Roly Poly Triumphs and Colgate at the ready!

[beaditAli]

Hope this works!

LOL chelle love it!

so glad the health care professionals know what they're doing!

No advice on teeth JodeyBogeyPicker as ds1 never had trouble with teeth other than dribbling like you wouldn't believe!

Looking at ds1's red book he was 21lb 14oz at 27 weeks!!!

Toby was 15lb 8oz!!!

Just goes to show how very different they all are

Gosh these are big babies Lucy is only 15lbs

would have loved a littley Debs75!

Quiet day today, one still off with sickness bug and another came late but her mum stayed to chat about maternity leave. As Mums who are returning to work I wanted to ask your opinion. I charge £3.50 per hour for under 25hrs and £3.00 for over. The little girl is currently coming 26 hours but will drop to 20 when her Mum is on maternity leave I am keeping her hourly rate at £3.00 but have said it will have to go up to £3.50 if she doesn't return to the longer hours when she returns to work. I am also charging a retainer as I am keeping the space open for her from September until she returns to work so am charging £1.50 per hour for the 20 hours per week. Does that seem fair, never done this before!

Ds1 has made me a mothers' day present it's soooooo cute will post pic on facebook for those who are there. Have a lovely weekend all x

Cinnamon That sounds resonable, you are keeping her place open at a reduced rate so she can come back to a place she likes when mum is aback at work. I would also offer her the chance to use these hours if she gives you adequate notice. Say if she takes newborn for baby jabs she could arrange for them to be done when her dd would normally be with you then you just charge her the normal rate for that hour.
Iv'e had all different babies now, DD1 was supertall and big, DS was smack bang in the middle, dd2 was on the 25th for the first 18 months and Lucy is my little one.

She is using the 20hrs for her daughter, the retainer is for the baby as I will have a space from September when ds1 goes to school, sorry if that wasn't clear. She is still sending her dd just for a few less hours and wants me keep the space for dd2 when my ds1 goes to school. Glad it sounds reasonable Debs75.

So you're charging the retainer from sept??? That all sounds perfectly reasonable to me. I'd be happy with that if I was the mum! Good childcare is worth paying for!!

Yes because the space isn't actually there before September as ds1 will still be at home.

Feel like a stranger on here now...... just done a monster catch up but have forgotten everything I wanted to say to so many of you. I'll just say "Hi to everyone and hope all the lo's teeth, tummies, and sleeping are going well!"

Been away in bonny Scotland to visit Jack's Great Gran who's in her 90s and not very well really. Really happy times but also sad to leave her. Jack has the same name as her late husband!
Maybe they'll have more snuggles soon but we have so many long trips planned this summer (all in the UK... nothing exotic!) that I doubt it'll be before Christmas.

Need to address Jack's meals this weekend. He must be so bored of parsnips and sweet potato!

apologising again to chelle 3am wake ups from a silly beady can't be much fun

Anyone else's wee ones found a new volume of squealing recently? Jack is gonna give me migranes if he carries on with his Whitney impersonations!

On the subject of weights: last had him weighed at 24 weeks and he was 18lbs 2oz. On the 75th...... strange that he was the second biggest monster on the thread at birth and now he such a grazer and so not fussed about his food really.

Have a lovely weekend September mums xxxxxx

Oh and not a tooth in sight yet after me being so convinced his bottome end last week was a sure sign!

I got a letter invitiong Lucy for her 6-8 month check today. Its not for a few weeks but it sure feels early.

Lucy is fast realising that whilst it is fun to roll over it is pretty boring on your tummy

Ds1 had his at 9 months, Lucy is one of the oldest on the thread though isn't she? Can't believe Luke is rapidly advancing towards 7 months :(

Wow all the shenanigans with your lot! Phoebe is not sitting or crawling, nor have we seen any teeth to speak of. She is bellowing like mad these days tho beadit. My head is wrecked some mornings and then she looks up with this cute smile and eyes dancing in her head as much as to say 'can you believe I can make all this noise?'
I have no idea how much she weighs - will have to pull out a scales tomorrow. She is eating for ireland and has gotten quite chubby but not such a bad thing when she was so skinny.
newmum I always introduced texture slowly and led them up to lumps. It wasnt a big surprise then. And I wouldnt expect them to deal with lumps until well into 7-8 months and thats taking into consideration that all mine were weaned between 18-21 weeks. As for the advice from the HV's (we dont have them here) if it sounds like rubbish to you ignore it! you are the expert on your baby! There is no set date or time for when they aught to do something. DS1 was a textbook baby, DS2 (still!) takes his sweet time and doesnt dream of doing anything til he good and ready! Phoebe seems to be happy to take things slowly and in her stride too.
Cinnamon I pay ?5.50 an hour per child. All holidays etc except for the summer holidays and retainers would be at full price too! I think its great you have a reduced rate for amount of hours and your retainers sounds more than reasonable.

cinnamon IMO your rates seem a little too reasonable! It's £9.50 cheaper to have them for 26 hours than for 25 hours. Do you not find that parents use that and you end up having children for longer than their parents need you to?
And the reduced price and retainer sound very reasonable. Especially considering I know you've mentioned money can be tight and you could earn far more by taking on another child and charging her the 20 hours at £3.50 per hour. She should be pretty pleased with your offer!

