After five weeks of holiday we now only have one week to go before Toby goes back to school and Gabe starts at his new nursery. He was going to the local preschool last year but as it is only open for 18 hours a week and we are entitled to the 30 funded hours he is moving to a different private nursery where he will be going into the preschool room. Read more
Before Toby was born we did the whole expectant parent thing of painting the nursery, getting new carpet, choosing the furniture – although actually we just matched the walls to the curtains we already had up in the room and the only new furniture we bought was a cot. For a while his room didn’t have any other decoration but when he was about six months old we decided on a space theme. We added solar system stickers to one wall and a Dr Seuss quote with some rockets on the other wall. My brother and sister-in-law bought him a space rocket rug and when he moved into his big boy bed before Christmas we bought space themed bedding too.
Toby loves his space rocket room and he can tell you all about the planets – Mercury is really, really small, Venus is really, really hot, Jupiter has a big red spot, and Saturn has rings – what more do you need to know?!
Poor old Gabe though, he hasn’t even got a room of his own. He’s heading towards eight months old and is still sleeping in his co-sleeper crib in our room. There are a few reasons for this; we have a three bedroom house but our third bedroom is full of Barry’s computer, bookshelves, the sofa bed for when we have visitors and all the other accumulated junk that doesn’t have anywhere else to live. We were hoping that the boys would be able to share a room but with Gabe still waking in the night, and usually up at between 4 and 5 am I don’t think we’re quite ready for that yet! So for now he’s staying in with us and we’re going to have to try squeezing the cot in our room soon as he’s not got much room left in the co-sleeper.
However, we are hopefully going to be moving house sometime this year to go and live nearer to our parents and we’re hoping the move is going to be sooner rather than later. We’ve been looking at four bedroom houses so that the boys would have a room each and then they can share when they’re a bit older. I’ve been Pinning lots of nursery ideas already. I really love the grey and yellow of this Snuz bedding so I think I might go with those colours as a start and then maybe go with clouds and rainbows. It would need to have lots of storage too – I’m a bit obsessed with buying clothes for the boys at the moment so we would need somewhere for them all to go, and somewhere for all the cloth nappies too! I’m mostly looking forward to him having a room of his own though, at least until he’s a bit older.
I guess then when the boys are older if they want to share a room they can. There are so many cool bunk beds and cabin beds out there – I know I loved having bunk beds with my brother when I was small, until I fell out of the top bunk when I was seven and split my eyebrow open on some Lego at least! I know when they’re a bit older I might not get my own way as easily but I’m hoping we can avoid the cartoon character bedrooms for a good few years yet anyway!
For now I’m just hoping we get our moving plans under way soon – I don’t really want Gabe to still be in our room when he’s one!
**This post is in collaboration with homify
After three settling in sessions Gabe is having his first full afternoon at nursery today. He is seven and a half months old and technically he doesn’t really need to be there. I’m not working at the moment – I’m still receiving maternity pay from my former employer but as I was on a temporary contract I don’t have a job to go back to. So there is no real reason why I couldn’t look after Gabe at home, like I have been doing for the last seven and a half months.
But the thing is, I’m exhausted. Gabe is not an easy baby to take care of. Whether it’s due to his reflux or just the way he is Gabe is not a baby who will just sit quietly and play for longer than a few minutes. I wouldn’t even mind if he was happy sat on my knee or cuddling with me but he constantly wriggles and writhes, he wants you to stand up with him and when he’s pushing a stone and a half that isn’t easy to do for long.
Oh, and Gabe is not a fan of the afternoon nap either. I don’t really know why – he generally naps well in the mornings, an hour or two in his crib but in the afternoons he will only really sleep either in the car, or sometimes on me at home. I don’t really mind that so much; I get some nice sleepy cuddles and a chance to catch up on some TV but it doesn’t give me chance to do anything else.
