To ask childminder not to bring DS to playgroup

I imagine that your child goes to a childminder because you work and your OH works…….that said, how do you ensure that neither of you pick up any bugs, take them home and share them around amongst your little family unit? Unless you work in a sterile bubble where no one else is allowed to have access you just cannot isolate yourself from potentially picking up anything.

Your best course of action is to stay home and look after your own child.

Your DC will probably be thoroughly miserable. Everyone gets a cold/flu over Xmas at sometime in their lives. Is it really the worst thing? Yiu might as well wrap him
in a bubble , and yourselves. Sorry to be so blunt,

I think it would be ok to ask for the week before Christmas, but not longer than that. If he picks up a bug in early December he'll have recovered by Christmas anyway, so they'd be sitting around at home for no good reason.

I'd say considering she is still having your child when he is unwell which she can by all rights refuse to do, adding on top of that that they don't socialise for a month might be a bit of a piss take.

She's a childminder not a nanny. I think this is rude. This is probably good entertainment for her and she will likely have paid membership!

surely you can ask her what you want?

As your child is her only attendee then I guess that makes it easier for you to politely ask what activities she has planned over the next few weeks and ask her to change.

However being nosy here, I would be more concerned that this childminder only has your child and no one else. Have some recently left and she hasn't managed to take on more? One of the school mums is an Ofsted registered childminder and is at full capacity with a wait list. Most other childminders are too. I would be concerned that as a childminder and not a nanny why they only have one child when it is actually quite difficult to manage financially?

In some parts of the country it’s raining all next week.

Good lord!

You can ask when I childminded I might have agreed the week before if he was my only one but our group we all organised loads of activities particularly at Christmas so I’d have let the others down by not going.

Indeed, crossing a fine line there! Plus, guaranteed the child will get a bug no matter what they do!

If his at a childminder you can’t ask that really as she’ll have to take all the kids not just your son , plus he’s at a child minder he could pick something up from any child or anywhere. Safest bet is to keep him home, but not always easy x

I disagree. My 15 month old 1) prefers the park anyway, 2) has zero awareness of Christmas and will have zero memories of this period, 3) playing in the park does not carry the same risk as mixing with 15 other snotty one year olds in a close quarters and 4) not all sniffles last a day, some last 2 weeks and would absolutely ruin Christmas.

I have a 15 month old and he honestly prefers to be outside in the park to any playgroup. Which is what my nanny will be doing in the run up to Christmas.

He also will have zero memories of this Christmas period, under 2s don't care really.

He’ll miss out on so much. I think it’s a really unreasonable ask from his perspective. He’ll be sick, if he’s going to be, one of you could carry it home, he could pick something up in the shop. It’s one of those things. It’s less likely as his immune system develops and that happens by being out and amongst the people.

Yes agree and the official advice is that children do not need to be excluded from childcare due to conjunctivitis. www.gov.uk/government/publications/health-protection-in-schools-and-other-childcare-facilities/managing-specific-infectious-diseases-a-to-z#conjunctivitis

I'm sure the OP's childminder has got sufficient voice to tell her this if she wants to.

PFB?

If I was your childminder I'd be instructing you to keep him home while he's ill! You're very lucky she's prepared to care for him in that state.

As for the run up to Christmas, I'd suggest if you don't want him to participate in normal activities then keep him at home.

Keep him home yourself if you want him to stay home.

The pre-Christmas lead-up is the best bit for kids. I always think Christmas itself is a bit of an anti-climax.

I mean, he's your kids so do what you like, but personally I think you're bonkers. All that fun missed to avoid the risk of a sniffle on Christmas day, which he might catch anywhere.

By runny eye I hope you don’t mean conjunctivitis. He’s unwell and should be at home .
Your childminder and her family would rather not get sick either , not least because she won’t get paid if she has to close .

Most play groups break up 2weeks-10 days before Christmas, don’t they?

But unless you and your entire family are planning to quarantine, staying away from playgroup is probably a futile effort. My DH brings most of the Xmas bugs home via his commute.

Much better to instil/reaffirm hygiene practices for the entire family and ask CM to do the same before/during/after playgroup if she goes… which I am sure she probably already does, anyway?

Fine to ask her if she sees any problem with it - have a chat.