Orlaith's being really strange. She's hardly drinking, not sleeping well, waking up crying but not wanting feeding, she's constantly tired, but in the day she's generally pretty happy. She should be grumpy being tired and hungry!

My niece had a horrible fever yesterday, she cried and slept all day but couldn't muster the energy to cry properly. I realised at about 7 last night that she hadn't been changed since the morning so I did it and there was the tiniest amount of wee in there. She must be dehydrated too. Poor little thing. I hope she's better today.

It's frustrating when they can't tell you what's wrong isn't it, all I get is mamamamamam!

Aphra pulled herself upright on DP's hands this morning! Standing, or as near as. She's really getting on!

Her poos are pretty much changed into non-bf poos now - smellier, more solid (though still somewhat paste-y). For a bit last week I was worried because she hadn't done a poo for ages, but she did more than one yesterday so I'm not worried any more...

Aphra 7 (calendar) months today, yay!

Go Aphra! She'll be running around before you know it comix

cinnamon I think your rates etc are v reasonable. From what I've seen CMs in Cambridge are £4-£6 p/h in general.

Don't have time to catch up properly now but will try to get on again later...

Yay for Aphra not so for comixminx, trouble's coming

It's a problem saoirse86 as generally childminders charge more for part time children due to the inconvenience of having to find other children that fit around those spaces but you have to have a cut off at some point and decided on 25hrs. The lady in question was using another Childminder for the same hours so I guess she didn't decide on 26 hours for her financial gain unless the previous Childminder had the same cut off and the rest of my part time children are well under 25hrs. People generally know what they want when they visit before seeing prices. I am actually more expensive than several other childminders in the area. Glad no one thinks I'm ripping her off though!

It's so warm here today but not sunny, just found a group of boys jumping out of a neighbours garden and wandering around at the side of out house. My next door neighbour took a photo of each of them and said if anything goes missing he will give them to the police. To which they replied you're not allowed to take photos of kids, urgh excuse me if I'm wrong but you are also not allowed on other peoples property without permission! Had just got back from shopping with my mum, she bought ds1 a pair of shoes he's wanted for ages, they were supposed to be for his birthday as he hasn't changed sizes just liked them but she let him keep them on and his face was a picture!! Hope you're all having nice weekends.

I have a friend in Cambridge who keeps asking me to move so I can childmind her son mapletrees, somehow the extra I could charge per hour wouldn't meet the extra my mortgage would cost :(

Whizzed up corgette, tomato, onion, garlic, herbs & chilli flakes! The biggest hit yet!

It was my Birthday yesterday. I had a lovely day. My boys bought me a voucher for a beauty place. Not sure if they're trying to tell me something or if they just think I deserve pampering! I had a party last night. It was great. We played pass the parcel and musical statues and everyone went home with a party bag! Dh is cooking me a special meal tonight & we're having a day out shopping and swimming tomorrow.
What's everyone else doing for mothers day??

On the subject of swimming, I found out yesterday that My friends little boy slipped in the leisure centre changing rooms last sat & fell on his head. He's fractured his skull and got bruising on his brain! The bruising is in the are the area that controls speach and co-ordination so because he's only 1 they can't tell if there's any damage and won't really know until he starts school! Its awful. I can't imagine what they're going through & to top it all off they were questioned by social services. I know they have to but they spoke to the hv, gp, examined the baby, questioned the parents all before they spoke to the leisure centre staff who had been there when it happened!

Happy birthday for yesterday banana. Chilli flakes! Got to get some into Louis soon

cinnamon, you could look after Louis too, but I'm not sure we could afford the £200p/h or so you'd probably need to make it worthwhile

Well, hopefully not jinxing it here, but, Louis seems to have taken to his own room quite easily. The first night he went down straight away at 7.15pm and didn't wake up until 12.10am, and then he lasted in there until 4ish. Then the last 2 nights he's stayed in there until 7am and 6.30am . He still wakes up lots of times though...

saoirse, Arlo's just started doing 'mamamamamamam' when he's unhappy too. It's so sweet, the first few times I've just stood there filming him on my phone while he gets more pissed off. Bad mummy!

My sister's wedding today. Arlo was pretty good, managed a few naps in the buggy, I had to nip out and bf a few times, he even managed to sleep a bit during the disco, although the live band were a bit too loud for him! Wonder how the interrupted routine will impact sleep tonight...too much to hope for a lie-in do you think?

Was going to ask how arlo was getting on with his food and cup and how the hen night went didn't realise it was the wedding already Dixiebell!! Hope last night went well.

Trying to teach Luke mamamama but he just laughs at me' he's got a good screech on him now though!!

Happy mothers day to you all, especially those having their first one. Hope you all get spoilt! Just up now after listening to Luke chatting since 6.45 to find him the opposite end of the cot to the one I left him!

My Mothers day pressie from Olly??? His 1st ever 6.30-6.30 sleep!!!!!! Yey! Although I had a crap nights sleep, at least I can't blame him!

Olly occasionally says mamamamama but his latest is bababababababa which is pleasing my Dad cos Ds1 calls him baba. I keep telling him ollys just found a new sound but he's not having it

Mapletrees you can't really taste the chilli flakes unless you chomp one but they do flavour it a bit!

Glad the wedding went well dixie Hope you don't pay for it today!

HAPPY MOTHERS DAY EVERYONE! [GRIN]

doesn't work in capitals!!

Happy Mother's Day everyone!