Toby already goes to nursery four afternoons a week – he used to go full time when I was at work and when Gabe was born we decided to keep him going part time. He enjoys it, he gets to do things he doesn’t do at home, and if I do go back to work and he has to go back full time then hopefully it won’t be too much of a shock for him.
A month or so ago, after another sleepless night and another minor breakdown from me we decided that it would probably help everyone if Gabe was to go to nursery one afternoon a week too. Barry and I are happy with this decision and yet why, when I tell people do I feel embarrassed? I feel like I’m admitting I can’t cope with looking after my children myself. I know lots of people who’s kids are regularly looked after by their grandparents or other relatives and no-one bats an eyelid but we don’t have that option – our nearest relatives live over 200 miles away.
I know there are probably thousands of mums (and dads) around the country who look after their kids all day every day on their own and seriously, I take my hat of to them. Because I can’t do it. Looking after two little boys is exhausting and I felt like I was going slowly insane. I was irritable and snappy with Toby when he doesn’t deserve that, and I wasn’t giving Gabe all the attention he needs either.
Gabe’s been fine at nursery so far as you can probably see from the photos I’ve taken from his online learning journal. I think it might even do him good to be somewhere else and get some stimulation from being with different people and doing different things.
And I’m hoping that this one afternoon a week, when I will have chance to work on my blog, or go to the dentist, or catch up on chores, or even catch up on some sleep, will help me be a better mummy the rest of the time. And I refuse to feel guilty for that.
Last week Toby left the nursery he has been at since he was 13 months old and started at a new nursery.
There were a few reasons for this; there were always a few niggling issues with his old nursery, nothing that was serious enough for us to move him but things that given a choice we would have changed. The nursery he has moved to was actually my first choice when we were putting Toby into full time childcare when I went back to work. The only reason we didn’t send him there was because it didn’t open early enough for me to drop him off and still get to work on time. Obviously that isn’t an issue now so it was no longer a reason to keep him where he was. The other main reason we have moved him is because this nursery is a lot cheaper than the old one! This doesn’t seem to have any ill effect on the care the children receive, and it means we can afford to keep Toby going four afternoons a week for the same cost as three afternoons at the old nursery. The other thing that influenced our decision was that the old nursery doesn’t receive council funding to provide children with their free hours of childcare when they are three and the new nursery does. Although we are planning to move back to England in the next year there’s a chance we’ll still be here when Toby turns three and it was easier to move him now than wait until he is three and there’s less chance of getting him a space.
Anyway, last Thursday we went along to the new nursery for a settling in session. We had told Toby what was happening but I don’t know how much he really understood. I think he was pretty confused when all the staff were giving him cuddles when he left his old nursery on Wednesday! On Thursday Barry had taken the afternoon off so we all went along. As soon as we got there Toby went off and started playing. I spoke to his key worker for a while and then we went and sat in the manager’s office for half an hour and left him to it – I don’t think he even noticed we weren’t there! When our hour was up we headed home again, Toby seemed like he’d enjoyed himself and we told him he would be coming back again the next day.
On Friday we went again. The plan was for Toby to stay at least three hours but that I would phone after two and if he was doing OK then he would stay to have his tea and do the full afternoon. When we pulled up in the car I told Toby we were at his new nursery – ‘new nursery’ he said and seemed quite happy to go in. In the hallway I was explaining to Toby that he had to change into his special ‘inside shoes’ (he didn’t have to do this at his old nursery), and I showed him the cool slippers that look like trainers that I’d got him. One of the staff came out and at this point Toby started saying ‘home’ and trying to pull me towards the door. He’s only just learnt to say home and what it means so he likes to use it, even if it’s not necessarily what he really wants. I told him we weren’t going home and we went into the toddler room where he’d had so much fun the day before. At first he clung on to me and refused to go and play. Then he had a spell of lying on the floor. After ten minutes or so he decided to go off and have a look at what there was to do. I stood up and he came back to cling to my leg again. Then he found something else to do. I probably could have sneaked off without him noticing but I don’t really like to do that, so I said goodbye, and he cried as I knew he would. He has been going his old nursery full time nursery for well over a year and still cried at least half the time when he was dropped off so I wasn’t too worried. I left him to it and sat in the car outside for a while just in case they rang me straight away to say he wouldn’t settle. No call came though so I headed home. I called them a couple of hours later and he was absolutely fine so we left him there to have his tea and do a full afternoon session.
