Planning birth number 2, what did you do?

[houmousandcarrotsandwich]

am currently 28 weeks pg, and starting to think about when baby decides to arrive, what to do with DS1

He is just 2 and hasn't had a night away from mummy or daddy yet, still in cot (but may be brave and try a bed soon). Both lots of grandparents are 30 mins away (in opposite directions) & neither tend to bend over backwards to help with anything. My mum is on her own, doesn't work, but god help you if you mess with her routine ( & she doesn't drive in the dark!). In laws both work full time and only fil drives.

Hospital about 20-30 mins (in diff direction to all family) & a home birth really isn't for me.

So back ground over, what did you do with your children when you had another? Did you have family "on call" or stay over? How long before due date did they stay from? Or any ides what I could suggest for my lot?!

Any friends on your road that would pop over in the night and stay at yours until daytime when your Mum could come and relieve them?

Well I'm extremely lucky and have an amazing next door neighbour who I phoned at about 2ish in the morning and we just passed our 3 year old son over the fence all wrapped up in a blanket still half asleep, but of course he knew her really well even then..when the hospital sent us home to wait a bit more we retrieved our boy and when we had to go back in later in the evening a friend of mine a few miles away had ds until dd was born..(neighbour was then not available anymore but had been when we really needed her) This time my mum is coming up from essex(to Bristol) to be here when I go into labour to look after ds and dd so daddy can be there to see baby born and support me(look after mummy as we put it when telling the kids what was gonna happen...they need more preparation than usual cos I'm gonna be in for at least 5 days for medical reasons)..what are your neighbours&friends like? are they in any position to help you when the time comes? Even for a while til family can take over?

DS will be going to his gran's at the first sign of any action - he'll be just 2. I don't want to get caught out and end up delivering on the roadside or something so will call her as soon as I feel things kicking off and she'll come and get him (or stay at ours if it's the middle of the night). We are lucky in that she is very nearby, happy to drive in the dark, and he spends lots of time with her already. we've had a couple of trial runs of him staying over at hers in case this is what needs to happen - makign the whole 'staying at Nanny's in a big boy bed' thing an adventure, and he seems to love it! (Relief!)
I think you're doing the right thing in working a solution out now - you can never be too prepared imo! Good luck...

Thanks everyone.
Think I'm going to have a chat with some friends to see if any can help whilst waiting for a grandparent of some form ( to work around their schedules!)

I think I wasn't thinking outside the family enough & hoping people will want to help as it's for a new baby!!

I was the on-call person for my friend (I was on maternity leave and her parents lived a few hours away) so I packed a quick overnight bag with the plan being that she could drop her son at mine or if it was during the night I would go and sleep at theirs and DH would drop DS with me in the morning if I still needed to be there.

She had worked out a whole list of back-ups; friends who worked part-time or would be around on certain days but not others, some for daytime, some for night times.

We had next door neighbours who stayed over and nursery friends. No family near by (12 hr abroad and 6 hr drive away). Had nursery key workers on standby. DS had a bag packed with clothes, dummies, toy. Typed out list of things, routines, favourite foods and contact phone numbers.