How far away would you go from your nursery in a day?

[LucyJones]

Both dcs go to nursery will me and dh work. Dh has got a training day in London next week. This means he will be an hour and a half away in the car from the nursery. Work want me to go to a meeting that day which is 2 hours train journey away.
So basically if we both go we won't be able to get to the nursery in, say, 20 minutes.
Do people leave their dcs in nursery where they live and then commute an hour to work everyday?
Are you always very close in an emergency?
We don't have an emergency person closer than 3 hours drive away.
What would you do?

Lucy - I'm in this position and it's about to get worse as my work increases, dh travels for work, and I occaisionally travel too. We have winged it a few times so far but I really must find someone to be a contact.

If it's someone without children (which I did have down) it ocurred to me that they don't have a car seat and so couldn't legally take dd anywhere. I have another friend locally but she has 3 kids of her own - I'm really not sure how she could cope with an emergency without setting of another emergency. Everyone seems to have someone local but my friends either don't drive, have no car seat or are too far away. And if they have their own child in the car seat - then what? Anyone got any thoughts on this situation?

We have no family in this country - it does make a lot of difference when it comes to child care.

But your post reminds me that I really MUST do something about this. Jill

I don't think 1.5 hours driveable is that bad. DH and I have taken the day off and gone Christmas shopping above an hour away from nursery. I think you need to start cultivating friends who you can do a favour for and they will do one for you. Do you work full time? I do understand how it is different when your family are not local. And DD ended up being born while DS was being babysat by the tweenies (we were at home I hasten to add).

If it's just for a day I'd ask a friend. They would only be called in an emergency which is unlikely and most people would want to help in that situation. Three of my DS's godparents are our emergency people and they all work full-time too, but I know that in a genuine emergency they'd be happy to help.

We regularly go 1-2 hours distance away - we are in London so even into central london is an hour. But we also have 2 local contacts who are other parents at nursery & this is really useful just to put minds at rest. I think I would go for not worrying about it this once, but try to cultivate someone else from nursery to reciprocate with in future.

DH when he is in the office is 45mins -1 hour from the nursery, and we are both regularly out and about during the day so that we are both 2 hours or more from there. We have no family within 2 hours and no friends in the area. Certainly I never exchange more than a 'Hi' with the other parents at nursery, and I found that people I met when I was on mat leave all had loads of local family that meant there was no chance of reciprocal babysitting etc.
The nursery would always take DS to hospital rather than waiting for us in an emergency anyway.
I had to phone a colleague to take me to hospital when I went into premature labour and DH was 2 hours away with his phone off.