Unfortunately this week hasn’t such plain sailing. It’s been a struggle some days to even get him in the door. Yesterday when we pulled up outside he started crying and saying ‘no nursery’ and then ‘me home’. When I left him he was really crying for me (and it was the same on Tuesday) but there have been no calls to collect him early and we’ve gone to pick him up they said it’s taken no more than five minutes for him to calm down. I’m sure there’ll be plenty more tears of drop off but as long as he continues to settle down quickly I know he’ll be fine. It doesn’t change the fact that leaving him crying is one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do, and it doesn’t really get any easier.
I’m so proud of my biggest boy though. There have been a lot of changes in Toby’s life recently and he’s coping with it all so well. I guess he’s not my baby any more, my little boy is proper toddler and he’s a total superstar.
I was reading a post today by the lovely Eline at Pasta & Patchwork about how her 3 year old (affectionately known as the Bean) has been going through some separation anxiety as she gears up for a work trip away from home. It made me think about this post I wrote back in April about Toby’s nursery wobbles and I thought it was about time I wrote an update.
We’ve had a few more ups and downs since April but happily things seem to be settling down a lot now. There haven’t been any more staff changes at nursery recently and Toby appears to have got used to the new people. I’m sure it also helps that all his teeth have now come through, and eventually we got his awful nappy rash cleared up too.
There are still some days when he cries as I’m leaving but we aren’t having the same drama just getting his shoes on and into the car. Usually if there is something to distract him as soon as he arrives at nursery (a ball or balloons are sure fire winners here) then I can leave without so much of a shout. Sometimes he’s so distracted he doesn’t even say goodbye but often I get a wave accompanied by an enthusiastic ‘Die!’ (yeah, we need to work on that one!) or his new party trick which is blowing a kiss.
Toby is still eating everything they put in front of him at nursery (although hardly putting on any weight – should I be worried about that?). His naps have got even better too and he usually sleeps for about two hours in the afternoon.
Sleeping at night has improved too. We still have some nights when he won’t go to sleep unless I stay in the room, or nights when he wakes up, and frustratingly when he does wake up he tends to take ages to get back to sleep. Last night I ended up sleeping on his bedroom floor from half two until half three because he just stood up and started crying whenever I left the room. But on the whole he sleeps through a lot more than he doesn’t so I can cope with that. We’re also trying to do away with his bedtime bottle at the moment because I think at nearly two he really doesn’t need a bottle any more. We’ve started giving him milk in a cup when he gets in from nursery instead and then he has the hour or so before bed time to drink it.
So, although things still aren’t perfect they’re a big improvement from where they were a few months ago. Hopefully Toby will stay settled at nursery – we’re going to keep him going every day until after the baby is born so he has some stability and doesn’t have to deal with lots of changes all at once. He will be moving to part time in the Autumn but we’ve not decided exactly what days and hours that will be yet. I just hope he stays happy and we don’t go back to the days of screaming and crying every time he gets dropped off.
If your little one is having wobbles about nursery or other separation anxiety then, as hard as it is at the time just try to remember…
Toby has been going to nursery full time now for almost eight months. He started in August of last year when I went back to work and except for a few holidays and illnesses he has been there every week day since. On the whole it has been a positive experience but like everything when it comes to raising a child we’ve had our ups and downs.
