December locals chat

[mellow2]

New thread as the other one is not going to last long.

ros - you've outed me as a Royalty book lover

oh yes pc am so looking forward to that age!

About nursery schools, I'm going to be applying for ds's nursery school this month. On the basis that he gets a place, will it help him o tthen get a place in the attached school or not?

ros would love to come but have to work and then I'm off to visit a 6 day newborn plus her mum. Poor you - are you stilling feeling tender from the op? You must take it easy - no hoovering for 6 months (that I tell dh everytime I have an op).

ros depends on the nursery. Riverside say you don;t get preference if you go to the nursery - it's geography only.

Sushi - plan b is Darrell I suppose

MrsR - you would have to work very hard indeed to convince SS that you should be allowed to adop a child out of birth order (ie older than your DS). Anything under2/3 is considered to be an infant, "older" means school age to SS.

Excatly KC - I'd have to wait another 5 years to adopt based on their criteria. Such a shame as dds would love a middle sibling and there is such a gap between them and ds.

QC - Yes, Darrell is the only other option we have (good job the school too has good ofsted reports) unless we go for private. I think the council should have thought a bit better before permitting them to build so many flats by the river. Schools and GPs are completely oversubscribed.

(QC - did my DS look OK? He fell off the bed this morning and it's completely my fault.)

I'm not too bad MrsR, this is my first week back at lifting ds & cleaning & it seems to have caught up with me now. Have told dh I'll need to rest lots this weekend!

Adoption not an option either as a great part of the decision not to have a 3rd is dh doesn't want a 3rd. Oh well!

regarding the nursery/ school that is precisely why I want her to start soon. I can't afford even to consider private at this stage.
for secondary I have 2 in mind which I hope will pan out if we stay in the area I expect university will be the killer and we have started saving for that since she was born.

and we still want a second child

SJ we don't have a book club in the traditional sense just a book swapping meet up with cake

I like Jeremy Paxman - is the book quite Juicy MrsR?

Thanks for the Freecycle e-mail BTW

Have had some more lodger e-mails which is encouraging. One from a 30 yr old male teacher at LSE and one from a Mum with a 7 yr old boy, so have agreed to see both of them. Have a girl coming tonight as well to view.

Interesting discusssion about adoption - they make it so hard for people to adopt in this country don't they? Don't you have to prove you vote the same way as the child's biological birth parents or something in order to be considered "suitable"?

QC - I remember your DS "walking" down the stairs LOL - 'twas indeed hairy - but not as hairy as getting a school place eh? The 120>30 ratio is quite normal as people often apply to state and private schools, you are so close to the school I bet you would get a place. The ratio at the DC's school was at least 120>30 I think and we had to go on the waiting list for DS1 and I lost so much sleep over it. But they did get in.

Sushi - its probably worth you phoning the school and asking about your address and if they take people from that distance. That's what I did with Queens and worked out we would have had to move house - although we did decide we didn't want Queens in the end as we'd known too many people who weren't happy with it (to pushy on kids, too many "loud mouthed over-achiever" parents LOL, unhappy kids, bullying). You could always rent a flat nearer the school for a year? At least 2 families in DS1's class lied about their addresses to get a school place....

Imagine what it will be like when we are applying for secondary schools!! At least the primary schools in the borough are all good - the scrum for a decent secondary school will be a lot worse!

Its a real shame about the nursery hours and cost - luckily for us, the DCs school nursery don't charge for the extra teeny bit of time (over and above the grant they get) but I had to pay the CM to take them/collect them so it probably worked out more expensive.

SJ we all bring our fave books and swap requests and then swap books and eat cake . There is no obligation to read, like with a book club!! I borrowed about 7 books, none of which I have managed to read (blame DS2)

We have changed DS2's name to "Mini-Beast" BTW, due to the strange grunting and growling noises he is making!

Oh good news about the lodger. Don't discount the one with the child though. I had a room to rent once, a large (double/double) room in a maisonette and a family turned up - a mum and 3 kids and they were homeless and needed somewhere for six weeks. I really didn't want that many in such a small room but she was desparate and pleaded and pleaded. When I said yes, she cried her eyes out and was so grateful. She/they turned out to be the best lodger I had ever had. You never heard a peep from the kids (including the baby) even though their bedroom was next to mine. And the kitchen was even cleaner than before they moved in. Hope all goes well.

