Hello all!
Great news crace, congrats!
So far I have done 10 days of work, all of which have been counted as keeping in touch days so I still get mat allowance
kkey21 - if you pay NI then you don't have to prove income. Not sure what situ is if you don't, sorry.
Until mindee parent went on mat leave this time last year I had her dd 3 days a week, while the mum was on mat leave I had her max 2 days and usually only one, then when her ds arrived it was once a month. So to start back full on was going to be hard so I started by doing one day a week for a couple of weeks then 2 days a week, and so far it's been that, 2 days a week. From tomorrow it's 3 days a week with mindee aged 3.5y, her brother aged 10m (yes I got a variation) as well as my dd aged nearly 6, ds aged 12 weeks (that's gone fast!!) and mornings only school run mindee aged 5.
The days i've done already have been okay, though depends on how well own ds slept through night or not (some nights he does, others he's up at 3am and 5am!) but as the 3.5 yo goes to pre-school two mornings and one all day I do get a rest in the mornings as the baby brother sleeps in the mornings! Plus being a second child he's already used to not getting all the attention all the time. The thing I'm finding hard is finding the time to do accounts, look at eyfs, other cm paperwork etc! guess I could be doing them now instead of this...ds is asleep in wilkinet carrier....however this is much more interesting
The other thing is having to take the pre-school mindee to her pre-school - it's in the next village which means we all walk/buggy to school, walk back, get in the car, drive to next village, get out, take mindee in, get back in car, drive back, get back into house. A cm friend is able to stay by car while I take or collect mindee which saves me getting baby mindee and own ds out and into double buggy just to walk to/from hall & car.
Most useful thing has been the wilkinet carrier (or any front carrier/sling would do) as I can still do things with the baby mindee whilst ds is safe and comfy near me. I also put his play gym in travel cot in lounge so if he's in that I know he's safe and baby mindee cannot crawl over ds!
Oh and getting new car - updated zafira so 3 child seats fit across middle seat. In old zafira (still on the drive, as yet unsold ) I had to have child in very back meaning her getting in and out of boot with no room for double buggy - that had to go in front footwell!
Good luck and enjoy your time off ladies, for me it went too quick and I think I've started back to early but hey ho, needs must.