When he first started going to nursery Toby would often cry when I dropped him off but usually I could hear he had stopped before I even got out of the building. For a long time this crying stopped (unless he was ill or had had a particularly bad night the night before) and Toby would literally run, or crawl in the early days, round to his room and happily start playing. Unfortunately, the crying has returned in the last month or so and I’m not entirely sure why but I’ll come back to that in a minute.
He has always eaten well at nursery and rarely refuses anything they give him. The only thing we have found so far that he really doesn’t like is rice pudding but apparently he always tries a spoonful and then refuses the rest. Perhaps he’s just checking to make sure he hasn’t changed his mind!
In the beginning his sleep was a bit of an issue too – even though he was still having two long naps during the day at the weekends they would often struggle to get him to sleep at nursery and some days we would pick him up and he’d be really grumpy because he’d only had one short nap or sometimes not slept at all. It’s better now and he seems to be in more of a routine. He usually has a nap of between one and two hours after lunch, at the same time as a few of the other children.
Nursery has been great for his development too, he gets to do lots of things there that I probably wouldn’t do at home (mostly things that involve making a lot of mess!) and he gets to spend time outside in the garden or going for walks every day. Of course it’s difficult to say what he would have been like had he not gone to nursery because we don’t know any different but he certainly seems to be getting plenty of stimulation every day.
So why the wobbles? Well, there have been a few things lately that have started to make me feel uneasy about our situation. As I mentioned earlier Toby has been crying when I’ve dropped him off for the last month or so. I know he stops crying and settles down when I’ve gone, and he’s usually fine the rest of the day but it doesn’t make it any easier to leave him. And then a few weeks ago it started getting to the point where the crying would start at home as soon as I asked him to get his shoes, or tried to put his coat on. Last week we got to a whole new level of screaming, particularly when trying to get him into the car. The screaming getting into the car then carried on for the rest of the week, even when we weren’t going to nursery. We even had to abandon an afternoon out at the weekend because Toby was still screaming 15 minutes from home.
Now, I don’t know how much of this is purely to do with nursery or whether he is just going through a bit of a phase of separation anxiety. He’s been quite clingy with me generally, often shouting for me if I just leave the room, and refusing to let his dad put him to bed at the moment too. He’s been teething again too and also had really bad nappy rash for the last week or so which can’t have been helping either.
The situation at nursery hasn’t been helped by the fact there have been quite a lot of staff changes recently. This concerns me a bit in itself. High staff turnover is rarely a good sign in any business, and it makes me wonder why people are leaving. Toby has always been a little shy of new people so when there are different staff every day (they seem to rotate new staff round the different rooms in the beginning which doesn’t help) it is very unsettling for him. New staff also means new people changing his nappies and getting used to using cloth, so sometimes they have been put on really badly and must be uncomfortable for him.
So, as you can see there have been quite a lot of things that could be contributing to his unsettled behaviour. I spoke to the owner (who has also recently taken on the role of manager) last week and he did go some way to reassure me. They have put a procedure in place so that Toby’s nappy is changed every two hours and each nappy change is now supervised and signed off by a senior member of staff. This should at least help his nappy rash clear up and make sure his nappies are put on properly. They also told me that although a few people have left recently they are getting a couple of very experienced staff starting in the next week or so and hopefully one of them will become his new keyworker. I’m pleased that they have listened to my concerns and are putting things in place to try and improve things for us.
Actually, as I finish writing this post, things have already started to improve since I started to write it last week. The screaming and fighting about getting in the car seems to have stopped. He has had a bit of a cry as he his dropped off and we have to leave but he’s stopped before we’ve even left the building. I’m really hoping that this was all just a wobble and that things will keep on getting better. In a few months we’ll need to start thinking about him moving to the next room, but also make a decision about what we are going to do after the new baby is here and I’m on maternity leave. At the moment we are hoping to keep Toby at nursery part time, to give him a bit of stability but also so I can have a bit of time alone with the baby. Fingers crossed it just all works itself out one way or another, because for now I think we’re doing all we can.
