Tell us about your Family Friendly moments and win £100 Matalan vouchers NOW CLOSED

[carriemumsnet]

We now have more than 20 companies signed up for Mumsnet's Family Friendly programme and we'd love to hear about any Family Friendly moments you have this summer - this could be great service from a company, store, family attraction, travel company etc or something in your workplace that's made family life better or easier for you.

Everyone who posts on this thread will be entered into a prize draw to win £100 Matalan vouchers. (Thanks to Family Friendly members Matalan). Closing date August 18th 2013.

Thanks and good luck,
Family Friendly Team

Absolutely Cannon Hall Farm, for all.the reasons seslight123 has given. I live nearby and we go.often.

Also, the Barnsley Metrodome sports centre. Ok, so.I have not used Amy of the sports fa ilitues apart from the pool, but the pool.is amazing! There' s an interlinkied leisure pool and length pool and a seperate toddler pool. Big family changing rooms,fb with safety seats and playpens to put children in when adults are getting changed! Fabulous slides in the main pool, and some of the best, most patient swimming instructors ever. All sorts of swimming lessons. My DC have been going since they were a couple of months old each, and my 4 yo is just swimming confidently.without aids. OK food in the bar, lots of highchairs, staff will carry trays etc happily. The entry fee includes a swim nappy too. They do offers on.family entry for swimming and bowling, so when tgevdc are older I fully intend to have whole days there doing that. And they let yoy take pushchairs to the pool side, handy when dd was tiny and DS had a lesson.

We love Seven Stories, too - amazing place, and staff are fabulous.

Premier Inn hotels deserve a vote too - best one with the kids has been Putney Bridge, where they were given free chocolate medals and colouring sheets.

Also Belton House - NT place - so many staff made time to talk to the kids about the puppets they made in the Discovery Centre, and the indoor play cafe is brilliant.

We love the National Trusts wicken Fen, they always have lots going on for kids to participate in, the staff are always really friendly. Plus there is plenty to explore on the boardwalks and you can go back and do a different route time and time again!

As the prize is for matalan this is about them. I went shopping there brought a few bits, realised when we got home i'd left something in the trolley back at the carpark (25miles away) anyway...
3 weeks later when i was in the area popped in and mentioned to staff had it been handed in, manager came over and gave me a free one. Very nice of them and they didn't have to

The baby facilities at John Lewis are fab. We stopped at one of their home stores to break a long journey up and do an emergency nappy change. Was a lovely, large clean room, plenty of space with a nice changing area (not just a fold down plastic thing), comfy chairs for a private breast feed and a cold water machine with cups. Love John Lewis!

John Lewis are particularly good at asking if I need help with a tray etc, when I have a buggy and a walking child.

Some Pizza Express branches are great, depending on the staff - the Walton-on-Thames one deserved medals recently when my children and my parents dithered and fussed for hours. Others much less good - my nearest you have to ring a bell to get them to move a table aside and open the accessible door, and there's no baby change - though a while back the manager kindly offered DP his office to change ds on, on top of a pile of pizza boxes! Luckily it wasn't a nasty nappy. Staff since then have been dithery and unhelpful (taking half an hour to bring a kids' icecream and then causing meltdown as it was the wrong one) so haven't been for ages.

Actually one that really stands out is my local Carpet Direct, where the manager lent my 3yo his Iphone with an app that copied all noises made in a funny voice, so ds chatted to it for an hour while we debated measurements. Ds has also been encouraged to wheel trolleys of carpet from one end of the store to the other and back. The manager was still charming after I only bought carpet and arranged fitting elsewhere, and asks after the kids whenever I pass - sadly I don't need much carpet or I'd buy much more from them!

And local HSBC where staff have always been very happy for me to have business appts with a baby in tow and said I'm welcome to breastfeed or feed the baby there and to change a nappy on the floor if need be, and given me water.

A bit of thought from staff is more important than anything else - though facilities at places like the Horniman Museum are appreciated too.

We have a noisy DS who doesn?t like to sit still, so I was quite nervous when our friends booked a table in Strada. As predicted, he didn?t want to sit in his chair and escaped out of the door. However, the staff were great and extremely patient. One thoughtfully brought over some nibbles for him and a glass of milk and they also provided some paper for him to draw on.

It?s great when companies have all of the facilities to entertain little people, but it?s their manner and attitude to children that really matters and I am very grateful to Strada for making it a lovely, relaxing evening when with the wrong staff, it could have been extremely stressful.

The Red Deer at Crediton. It is a Marstons pub and it has an outside play area and a small indoor play area. The staff are fantastic, they put families at one end and couples at the other, and minimise any complaints that way. The staff are great, they are helpful and friendly and have given DD things to play with. A drink was accidentally knocked over and they replaced it free of charge.

For family friendly it has to be The Flight Centre. I rang up to book a long haul flight for me, my husband & 7 month old son and without asking they called the airline and arranged a bassinet for the flight, a baby pack incl food & toys and a pushchair loan at our connecting airport. Absolutely fantastic service and they were cheaper than others :)

A fantastic Day and evening celebrating my Grandmothers 80th Birthday.
My auntie transformed her garden into a wonderland filled with about 40 tea lights and candles hung all around her magical looking garden.
The kids had a child friendly area to play in, the BBQ was on the go as well as every sort of food imaginable, Friends and family celebrated my grandmothers 80 years and it was so touching to see her reunited with old friends.When the music stopped playing( my Aunt's friend is a DJ, so we had a DJ in the garden) and we all sang 'Happy Birthday' it was very emotional and such a great day, her sick brother even came from his home 2 hours away as a surprise which really made her day.
My children met family members who hadn't seen them since they were babies.
This by far was the nicest, sweetest and most fun day we have had this Holiday.

The Tavern in Tansley near Matlock are very child friendly. Never complain about the noise and mess and the staff are really friendly. Lots of highchairs available too.
Also Costa Coffee in Matlock were very helpful to my mother when she was babysitting my baby and toddler for me.

It's dd1's 7th birthday- she requested a trip to the Giraffe restaurant at the Trafford Centre, and it was great. They really bent over backwards to make it a really special meal, the usual colouring books etc, but staff who genuinely seemed to be interested. And children eat free til the 23rd August, (with an adult having a main course), so it was loads of fun, and great value too!

Hi all, thanks everyone for adding your thoughts to the thread. Congratulations to rusmum who has won the prize draw for £100 worth of Matalan vouchers.

Had fantastic family friendly service in Starbucks in Braintree Freeport (Essex) unusual to find children's toys in a Starbucks but they were there and kept the kids amused whilst we had a quiet ten minutes. Starbucks offer free babychino for children and as we asked for cream to be added we expected to pay for it but wasn't charged. They were polite and friendly and we didn't feel in the way at all. lots of buggy space - always a bonus, especially in a Starbucks.