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.

Just checked hopefully's blog and seen this - yippee for her!!

As I may have mentioned, we've moved house! Tragically, this has resulted in the death of all internet connections, so I'm only able to come online when I can bribe my sister with cake to let me come and use the internet at her house.

Anyway, I promise normal service will resume soon, but I'll leave you with a couple of pre programmed posts to keep you occupied while I desperately root for my sewing machine under yet another pile of boxes.

digi I have to say that I'm quite jealous. We have no family to give us a childfree night and last time I went to my mum's I found M in ht esitting room with a HUGE box full of different types of pills on the floor

It must have been annoying though

do you think I over reacted? Can I blame pg hormones? I was quite teary. Pfb syndrome?

No link showing up on my phone ninja, is it what I think it is?

I posted what she wrote - she HAS moved house.

Don't worry I know what you mean, when m was a baby I didn't want people taking her away, but now I have 2 running around I'm really glad of it. It's hard to think that they're getting so independent that they can stay elsewhere.

H is taking both the kids to ireland in May for 3 days without me and it'll be fantastic really strange

Thanks for the welcome back, well i have never been away, i catch up every day but never have time to post,

Congratulations to dg and *deb75

I am sooooo broody for number 4 but things are not to good for us at the mo

That is great dg if you get a scan, ive had 3 mc, ive always had to go private for a reassurance scan.

Well F is doing really well, talks alot eats alot but is still tiny, he is in 9 12 months clothes i think he weighs around 20lb, my other 2 are tiny so i'm not too worried.

Dg i dont think you over reacted at all.

Hello lolly! digi I'd be freaked out if my mum just decided to have the dc's without asking me first. Of course, when she does ask (which is not very often, last time was december) I always say yes . I'm not sure if all hospitals offer a scan for pregnancies following a mc. My gp wouldn't do one for me when I was stressed and spotting at 7 weeks. So I went to the private hospital the following week and paid for it on my credit card, was £115 IIRC. Same consultant as the nhs hospital and the nurse played with ds while I had the scan. Was worth every penny to calm me down and get my first sight of tiny dd.

Pleased to know hopefully is ok. Wonder if she's planted much veg yet? I've got pumpkins and leeks starting to grow.

Thanks Ninja [proud mummy emoticon]

Hi everyone.

I am still around but I am not on MN too much now. It is a part of a longer term commitment to break away.

It sounds like quite a few people are pregnant again so can I be cheeky and ask for someone to do a summary with dates attached so that I can be nosy congratulate y'all?

The dds are doing great.
DD1 has her fifth birthday party at a soft play (imo one of Dante's circle of hell) on the 17th with a boy in her reception class who shares her birthday so we are stumping for only half the bill.

DD2 is a star. she loves singing and her speech is well ahead what dd1's was at the same age. Actually at 18 months, dd1 was mute. I don't thing she had any recognisable words at the same age besides things like ma, and no.

She sings 'winka, winka, winka tar' to her dollies as she rocks them. She does between 6 and 10 nursery rhymes in her own little way. Pricless. I should be psb (perfect second born) mummmy and write down her words and nursery rhymes for posterity.

Finally: we may be in London for 3 days next week. Dh now is working in London and as it is the easter break we may as well go down and spend some time there.

Any ideas what to do with a 5yo and an 18mo old?

Hi all - so am massively down now as we have called the council today and DS has gone to to 8th on the list for our closest school.

I just called the school to speak to the lovely Admissions Officer again and of course they are on holiday so ended up crying down the phone to the Head who answered it. To say we're worried is the understatement of the year. She did say that she's confident he'll still get in but confirmed that they won't be running an additional class this year as they don't have the room. I just don't know what we're going to do if he doesn't get into this school.

foxy there is so much to do with the kids:

• London Zoo is ace but so is the Battersea Park Children's Zoo
• Science & Natural History Museums are great
• Aquarium
• London Eye
• Duck Tour
• Kew
• Wetlands Centre in Barnes
• Pricess Diana Playground in Kensington Gardens
• Dean City Farm
• Children's Museum in Bethnal Green

I'm sure there's more. I'll post them when I think of them.

Where are you located Dastardly? And who are you? Sorry to hear you didn't get your first choice. Had I been around I'd know more already.

Hi foxy am in Wandsworth and am normally Sunshinemummy. It's not just that we didn't get our first choice - we didn't get any of our choices. We haven't been offered a place anywhere.

oh dear. that is really not good news. can you even consider home education?

do you have the time to write letters to the LEA, your MP, the papers? surely your child has to at least been offered a place.

there must also be forums on Yahoo for parents like yourself who will know loads about the system and you can quickly teach yourself on how to respond to this crisis with a few well placed and articulate information.

an unrelated question: are you on natural mamas?

