Fitting DS's routine into nursery hours?

[Mamatastic]

Hi, my DS is due to start nursery 3 days a week as from October when he will turn one year old. It just occured to me that his current routine of breakfast around 830 / 9am and dinner 5pm with bath & bed about 6pm will be difficult to do once I go back to work. I work 9-5pm and by the time I can pick him up it will be 540pm ish. Do you think I should gradually start to change his routine now so he eats and goes to bed a bit later by October? Another option is to get the nursery to give him dinner at 5pm then I can have maximum play time before bath & bed after I pick him up. Not sure what to do really. I will also need to give him breakfast earlier once he goes to nursery but don't really fancy getting up at 700am just now!

What have you done in similar situations or what would you do? Thanks.

You might be able to shift feeding and napping times slightly, but in my albeit limited experience, trying to keep a little one to stay up later is very difficult, especially if they've had a very tiring day, which nursery is. But Oct is a darker month, you may find he has automatically shifted his bed time a little by then.

sorry, long run on sentance.

What's the nursery's normal routine? DS's nursery serves breakfast from 7.30-9 am and dinner around 4.30 pm, so it wouldn't be a problem there.

Nurseries do give lunch around 12 and then tea at about half 4 in my experience, so you wont have to worry about his dinner.
The tea is a light one though, so take a banana or something to give him when you pick him up in case he is still a bit peckish.
Then all you'll have to do is bath him and straight to bed once you get home.
You could even give the bath a miss if he is too tired and then bath him on the days you are not working until he adjusts more to the slightly later bed time.

Yes, they will give him beakfast too.

Our nursery has dinner at 11:30am and tea at 3:30pm so those times would be fine with you too. Definitely worth checking what their routine is.

Nursery may well do breakfast if you are there before 8.30/9am and then lunch and either high tea / snack or a full tea depending on their operating hours, i have found those opening 8-7 do a proper tea around 5pm so it would be play, bath, milk and bed when you got home i would guess.

Like giddykipper, DS's nursery gives him breakfast (which is fantastic when you are trying to get ready and out of the house in the mornings!), lunch at about 11.30 and then tea (light tea of sandwiches, crumpets etc and fruit) at 3.30. They often give them a snack of breadsticks and cheese about 5.30 if they are still there - but I have usually picked DS up by that point and then he eats lots of snacks at home - in fact, he eats tons we gets home from nursery!! But, I give him easy things, like toast, ricecakes, cheese, yoghurt etc so I am not stuck in the kitchen when I could be playing with him.

I hadn't really thought of the nursery giving him brek and dinner, I knew he'd get lunch there but I had thought I'd give him breakfast and dinner at home, d'oh! I could give him some milk at home then before I take him to nursery where he could have brek about 830am as usual, then he could have tea about 430 / 5pm ish. Eating times are quite flexible for young uns, it's just more imposed once they are over 2 years old as far as I know. Thanks!

I'd be surprised if it was that flexible Mama, with teeny babies who are just on milk, yes, but once they're on solids I would think they would want to feed them all together. I would expect them to have fixed meal times tbh.

At our nursery they only give breakfast if the kids are there at 7:30am. Most arrive at 8:00am and they don't give breakfast then.

My ds' nursery has meals at the same time as giddykipper's and to be honest I think you will find your ds is soooo exhausted until he gets used to it that you will struggle to get him to wait while you cook him a meal etc after you pick him up. Nursery is sooo full on that bed will be the best option when he gets home!

Bit late to this but I drop DD off at 8am, when the nursery opens, and they give her her breakfast by 8.30am. Some of the others have breakfast, some don't, and they seem to be able to cope with that.

They have dinner at 12 and tea at 4pm.

Nurseries are supposed to fit in with your childs routine not the other way round when their under 2, and they are supposed to be fairly flexiable with older children too.