Is this wrong of me?

[peggotty]

My dd is 2.2 and is on her way to giving up the daytime nap. She won't sleep in her cot during the day anymore, or her pram. The only place she falls asleep is in the car. We're usually out until after lunchtime and then drive back home, this is when she falls asleep. I leave her out in the car until she wakes up. I can see her from the living room window (have tiny front garden) and the car is locked. This is ok, isn't it?? People used to leave babies out in the garden in prams I suppose...

NOw, there was, I believe, a case where the car caught fire ont he drive and the child couldn't get out. This is why I leave the doors unlocked (so someone can get them) and don't ever really settle but leap up and down checking them. It's really no different to leaving them asleep intheir cot TBH and that's much further away and I check on them less. Well, not at all.

Yep. Did it all the time.

Ds can undo his car seat buckle - must be gifted and talented I suppose

Message withdrawn

I'm a childminder and I've never done this.

My worries would be:

1 another car crashing into my parked one

2 regularly doing so might attract the attention of a local weirdo, who might decide to strike when I was getting my coffee/going to the loo etc, or distracting me in a way to move my attention from the car.

3 heat inside the car - too hot to sit in even in shade sometimes. Also would need to slather child in suncream, in case I couldn't park in the normal place. Do you know how hot the metal buckles on seats can get?

4 child woken by passing dog/family/marching band and scaring the bejesus out of it

5 nosey neighbour calling social services!

If I lived in a quiet residential lane it I might consider it, but where I live I just couldn't. Could you stay in the car with a magazine and a cold drink, until she wakes?

I have done this, but got myself so worked up about all the publicity about dogs being left in parked cars that I went and got them inside after ten minutes and put up with grumpiness from being woken early.

for those of you who have done did you have a driveway or were you parked on the side of the road? did you keep the doors locked/unlocked, windows open/closed?

Oh god, I am starting to regret this!! I hadn't thought of any of that.. I live in a VERY quiet cul de sac, the drive of the house is about a meter away from the door and if it's really hot I have the front windows down and sit on the front step. Does EVERY neighbourhood have a 'local weirdo' then!?

I would totally do this. The risk to your child from strangers is mind-bogglingly small.

(I say 'I would' - I don't really drive. But I have left both DSes, in turn, asleep in the front garden, in a pram.)

Drive.
Windows open (in hot weather),plus front and rear windscreens shaded.
Doors open (so unlocked obviously...)

And left them outside in a pram too. Often. Indeed regularly.

Have done it with both my younger two - sometimes togther - eldest rarely slept during the day anyway.

In the drive, doors unlocked, in a naturally shady spot, regularly checked etc etc.

For a short period, when DS1 had just started school and DS3 was vv young, I would also put middle DS in the car to GO to sleep, if he hadn't had a nap earlier and we were going to school to pick up DS1. Didn't last for long, but it certainly helped my sanity.

'5 nosey neighbour calling social services! '

This is the only appreciable danger I reckon.

god I rely on this - love it when the DTs fall asleep in the car on the way home! I potter in the garden, hang the washing out, read a mag or get a coffee and the phone and sit in the car with them, quite neighbourhood and our road is dead end so no passing weirdos, only neighbours (mind you, they're a bit odd )

Oh FGS!! I got an email today which was the obituary of "Common Sense". I think this falls int hat category.

WOuld someone really call ss if they saw that the mother was checking regularily, and even sitting next to the car in hot weather and all the windows were down..?

Sounds that that needs a thread of it's own.

(oops I meant the obit of common sense).

Am in exactly the same situation with DS2 and gladfully leave him in car on drive. Used to leave him in back garden in pram too. Don't worry about it - let your common sense prevail.

niceglasses, am thrilled you think so. Was going to change it. You've saved me the ag of thinking up a new one!

I do this all the time, but i do have a little drive in a cul de sac, it is starting to get a bit hot though which is a pain.
I'm sure even if someone called social services, they would have much better things to worry about

The only problem I can conceive of (and it's worse case scenario), is that if you leave your windows open for circulation, it makes your car easier to break into .. and believe me, car thieves don't give a damn if there's a sleeping babe in the back.

Mine (2.5) goes off in the pram if I time it right, but they're all different, I know.

dd1 - I sat in car with her until she woke up
dd2 I sat in front garden usually on front step waiting
dd3 am in house and look out window every now and then

would anyone do it if they lived on a main road or didn't have a drive?

we dont have drive, terraced street in quiet residential area