Have you experienced nursery wobbles with your little one? I don’t know if it’s common to go from being happy and settled one week to really not wanting to be left the next – I’d love to hear if any of you have gone through something similar.
This is it. After over 13 months of maternity leave I return to my job as a Modern Languages teacher tomorrow (we go back to school crazy early here in Scotland!). Although I’ve been off work for over a year it feels like the time to go back has come round so quickly. It wasn’t helped by the fact that a month ago I still didn’t have a job to go back to – it was only two weeks ago that I interviewed for and was offered a new job in a new school and with a different council, so the end of maternity leave hasn’t been entirely stress-free!
I have such mixed emotions about going back to work – on the one hand I’m looking forward to going back to work. I enjoy my job (most of the time!) and I’m looking forward to doing something that involves using a bit more brain power for a change. And I got to buy some new clothes too. But on the other hand, I’m going to miss Toby so much. It makes me so sad to think someone other than me will be looking after him. And because he’s going to nursery full-time he’s actually going to be spending more time with the people at nursery than he is with me and Barry. I know though, that he’s going to get so much out of being there and playing with all the other babies. He’s had three settling in sessions this week; we went for an hour last week and I stayed with him and then he was there on his own for two hours on Monday, three hours on Tuesday and then a full day (7am-4:30pm) on Wednesday as a proper practice for what we’ll be doing next week.
And I’m relieved to say he seems to have taken to it remarkably well. I was quite worried about it as no-one has ever looked after Toby except me and Barry (apart from a couple of times when we’ve been out in the evening but that’s always been after he’s been in bed). He’s been fine at nursery though – we did pick up a very tired and slightly grumpy boy on Tuesday when they couldn’t get him to have a nap but he managed two naps on Wednesday (albeit much shorter ones than he would have at home) so I’m hopeful that he’ll settle into a routine soon enough. He’s been eating well at least and they managed OK with his cloth nappies too, although I might have to give them a few more fitting lessons yet!
So, it seems Toby is going to be all right at nursery so that just leaves me. For the fourth time in five years I will be starting the new year at a new school. I really wish I was going back to the school I was at before my maternity leave. It was a small school and I knew most of the kids and had fitted in well with all the teachers and other staff too. It’s always hard to start a new job but as a teacher you don’t get any time to settle in and find your feet. Fortunately the first day is in-service day so at least I’ll have chance to see what classes I’m teaching and find my way about a bit but from Tuesday I have to be on it. I need to at least pretend I know what I’m doing from the very beginning or it’ll take months to get the kids to accept me. There are so many things to learn going to a new school. Every school seems to have a different way of doing things, from where the pencils are kept, to what you need to do to get a brew at break time! I know it’ll all be fine in a couple of weeks but for now, I’m really not looking forward to that aspect of starting my new job.
The only other thing then, that I’m trying not to worry about, is that my new job means that both me and Barry will be working on the other side of the Forth Road Bridge to where we live, and more importantly on the other side to Toby’s nursery. In severe weather the bridge can be closed, or if there is an accident or breakdown this can cause massive delays so I’m really worried in case we both get stuck on the wrong side of the bridge and we can’t collect Toby. Not having any family near by means there isn’t anyone we can call on in an emergency. At a push my friend Claire could probably get him but she has her own twins to look after too. Hopefully it will never come to that, but it doesn’t stop it being something that is going to sit at the back of my mind. Before having Toby I never would have thought that going to work could involve so much stress and worry.
So anyway, it’s going to be a big change for us all over the next few weeks, and I have a feeling that blogging is going to have to take a bit of a back seat for a while. Don’t worry though, I’ll still be around and I’ll try to post a few updates when I can. If anyone has any tips for combining a full-time job with being a mum then please do let me know, I think I’m going to need all the help I can get!
