to be annoyed at the nursery workers comment re DS still using a buggy?

[choceyes]

My DS is 3.4yrs and this morning when I dropped him and his sister, 18 months off at nursery this morning, nursery worker commented to DS , "ah you are a big boy now DS, you should be walking" .
Argh...I told her that we walk 2.5miles into nursery. It would take me about an hour to walk that with a dwadling DS, it takes me a good 30mins in a brisk walk. And most days I am late for work anyway.
I don't need the stress of making him walk all that way first thing in the morning. I just want to get to work!

Just annoyed me really as, most parents drop their kids off in a car at the nursery entrance and walk in. They never get commented on. I know some drive the same distance that I walk. If i took DS off the buggy just before we get to nursery and let him walk in, I'm sure that would be OK too
I just hate the assumption that just because DS is in a buggy that he is being lazy
He walks back home some days, when he is not too worn out from nursery.

So AIBU to let DS be in a buggy at his age?

Sorry, this is a monday morning rant above all really!

So, you've never had a tired child then? How lucky.

"Breakfast is the first thing you eat when you wake up.

What a narrow view. There is absolutely nothing wrong with having a small snack and then a full breakfast when you arrive somewhere. It really won't harm anyone.

I really don't see what's so bad about it but whatever...

Does anybody else feel a childish urge to give AThingInYourLife a sneaky but immensely satisfying boot up the backside for being such a perfect, sanctimonious, smug old bag?

When I was a child, I used to always feel nauseous for an hour afterwards. I couldn't eat until after that.

AThingInYourLife - just out of interest, what's your morning routine? Because I for one am enormously impressed with the OP walking 2.5 miles with 2 pre-school children before a day's work. And the fact that the child eats on the way seems a very efficient use of time.

Me, me anonymumous glad you said it for me.

OP, not read all the responses, but I feel your pain.

Next time anyone comments, ask them how they made their journeys that day. Did they walk?

It's not a "narrow view", it's what the word breakfast means.

:o

I'm often surprised on MN by the ways people expect small children to contort themselves to fit in with what suits their parents.

It would never have occurred to me not to feed my children at home in the morning, or that it would be a more "efficient" use of time to make them wait and eat on the move.

I walk 2 hilly miles with 2 preschoolers every morning before work. But I like walking, and even pregnant and breathless as I am ATM I enjoy it.

I doubt my morning is anywhere near as pressured as the OP's - but I do wonder if getting up a little earlier might help when the current routine means a 3 year old has to use a pram so he can eat.

It's where the word breakfast came from which isn't the same thing at all. The long summer holidays come from the fact that families needed to harvest the crops. I assume that you take your children off to a farm for the duration and make them work in the fields?

I'm often surprised on MN by the ways people contort themselves to fit in with what suits their children.

Its called doing what works for you as a family. Does the child mind having a snack on the way to nursery before breakfast? Does the mother mind using him while he has a snack on the way to nursery? Do either of them mind having an extra half an hour in bed?

AThingInYourLife - fair enough, that's me told

"The long summer holidays come from the fact that families needed to harvest the crops."

Um... OK

Are you implying a connection between summer holidays and breakfast?

Unless modern people have started eating whilst they sleep, and my family is just some crazy throwback, you break your nightly fast when you first eat in the morning.

Given that pre-schoolers usually sleep 11-12 hours a night, that's a long time without food. I would have thought a decent breakfast was a normal part of the morning.

"Does the child mind having a snack on the way to nursery before breakfast?"

I don't know and neither do you. Only choceyes can know whether it would be better for him to eat a proper breakfast at home.

Why does my suggesting they get up a little earlier to take the pressure off the morning dash-cum-breakfast make you so angry?

Doing what works for you as a family involves making sure the things you are doing are actually/still working.

Dashing out the door for a 2.5 mile walk with a toddler in a sling and a 3 year old in a buggy eating sounds stressful to me. The OP indicated that she might like to use a scooter for him, but that it would get in the way of him eating.

All I'm saying is - if things are that tight in the morning, maybe get up aclittle earlier.

