Sept 08: last year they were cute little bundles that smelt of milk and vanilla, but now they've been replaced with a babyzilla!

[ILikeToMoveItMoveIt]

A new thread for us as the last one was running low.

we play a lot of games before bedtime (she has a half hour activity time after M goes to bed) - recently we've been playing Junior Scrabble (a lot more fun than I thought it would be) and ba=nanagrams which has been a great hit with her (although she is flexible in the direction in which she writes her words).

Every Tuesday I also leave M in the childminders and we go to the library and read or try and do something. The thing is that she wants to write stories, she has a fantastic imigination (a lot better than mine!), but when you start to do it with her she gets frustrated, panicky and often ends up in tears or hyperventilating - she likes the attention but doesn't seem to able to work with someone their either, I think she has the same difficulty at school.

Any ideas would be welcome though

Oh bless her..sounds like school has affected her self confidence. I know with Tom it has had a disastrous effect

WRT writing, we make story "books"...I get 2 sheets of A4 paper, fold them in half to A5 size and then join them together on the shortest side to make a concertina style book - it only has 4 "pages" so its not too daunting for them - and then I (or tom) draw 10 cm square boxes on each page for illustrations and draw 2 or 3 well spaced lines underneath for writing.....dont worry it the words arent spelt correctly - she will know what the words mean. Its literacy and art in one!! Tom also has a fantastic imagination and its a painless way to get him to write. Making cards for people is also good for literacy - get her to write inside the card too as well as draw it and colour it. In the past week, Tom has done 2 birthday card and a get well card.

Would she enjoy workbooks do you think? There are so many out there to choose from...I get mine from amazon and use various ones...WH smith do their own which are good, also Letts, DK and CPG. Tom particulaly likes the handwriting practise ones - he has nearly finished his second book!

HTH x

oh, and also there are lots of literacy/numeracy games online too but I know Tom isnt too interested in those as yet x

Caoimhe used to devour workbooks when she first started school - but not now. I try and buy her magazines with them in too but she's not generally interested. I might try again.

She would do games if she could do the same ones as at school - I might try making books like that, as you say it's less dauynting.

Thanks,

The book making sounds fab I will try that with ds1 5 tomorrow.

Thanks for that link to that thread ninja its put my mind at ease regarding baby eueys no words yet.I am looking at the squarking as progress now not irritation! I hope its helped you too hopefully

Congrats debs

I have been feeling a bit queesy today and it has brought back all memories of my ms back. . Its ok I still have implanon in arm so I am not pregnant. However, I am worried as I can not possibly feel so ill with two ds to look after, I would not cope However, I do want another baby.
Dont get me wrong the sickness was so worth my lovely baby. But How would I cope????

Too many pancakes xx

marking place...

I had 2 pancakes (sainsburys batter mix ).

Pancakes later in the week I think.
Still not pregnant. Have blood test form.
Got to round 2 for possible promotion at work which would be nice.

Ninja - That's a shame about your LO getting so upset over the writing - is it because you try to help her? For my childminding they are always banging on about letting the kids do absolutely everything themselves when doing art, writing etc as trying to 'steer' them in a direction is very wrong wrt their creativity. It means that art stuff gets VERY messy very quickly as even trying to get them to paint on the page rather than the desk is stunting their creative side!

Sorry to hear that you're not pg NC, good luck with the tests.

Would it be possible for any of you lovely ladies to take a look at the website i've made for my childminding, I've been making the odd change to it but I've been looking at it for so long that I can't see the wood for the trees and DF totally not interested . I'm just wondering what you think about it, whether it's not enough, too much, makes you want to puke etc etc!

Have had a quick look lollipop and it looks really good. Here's a couple of thoughts I had.

It might just be my screen but it's not all fitting on and I have to scroll across which is a bit annoying!

Some sections are written in 3rd person and some in 1st person. I think it all in 1st person would be better.

You should say when you want paid. My current childminder needs cleared money in her account by the start of a week but old 1 got paid on a Friday for the week just gone.

Your rates are very reasonable and I like that you do a discount for full time, that's a good idea. You could probably charge more for weekends.
Will you do a sibling discount? We pay £4 an hour for ds2 and £7 when ds1 and 2 are there. (my childminder is a friend though and I think she does us a slightly cheaper deal)

In sleeping arrangements you've spelt permanent wrong. And I think dandelions is spelt wrong in playgroup bit.

Hope that helps. It is really good and I like the photos.

lolli she gets stressed if you don't help her and if you do. She is getting better though

re your website - I've had a quick skim through and there are just a few things that I'd say.

1. you say on the fees page that the holding fee is 50% of the monthly fee but then on vacancies page you say that is negotiable for full time and that it's for a max of 2 months. I would put that on the fees pae as well as a lot of people are thinking about booking childcare 6 or 9 months in advance and might be put off by 9 months of holding fees.

2. there are a couple of spelling mistakes that I spotted - it should be permanent (not perminant) in babysitting and overnight care and organix/heinz on food and snacks. In activities and outing you've missed out a gap in each other. There may be others but I've just skimmed it

3. you sometimes use I and sometimes Lorna and I think it seems a bit odd flitting round. I think I prefer the 'I' (but for example it's Lorna on Behaviour and routine

Generally I think that it would make me want to visit and I'd feel confident that you were doing the right things.