No Home Ed is a total no-no as both DH and I work full-time. I don't want it for him anyway tbh.

I've written to my MP (no reply), the Sec of State for Education (no reply), Schools Minister (no reply), Shadow Schools Minister (rubbish reply from his assistant which I've responded to), Lib Dem Shadow Minister for Schools.

Haven't tried the papers and we're appealing to the LEA but not hopeful. DH tried to speak to the LEA's Head of Education when we were first told but, surprise surprise, he was on holiday and we were rold by his assistant that even if he as in the office she wouldn't put us through.

Yahoo forums? I haven't used these. How would I go about it?

Not on natural mamas no - why?

i was only asking because I think one of 'us' became a regular sling user based on my evangelism information and I was wondering if it was you.

I think that maybe some well placed letters quoting legislation back to the people who legislate to us would help. Contacting the Daily Shame is probably a good idea especially with elections coming up.

i had a look at potential yahoo groups but found none. maybe try googling for the legislations which govern the appeals process? look through the paperwork on the appeals process for names of the legislation which may apply.

have you had a meet with your local councillor?

is your ds baptised? sorry if I am being too nosy.

No meeting with local councillor but might be a good next step.

DS is not baptised as we couldn't agree on a religion (I'm CofE and DH is Catholic).

Thanks for the suggestions foxy. Is it too much to ask that my DS goes to his local school?

Do you attend either church? Your attendance can play a role with securing a place at a voluntary aided (read: church) school.

I can give you info on the appeals process as I have been through it once for secondary.

Try to make an appt with a local councillor and before you meet him, do your groundwork, ie look up the DFES site or other info you can gather. The LEA has to provide written info on how to go about appealing, I should suspect so query them on this. And look for the relevant statutes and your councillor for support in expressing your dissatisfaction that he was not even offered a place. They local authority is breaking its own code of practice here IMO.

Thanks foxy. We have had stuff about the appeals process but my understanding is that primary appeals are rarely successful. We do think that they have the distance wrong between our house and the school so that's forming a part of it, but I'm not sure that actually gets us in (higher up the waiting list probably).

Am writing to our councillors (we have 3) right now.

D&S That is so awful - I just never imagined that such a thing were possible. You are so right to keep fighting this.

Hi foxy. I'm due 14 June.

Hiya,

Thanks for the welcome back and the brief update. back in a mo.

D&S have you actually gone to see your mp? They hold weekly surgeries. Think you should get down there with ds and cry in his/her face. Then write to the local paper as well as the daily hell. Am so sorry you're in this situation. It's what I am dreading. Am hoping that as we live within spitting distance of my local primary that we should be safe, but wouldn't be surprised if catchment area shrinks to 10metre radius by next Sept.

Am due end Nov, fingers crossed. GP has kindly requested an early scan via letter so we'll see how long that takes to process.

I've got another AIBU:

AIBU to have asked dh to tell his parents that the kids and I will not be joining them bird watching this week?

He very graciously pointed out to them that unless the birds are in cages where they'be hard to miss, and without provision of an adventure playground and source of cappuccino, we'd not be going. I think they took it quite well!

Ds has cried and cried all afternoon. Just doesn't know what to do or where to put himself. He has these funny episodes, and the rest of the time is the most gentle, mild mannered, happy little boy. I still haven't worked out the best way to handle it. Ideas anyone?

And dd insisted on going to the toilet at the farm all by herself. How grown up. Oh except that she was trying to avoid me seeing that she'd done a poo in her pants. But of course the act of pulling down said pants resulted in poo smeared down her leg, all over the toilet and on the floor. Bleugh. Ds is never ever going to be toilet trained, its too traumatic for me!

cc yanbu!! Re your ds is he constipated? Last few teeth coming through? Is there anything that can distract him during these episodes? My iPhone comes in very handy when ds is like this. He will stop and play with it for half an hour if I let him.

DS has recently developed a fear of pooing where he cries, runs from room to room shouting no no no no, until eventually he stops and strains very hard and then spends the next ten minutes running around to avoid being changed.

I can't believe we're in this situation either. We're so close to the school that we just never expected it. Had another sleepless night last night worrying about it.

Hi Foxy Due on the 6th September

so that is 3 pg ones so far. Wow! I can't conceive (boom! boom!) of the idea myself. But congratulations all.

I still have SPD from the last time round. I have an appt with my GP on Monday to talk through that and some other signs of old age. I think it means physio etc.