October 2014 // thread 15 // hooray, here come the babies!

[sazzlehopes]

Going through these fast at the minute!

goats, the nurseries around here are £1500-1800 per month for full time(for one child). No joke. Although the £1800 one did say the nappies are free. Hmmm. I need to go back to work at 6 months so think we are going to look for a CM, at least for the first year I am back at work...

Great to here your positive section story porcito. Have you managed to lose the m-in-law yet?

Gee whiskers! I can't believe how much childcare costs!! I had heard prices but wowzers reading all these amounts freaks me out.
Does it even pay people to return to work?

So I haven't bought a room thermometer or baby monitor yet - what has everyone else has bought?

Goats - I'm glad I'm not the only one stressing over the nursery thing! Soooo expensive. I also had the 'why don't I open my own nursery?' thought.

I need someone who is good at sums and looking at options to help me out. The minute I start trying to compute the options, my brain freezes.

My mum (lovely as she is), keeps saying, 'think about that in a year'. She doesn't understand that will be waaay too late, especially living in London. She also goes very quiet when I mention what other potential options there are for childcare. Don't think she wants to be tied down to anything - which I understand, but I feel she could help a little bit.

If someone could come and fix it all for me, that would be great

PS. loving the OH sex chat. Mine has been warned. We'll see how we go. He's been warned about the poo sieving at the water birth too... poor man.

Nursery costs are outrageous! I was when I was pregnant with DS and looking into all that. Though the childminder route can be great (we loved our cm in London and she was expensive, but way less than the local nurseries). CMs can also be great for babies, as it's a home environment with one baby at a time rather than 10+ babies in the baby room. And for those with 2+ a nanny may be a better option as you're not paying per child.

Goats I did compressed hours (5 day week in 4 days) and definitely recommend it. I was still available for emergencies on my day off but kept it to a minimum (my day off was a thurs precisely so I could deal with emergencies before the weekend - I worked for a paper so this was relevant!).

Ladies, I feel odd and rough and have been having cramping. And waves of tightenings. Tmi alert but I've had 8 bouts of runny poo (explosive and watery more like) this morning. So much so that I cancelled my midwife app as j can't trust myself to drive a half an hour each way (I didn't make it to the toilet in time on one occasion as I thought it was just a fart...moral is I'm not trusting farts anymore!!). Could this be a pre labour clear out? No bloody show or anything. Have no idea (as induced first time and a sweep second time set things off).

Need to clean the house! It's way too messy for me to go into labour!

At least both kids are in preschool til 1pm so I can actually get stuff done...

flip I'm thinking childminding is going to be the best option. How do you work out whether someone is going to be a good childminder though?!

The thought of nursery fee's etc is really frightening and with my job it's really unlikely to be worth me going back. Dh and I are hoping his business might be in a position to take me on as admin so his mum can retire.

Ooh flip sounds awkward! They say it could be a sign so fingers crossed

Kirstipops could you PM me the FaceBook details too please? Thanks v much

Woo I wonder which will be the first October baby?

I recommend a CM and compressed hours working. I do 4 days a week compressed into 3 and for J only this works out at £370 a month (nursery was £520) she also offers a 10% discount for siblings, provides nappies, snacks etc and takes him on trips ie swimming etc for that price. Its also handy if you are considering no.2 as some CM would do labour emergency childcare cover.

I picked a CM on a friend's recommendation (and looking at regulators reports), but I also looked at other CMs who go to our toddlers groups etc to see how they were on the job. The lady who's garden backs onto ours is a CM but she spends all day yelling at the kids so I discounted her

Thanks for sharing your birth story Porcito. Hope your recovery continues to go well and your MIL is at least cooking for you!

You all make me laugh re the sex talk. The midwife just told me to have sex. DP has said he will once it's instructed, but I'm not sure he'll believe me. Anyway, 39 weeks today, seen the mw and she said baby's head is in my pelvis I said 'what? all of it?!' at which point she did a little frown and got all non-commital. Kept poking about and muttering it seemed that way. But has left that section of my notes blank and was avoiding answering my question. Hmmmmmmm. Annoying. Maybe she was just worried about my being peeved if I'm back there still pregnant in 2 weeks?

But I'm all excited now! Been having a bit of back ache on an eve since Sun but today I had it this morning too and still having it now. Having said that got to read the sweeps and inductions booklet I was given as well. Positive thoughts for now though!

Agree with all yellow says. I checked ofsted and asked around friends and then interviewed some. And checked references (some had obvious negatives, eg one place stank of fags). And went with the one I clicked with (she did lovely food, tonnes of trips including to places DS knew already like the library...and her 18 year old minded DS when I went into labour with Dd!). An old colleague now has her daughter there and I was a reference despite now living in America.

So much for cleaning. Just had a nap instead and feel calmer.