I’ve been on maternity leave for 13 months now – I’m a teacher and a conveniently timed pregnancy meant I started my maternity leave at the beginning of the summer holidays last year. It was always my intention to return to work after a year but I was only on a temporary contract before my maternity leave and unfortunately, although I was successfully interviewed there were no posts available for Modern Languages teachers in the council where I was working previously. In this council everyone has one interview with the council and then they allocate people to the available jobs, rather than the decisions being made by individual schools.
Staffing requirements can often change over the summer holidays which means a job may come up once the schools start back in a few weeks (and this is what has happened to me every other year I’ve been teaching) but this year, with childcare to organise, just hanging around and hoping something came up wasn’t ideal. I can go on the supply register, but again I wouldn’t be able to make myself available at short notice because of having to arrange someone to look after Toby. We don’t have any family nearby so it’s not like I can just ask my mum to pop up the 250 miles to look after Toby so I can go to work for a day!
Anyway, it was starting to look like I might not be going back to work after all. We told the nursery we wouldn’t be able to take up the place we’d reserved for Toby and after doing some sums we worked out that although we wouldn’t have a lot to spare, we could manage on just one wage. But then I saw jobs advertised in two schools in a different council. They were a bit further away than I’d like ideally but I had to take a chance and apply for them. I was selected for interview for both jobs and had the first one today….and they offered me the post!!
I’m very pleased to be going back to work – I love being at home with Toby but I’ve been surprised just how much I’ve missed my job over the last year. But it’s really scary to think that in two and a half weeks I’ll be back at work full time (Scottish schools go back mid-August). And even scarier is that my little baby boy is going to have to go to nursery full time in a couple of weeks too. Luckily the place was still available at the nursery we had chosen so he’ll be going there. He’ll be doing some settling in sessions very soon and I really hope he manages to get used to it quickly. 
I know, when I think about it logically, that nursery will be really good for Toby. He’ll get to socialise with other children, he’ll get to do so many more activities than he would if he was at home with me all the time…but but but…..I wish he didn’t have to go. Nobody has ever looked after him apart from me and his dad (apart from a couple of times when we’ve had babysitters while he’s been asleep) and I can’t imagine him spending more time with the nursery workers than he does with us. I feel so sad that someone else might witness his first steps, or his first proper words. I’m so worried that he’ll get upset and I won’t be there to comfort him. I feel like he’s too little to understand what’s going on, and I can’t explain to him why I can’t be there.
Toby woke up from his nap just after I got the call this afternoon to say I had got the job and I went upstairs and gave him a cuddle and I cried for all the cuddles I’m going to miss. I know, really, that I’m doing the right thing, and I’m sure Toby will love nursery soon enough. (And if our plans work out the way we hope it will only be for a year and then, hopefully, I’ll be on maternity leave again…and after that, who knows.) For now though I need to start organising and working out how I’m going to fit in all the chores around a full time job. And I’ve got two and half weeks to fit in as many cuddles as I can!
I’ve mentioned before that my work situation is a bit complicated. This is because I was on a temporary contract before maternity leave so I don’t have a job of my own to go back to. I will be given another post (teaching posts are allocated by the council here rather than schools recruiting their own teachers) but as yet I don’t know where or on what terms. I’m hoping to back to the school I was at before having Toby but that isn’t guaranteed. I am planning on going back to work in August (the start of the school year in Scotland) but I probably won’t find out anything about where I’ll be working until June. There is also a slight possibility that I could go back before the summer holidays and also a chance I might go back part-time instead of full time. Whenever I go back to work it’s getting to the time that we really need to start choosing childcare for Toby.
All this uncertainty makes arranging childcare a little tricky. We have had to make a start though because I don’t want to risk leaving it too late to get a place anywhere. So just before Christmas I started looking at local nurseries. I had considered a childminder but to be honest without any personal recommendations I didn’t really know how to go about finding one. And on reflection I think nursery will be good to help Toby’s social development and give him access to lots of different activities.
