins from Charing Cross and it says a 15 min walk from there, or taxis at the station. I'm going to try either this or the seashore next week, weather depending. Thanks again!

I had this and I eventually gave up and went back to my natural hair colour (darker brown) and found a colouring kit (to cover the greys!) that matches my colour so I can do it at home. It took a while to get used to the colour but it is so much better now that I don't have to worry about it! Without the colouring bit I don't find it as hard to get my hair cut because it is so much quicker than when you need highlights too.

That does sound very extreme with that number of wakings, but we have had periods of these types of wakenings. In our case it would be more like 1 or 2 per night but very, very upset and take ages to calm him down. My son is the same age. We haven't had them in a while though - thankfully. Not sure if my son ever had the proper night terrors but rather just very bad dreams and unsettled sleep where it was very difficult to wake him up. Key triggers for us seem to be overtiredness. Is he recently dropping a nap or going to bed a bit later than usual? My son is very prone to these kind of night terrors if he starts to get a bit overtired. Chocolate? I used to work at a summer camp with children and one of the little girls would have severe night terrors if she had chocolate late in the day (she managed to get some hot chocolate without us seeing, so I witnessed the night terror later...it was awful!). Tiny point but could he suddenly be afraid of the dark? My son went from sleeping in a pitch dark room until a few months ago when now he insists on having a fairly bright light on all night. He won't even go into his room in the daytime if the lights are off! Waking up every hour is really awful though. Could there be anything else going on like pain of earache or something? Delayed teething of his 2-year molars??

We have this one and it has been great: http://www.vupbaby.co.uk/content/beaba-potty-3-colours I've been staring at it in my house for over a year now and appreciate that it is not hideous!

So true Fuschia! I thought that it would be enough to have my parents come and visit from overseas for the first few weeks but actually A. they were somewhat useless with newborn babies having not had to deal with one for over 30 years and B. I needed help for much longer than a few weeks as it was ongoing advice, support, etc. that was invaluable as each different stage presented its own challenges. So thank goodness for the Forum and the network of amazing Mums (and Dads!) I've met in East Dulwich.

The suggestion that annoyed me as much as "sleep when the baby sleeps" (ummm....he doesn't...that's the problem) is "do you have a sling"..... BUT Do you have a sling?? I have 4 different ones that you would be welcome to try out. All have been essential at one point or another. Son #2 would not sleep unless snuggled in a sling. He liked my Coorie Fleece pouch in the cradled position and hated being upright. Son #1 loved the wrap sling and wanted to be upright. Finally, you mentioned that he doesn't have symptoms of reflux but just to make sure that you know about silent reflux (i.e. he doesn't spit up but has burning pain you can't see). If he prefers to fall asleep in upright position (inclined in buggy, upright on your chest, in car seat) that is a sign. It is so overwhelming with all of the information out there - just know that you aren't doing anything wrong and this is no indication of what your son will be like as he gets bigger. It is a detective effort at first to learn about each baby - what they like, how to get them to sleep, if they have any issues with pain/discomfort - and all you can do is try different things until you strike on ones that work. If a night nanny helps get you through a few days, then don't think twice. Just do it. You are not a failure.

We go to the barber/hairdresser beside the post office on Forest Hill Road (near the Co-Op, at the end of Dunstans). It was ?11 for my son but she spent ages cutting and layering (he has loads of very thick, straight hair) and did a great job. We had a serious mullet-tastic experience at Jazz on Lordship Lane but I think that was probably because of my bad instructions!

Yes prm that sounds amazing! I'm not finding anything in that realm. Unless I'm underestimating ED prices, there doesn't seem to be that much difference. I'll keep my eyes open though as those streets are lovely!