OK I have walked/staggered for 3 miles... walked with a friend who had her baby in a sling feeding him all the way, it was ace for him/her. She's so excited she can get out properly now they've mastered that skill. She said that she went into labour without her bump dropping at all, which made me think there might be a tiny chance that I haven't got yonks to go after all.

I'm absolutely wiped out now though, everything from under-boob to knees pretty much hurts.

Oh, and she's going to be paying £13,000 for child care per year. !!!!!

Goats i had a breech baby that never dropped and she stimulated my cervix at an alarming rate ... Your baby may drop whilst you are in labour so dont give up hope, it might happen sooner than you think, maybe tonight after that big long walk .

On the childminder front - after the £1800 nursery quote I did contact one and she worked out at £2000 per month. Basically £10 an hour for a baby under one year old, from 8-6pm five days a week is £2k! Ouch! But she drops to £8/hr once the baby is over one. Still astonishingly expensive :(

I need to get organised because where I live in London there are apparently waiting lists for nurseries. We have no family nearby either - my parents are in Scotland, DH's are in the west country and are quite elderly/bit frail so could do emergency stuff btu couldn't do one day a week or anything like that on a regular basis.

Childcare is VERY expensive. Last time around my sis was able to have dd one day a week. That won't be an option this time as she has moved away :( it was so good for my dd though as my sis had other children at home so it was completely a home from home for Dd.

This time I only really need part time nursery hours as I work 9.30 - 2.30pm but nurseries don't work like that around here. Once you go past 1pm you pay for a full day :( there is a possibility that the nursery where I work will allow me to do this hours rather than 8 - 1pm but there is no guarantee at this point...

Well walking with the crutch didn't seem to make much difference to my pain earlier...Dd has taken it off my hands and is using it to get around the house lol!

Dp actually came on the school run this morning and took dd into school so I wouldn't have to walk...not sure I can persuade him to do it every day now though!

Anyone else really hormonal? Had a total melt down earlier just found everything too much to deal with, school run wrecked me the. Ds did a poo in his pants and our car failed Mot and was going to cost £500 to pass garage said it's a pile of shit and he wouldn't bother as it still has lots wrong with it. So now car is going to get scrapped and we can't afford another without asking for a loan. Aghh I've had enough.

Can sympathise with childcare expense last year childcare cost £15000 for 2. And I have worked out different scenarios for 3 and the only way it would pay for me to work is if I did 16 hours a week and then we would only earn approx 80 a month more than me not working it isn't worth it. So I am seriously considering not returning.

£10 an hour for a childminder! Wah ours is £3.50 per child per hour. Gawd I'm glad I live in Scotland

Me23 what a pisser of a day for you :( I'm def a hormonal mess today, I read on Facebook that the biological father of my cat (yes, my CAT) - whose company I had been in a grand total of one time when I went to collect my cat as a kitten - had passed away prematurely today.
Sobbed for about an hour.

Childcare costs are nuts, it's definitely not worth me going back full time so I need to decide whether I'm going back part time or not at all, but right now I'm hoping to jack it in completely.

Me23 I'm exactly the same today. Tired and hormonal with ds to look after and DH always at work is not a good mix.
Our nursery is 50 a day. When pregnant I had my mind set on a childminder but we couldn't find one we liked. However I'm so glad we went for nursery, ds loves it and is coming on so well because of it. He gets on so well with other children and developmentally doing really well. Luckily he's not in full time due to DHs shifts so often only 2 sessions a week which keeps costs down.

I'm a stressed out ball of joy, me and I don't know how DH is putting up with me, tbh.
As some of the facebookers will know, I went in for monitoring this morning, first time ever, after an eerily quiet 12-15hrs where this LO is usually a gymnastics specialist. Of course, the moment the monitor was attached, the little monster decided to put on a spectacular display, even kicking the pads/belts off
However, I was surprised at the regularity and strength of my Braxton Hicks, though they didn't mention it, they're definitely getting stronger/more regular - can I take that as any sign, or is that wishful thinking?

Our CM was fifty pounds a day (North London, near Crouch End) and also did half days (also accepted our works' childcare vouchers, which do help too). We provided nappies (and formula had we used that) but she provided food. Our local nurseries ranged from 75 to 90+ pounds a day (but had longer hours -with the cm DH did drop off and I left work at 5pm on the dot to pick up).

Me23 I had the hormonalness last week. Very weepy! Although if I took the call you did today that would bring the tears right back! We spent £2000 getting dps car "fixed" this summer only to end up getting a new car in the end As no one could fix the bloody thing! Used up all we had set aside for the deposit for a house too :( very depressing.

Omg I'm changing career and moving south to become a childminder! £10 an hour!! Mine is £3 an hour which is normal around here :)

Can't get ANYTHING for £3 an hour down south! Lol!

I gave up work. We would have broken even when everything taken into account if I'd gone back. Never really expected to be a SAHM, can't say I'm great at it but I don't think I'll regret it in the long run. I'll definitely go back p/t once LOs get 15hrs free at 3. Until then, c'est la vie