I hope that helps

whoops - cross posts. I ste=arted mine about 2 hours ago and then children got in the way

Ninja and Debi - Thank you so much for your comments, they've been a real help. I can't believe how many mistakes I had made and didn't notice . I have changed the holding fee bit as I read it and couldn't understand what I meant so that'd be really difficult for parents to grasp, plus I've changed my 'about me' page as I thought it was crap (plus written in freaky 3rd person as pointed out!). Thank you thank you, hopefully you don't think I'm a complete inbred!

Debi - I'm not sure about the scrolling issue you're having, it's fine on mine but I know that if you have a mouse with a scrolley button thing in the middle that you can left click and at the same time scroll down which will change the size of the page on the screen, you might be looking at everything at more than 100%??

Notcitrus I'm not sure if it will help, or if you've tried it, but I sent this to my friend after reading about it on here and she is now pregnant with number 2 after a year and a half of trying.

"Taking charge of your fertility is THE book - several of my friends, and I, got pregnant by using the charting method and benefited loads from all the advice and information in it. And it's useful for birth control after you've finished having babies too"

Ah guys you lot are so helpful We have a lovely thread here

lolli I think your website is really welcoming and informative. I don't have scrolling ishoos, but I noticed on fees that for bank holiday it doesn't say hourly fee, it says £5 for the day!

DS did his first solid poo for a month today - he's got four molars and 3 canines in that time!

NC

I agree, Lollipop your website looks great!

I have given up eating sweet things for Lent and because I can do with losing a few pounds or so, but am lusting after chocolate already

testing a name change....

Off skiing tomorrow (at 4am )- see you in 9 days

lolli your website is ace and if you were near me, I'd use you! It's very professional - as others have said, it just needs a proof read as spelling is easy to get wrong when you're so close to it.

Photos lovely and your rates seem very reasonable. I think you could charge more for weekends/bank hols.

If you are having a page for vacancies, make sure you update regularly. I'm sure you know all this, grandma and sucking eggs etc but it's what sprung to my mind.
Overall, bloody well done!

And boy am I broody girls - been watching one born every minute on Ch4 and crying (crying!!) cos I never got chance to properly experience labour and 17m on I still feel the pain of a botched labour. Everyone I know tells me how lucky I was not to go further than 2cm but I don't know cos I never got to experience it before they whisked me off to theatre.
Feeling so broody but terrified the docs will just take over again. Sorry gone off at a tangent there - I need therapy!

IOM did you have a de-brief after you had your dd? I found mine really useful, it couldn't undo what happened when I had ds but it allowed me to get my head around what I wanted to happen when I had dd. I didn't do mine until ds was 1yo so you should still be able to get one for your dd's birth.

Congratulations Debs & commiserations NC
Sorry to hear about all the illness and teeth induced misery as well

Hopefully - dd2 had done a few steps every now and again for a while, but only really started walking this Monday evening - she was laughing excitedly & clapping her own cleverness. She's still only doing it every now and again though. Also because she's always crawled in a strange way (upright on 1 knee like she's about to propose, moves front foot forward & drags back knee along floor wearing out all trousers & tights!) - her right leg is leading a bit & her foot slightly turned in - hopefully that'll sort itself out though.

I know it's probably nothing but my proud mummy came about when she was walking along near the freezer, holding on with 1 hand, and when she got to the back, she paused, felt it & said "ot!" - which I thought was quite clever

Also she was saying apple, apple as she opened a cupboard, and i thought she was after the potatoes, but she had remembered a carton of juice she'd found the day before and recognised the picture on it

How many hours to people's children sleep? Mine sleeps around 12 hours a night, and 2 hours in the day - sometimes varies either way by half an hour.

But some people here have children of similar ages who seem to sleep or spend hours in their cots - in bed 6/6.30pm til 9am, then 3hrs+ in the day - is it abnormally lots or am I just jealous?

splish DD's sleeping is the same as yours. 7pm - 7am plus max 2 hrs in the afternoon. Well that's the theory.

Teething is a nightmare here too. Also the Miss Griselda Grizzly Babyzilla behaviour is not all down to the teeth - on Sunday her ear infection returned. Nasty thick liquid pouring out of her ear, so DH whisked her off to the after hours GP and now she's on another round of anti-bs. Poor thing. She is still tearing around like a mad thing in between the grizzles though. She also has a new beanbag chair which we bought from Jojo Maman and she looks so cute and grown up in it!

sunshine I have the Taking Charge of Your Fertility book which proved to be a resounding success - first month BFP! I am about to list it on ebay so if anyone would like to buy it first please let me know. Mint condition because it worked first time!

Thought about labour debrief but a bit scared tbh as it was so traumatic.

May give it a go if we start TTC

And C sleeps 7-7 and just has 1 hr in the morning. It means come 6pm she can be a handful but she just doesn't need a 2nd afternoon sleep (we've tried!)and we try to get her in the bath by 6.20 if we can.

I think the time has come for a pillow though, and perhaps a move to a proper bed as she's not looking too comfy in her cot. The cat will be annoyed as the stairgate will have to be closed all night