New baby and nursery looming - what would you do?

[Mamabear04]

DD is 2.4yo and I am expecting my next LO in 4 months. I work PT and my parents look after her 2 days a week. My plan has always to send her to nursery the term after she turns 3yo because of the free hours and also because she can get into the council nursery joined to the primary school she will go to. With the arrival of the new baby I'm thinking ahead as to what will be best for DD to make this transition as easy as can be. She is still very clingy to me although is fine to be left with OH or my parents and never gets upset when I leave however she is not at ease with strangers at all. I worry that having such a big change in her life and then 5 months later having to go to nursery will be really hard for her. I take her to a toddlers gymnastics class once a week, soft play when I have the energy and try to arrange play dates with her "friends" but she still gets upset when other people come into our house but tends to settle after a while if they have a child (possible covid hangover maybe?)

I guess my question is how to make the transition easier for her? She's never been looked after by anyone else except us and my parents. OH parents live far away. Should I start taking her to a play group where you have to leave them? I feel like all my friends put their LOs into nursery when they went back to work after mat leave and don't know anyone else in a similar situation...

My little boy started at a school nursery the day after his sister was born. I’d been in hospital 4 days at that point and wasn’t home until the end of week so missed his first week. Apart from normal nerves for a few weeks he’s settled fine. He’d also never been left with anyone apart from family.

We had a few books about starting nursery and talked about how just he’d go to nursery and we’d pick him up at the end of the day. We also went past the nursery regularly (I don’t drive and it’s on our route to town) and talked about how he’d go there when he was 3.
Our school website has pictures of the children doing activities and videos from the nursery staff so it might be worth seeing if yours does too so they’re familiar faces.
We did a lot of talking about how great nursery was and how much more fun it was than being home in the first few weeks as well

She will be so much older by the time she starts nursery and better equipped to cope
I think 5 months is plenty of time to get used to a new baby- it’s not like it’s all happening at the same time

So she will be starting nursery in 9m, 5m after her new sibling? I wouldn't do anything different in that case. She will have developed lots by then and you will be able to discuss it with her more. Mine started nursery at 3.5 and it went very smoothly despite their initial worry. I think they would have found it much harder at 2.

One thing you could do if you don't already is look at some classes like toddler dancing, swimming where they have to follow instructions. It would probably be with you at this age but gives some practise at having a 'teacher'. Mine had both progressed to independent swimming lessons (i.e. I wasn't in the water, the teacher was) and I think it helped. Not essential though if you aren't keen/don't want to spend the money.

She'll be fine and well used to the baby by that point.

I would take her to playgroups in the meantime so she can get used to being a in a room with a lot of children in a free-flow style.

Read lots of books about starting school. Watch episodes of TV shows where they have a starting school theme or they're just as school (Peppa Pig goes to pre-school for example). Walk past the school regularly, look at the children playing, talk about how she will go to that school soon.