My children have breakfast at home, but sometimes they are so busy messing about with each other or chatting or take so long getting ready that they don't actually eat much. In which case, you may well spot them 'topping up' with a muesli bar or a piece of fruit on the way to school. Is this deemed acceptable or not?

My three year old walks 1.7 miles to school in the morning, then 1.7 miles back again at 11.30 a.m. Then he walks another 1.7 miles back again at 2.30 p.m. when we go to get his brother, and then has to turn round immediately and do another 1.7 miles back again without a rest. 6.8 miles a day at the age of three and a half! He's a very slow walker, so each trip takes him at least an hour - the last journey back can take an hour and a half, as he is inevitably exhausted and tearful by that point. If I had the choice, I would take the pushchair for the afternoon trip, but pushing him uphill was too much for me when I got to six months pregnant (due next month), so the poor little thing is stuck with it until September when he goes to school full-time.

The irony is that I have gone directly from receiving snidey comments about using a pushchair for a three year old, to being subjected to affected concern and incredulity about how much walking he's now having to do. I can't win, whatever I do - so it would be very nice if smug, irritating people would please keep their irrelevant, pre-conceived ideals of childhood milestones to themselves!

"Does the child mind having a snack on the way to nursery before breakfast?"

errr no! He doesn't want any food any earlier than 8am, which is the time we have to leave for nursery. But he always asks for something to eat on the way. So I have an omlette or toast ready for him in a box and we also have a routine of popping into the Spar for a banana to eat on the way too. And he also eats breakfast sitting at a table when he gets there.

No way will I be waking up my kids half an hour earlier just to offer them breakfast at the table, which very possibly they won't eat anyway - what a ludicrious idea!! If my DH woke me up half an hour earlier just to have breakfast I would NOT be impressed.
My DD has a big BF first thing and that's her fast broken and then she has breakfast at nursery, she might also share some of DS's snack on the way if she feels like it.

oh and on the days we are at home (i work 3 days a week), they never want breakfast till about 8.30am. So any attempt to give them breakfast at the table on a work day before 8am, will be a complete waste of time!

That would really annoy me, and I think it appropriate to make a written complaint. However the nursery teacher probably wasn't thinking and saw the others walking in (from the car) - perhaps a comment like should I park the buggy outside alongside their cars might suffice?

Interestingly I belong to a community where on the sabbath we don't use the car and so everyone brings their children to the synagogue in buggies. Some people live a couple of miles away and its normal to bring 3, 4 or every 5 year olds in buggies, because as you say it might be a 2-3 mile walk. I don't think there is that sort of buggy judging as everyone knows how hard it is to get a 5 year old to walk 3 miles!

That would really annoy me, and I think it appropriate to make a written complaint

Seriously, you'd make a written complaint about the nursery workers comment Why not just say, "it's a long way to walk and he's slow, so this is easier".

Laughing at the idea that it's fundamental to wake children up early especially to eat breakfast at home

Er... exactly. Which is why he has a snack in the buggy

YANBU - I'd be very annoyed. It's absolutely none of her business and completely irrelevant to her whether he walks or not.

I'm amazed so many people don't feed their children a proper breakfast.

Waking up to give enough time to get dressed and breakfasted is hardly "getting up early", is it?

It's just getting up.

Not that I give two shites what other people do, I just had no idea that expecting everyone in the family to have breakfast before leaving the house made me some kind of paragon of mealtime righteousness. I thought I was doing the bare minimum as it is.

But sure, if half an hour of extra sleep is worth eating omelette out of a box (boak) and not letting a nearly school age child scoot to nursery, that's up to you.

I'm a bad morning person, and I need things to be less fraught. Sitting down and eating gives me time to gather my thoughts.

Basically OP, you need to stop doing what is working for you all at the moment.

Wake your children up an hour earlier, give them breakfast at home whether they want it or not, and then walk 2 really slow miles to nursery with a tired, hungry 3 year old. Sounds like a fun way to start the day.

He has breakfast at nursery doesn't he, just like lots of children do.

Surely that will depend on whether he is going to go to a school that serves breakfast?

What's the problem with eating breakfast at 8.30am TSC?