Haven't got to the raunchy bit yet - but plenty of useless information - did you know there was a King Zog who was invited to rule Albania!

Yes adoption in this country is near on impossible - my friend wanted to adopt her beautiful mixed race foster son who she'd weened off heroin in the first 6 months of his life (so no sleep at all) but she was the wrong colour and yet there was no-one there available to adopt him. Such a beautiful little baby boy as well. Yet another baby (they let her foster two babies who were six months apart) who was white and she wanted to adopt she wasn't able to as there were plenty of parents available for her. Needless to say, those babies were the last she fostered (and she was a mentor). Her heart was broken.

That is so sad, MrsR. What is wrong with this country? Then there is poor Fran Lyon. Wonder who they think should raise that baby? She was wise. She left. God, I just think they have lost sight of what is actually best for these babies in all their paper work.

MrsR I get quite about the insistence that adoptive parents are the same race as the children, as it has resulted in so many black children being left in care, when they could have been adopted into loving families. In somewhere like London, where everywhere is a melting pot, it shouldn't be such an issue as the child would still have access to people from their own culture.

I am quite excited about the Lone parent lodger, she sounds really nice and I'm looking forward to meeting her. Her son is the same age as DS1, so he would love a temporary same aged brother LOL!!!

Ele - Who is Fran Lyons?

Fran Lyon is the woman who once had some mental health issues. Long since recovered. She is now pregnant (or was -- baby may have been born by now) and SS said they thought she might harm her baby after it's born and therefore they would take it away as soon as it born.

She fled Britain about a month ago so they could take her baby from her.

It's horrible. SS needs a real shake up.

Fran types on mumsnet sometimes. And there is another poster (doric something?) who knows her in RL.

story here

She fled Britain about a month ago so they could not take her baby from her.

There was an update recently that said SS had changed their mind but then I read another story that said the order still stood so don't really know what's going on there.

That is so out of order . There is no evidence she would hurt her baby whatsover!!! The mental health problems were triggered by her being raped, so why can't they support her in being a first time Mum, rather than pigeon holing her.

FFS! [

On a slightly lighter note a nice woman just viewed the room. She wants to take it and is lovely, has refernces etc but wants her DH to move in with her in March after they marry in China. She is very studious and loves kids.

MrsR have you ever had couples as lodgers? If so, are there any "issues" I should be aware of?

there are quite good reasons why adopting out of birth order is often a problem - for example say you adopted a 6 yr old boy when your DS was 2/3, how would you react if he was violent to him? Older children can often handle the problems which come with a younger sibling as they are more competent to understand the issues and also physically more able to handle themselves. Younger siblings not so. I know of people who gave up fostering because of the violence shown towards their DC's.

It isn;t impossible and if you do your research and think through the issues very carefully and have an answer for SS on how you would handle the likely problems, it is possible, just not easy.

Don;t get me started on mixed race adoption - I would have been perfectly happy to have adopted a mixed race/black/asian etc child in this country but no dice esp in London. Some councils are more relaxed and accept that any loving family is better than none. The ultimate irony as MrsR points out is that though who are not adopted because of their race are quite commonly fostered by white carers! More than anyone I do understand the issues and know it isn;t ideal. But once a child is given up for adoption, there is no"ideal" at that point.

I'm around tomorrow if anyone wants to do something - need to go tto Kew at some point to get 2Cutes kew pass and my own.

Meet ups are going to get tricky for me from now on. DS is at nursery 5 sessions a week from Monday, comnbined with dd at full time school means meeting can only e 1/2 term/school holidays and week-ends from now on.

Tomorrow we are off to my parents for a pre birthday celebration for dd with aunts/cousins etc as they are away skiing the following weekend for her actual party.

all this with adoption and fostering is a terrible minefield and sometimes the luck of the draw.
I have a friend whose parents are Afro-Caribbean and he was fostered on/ off with a white family, he would be the first to tell you his foster mother was the best chance he ever had. when I met him he was a grown man in mid 20's and his foster mother was dying with cancer, he was utterly grief stricken as he considered her his 'proper mother'

in my experience and my sister who is a social worker often says many services are staffed by people who do not understand the real world at all. historically in mental health some have done more damage than good particularly with ethnic minorities.

having said that there are excellent professionals out there often blighted by bosses full of prejudices and small mindness

feel better now