I asked some of my friends for recommendations of nurseries (and lots of them have kids who all went to the same one) and also looked at some other local options. Location is important as it need to be somewhere I can drop the hubby off at the train station, drop Toby off at nursery and then make my own way to work. I narrowed it down to a few options and arranged some visits. I liked the fact that most of the nurseries said I could visit without an appointment, that way you know you are seeing a true reflection of the place.
So off we went on our visits. To be honest I didn’t really know what I was looking for. Obviously somewhere, clean, with friendly staff, with plenty of resources, with happy, engaged children. I wanted somewhere where food was provided and cooked on the premises and very importantly, somewhere that would be happy to deal with Toby’s cloth nappies!
The first nursery we visited was the one recommended by lots of my friends. It is in a converted Victorian house so I felt that some of the rooms were quite small, but it was well-equipped and the staff were all very happy and friendly. I liked the fact they had a separate cot room for the younger children to have their naps and it met all my other criteria. My only slight reservation was that I saw two children playing in just their vests and nappies – I don’t know why it bothered me but it just seemed a bit odd that they didn’t have any other clothes on. So far so good, in fact the main drawback with this nursery is that it is very popular and they don’t know their availability for August yet, meaning we would have to go on a waiting list with no guarantee of a place.
The second nursery we went to look at was purpose built so it seemed to have more space. However, we went on Christmas Eve so the hubby could come too and so they only had 18 children in when usually they can have up to 89. I’m sure if we went back when it was full it wouldn’t seem so spacious! Again this one seemed fine but it hasn’t had great inspection reports in the past. Although the most recent report showed they had made improvements it still makes me a bit wary. I also didn’t like the fact that at this one there was no separate area for the children to sleep. If Toby’s current behaviour is anything to go by he needs his naps and I can’t imagine that he would sleep in a room with half the children still playing. So this one was pretty much crossed off the list.
The third and final nursery we visited (there was another one which had been recommended to me but they don’t have any spaces) I think is going to be the one we go for. It’s fairly new, having only been open a year or so and again is in a converted Victorian house. One of our NCT class babies has just started going there one day a week and he seems to be getting on fine so far. Again the staff were very friendly; the manager is a scout leader and as all my family are involved in scouting I always take this as a good sign! Food is prepared on the premises which is great, there is plenty of space (including a garden) and again they are happy to deal with the cloth nappies. I do want to go and have another look round before we commit to anything, this time really just focusing on the room Toby would go into. With all the nursery visits I found that there was a lot to take in, and although it’s important to look at the whole place, I’m not too concerned at the moment with what the older children are doing. The other benefit of this nursery (although not the deciding factor) is that it is £6 a day cheaper than the other one. I know I shouldn’t put a price on my child’s care, but over the year that is an awful lot of money. And it’s money that we can then use for things like days out and family holidays that we may not otherwise be able to afford.
It’s hard to imagine what my six month old baby will be like when he goes to nursery. He’ll have just turned one. Will he be walking by then? Maybe. Actually, that is quite important because it might affect which room he goes into. Most children move from the babies room to the toddlers at somewhere between 12 and 15 months, but it really depends when they are walking confidently. In a way I think it would be easier for Toby to go straight into the toddlers room to avoid to much changing about, but then I don’t want him to be intimidated by all the bigger kids. Anyway, I suppose that’s all stuff we can worry about nearer the time. For now I can’t imagine my little boy going to nursery at all. Let alone to have someone else looking after him for more of the week than I am. I would love to go back to work part time but full time just makes more sense at the moment. For one, it makes it more likely I will get my old job back, and secondly we are planning another baby quite soon (I know!!) so if I go back to work full time I’ll get full maternity pay.
So there we are. I think we’ve made our choice. How did you choose on childcare for your children? Is there anything I should have considered that I’ve forgotten about? Help me out, I’m new at this!