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[[::Stev0::]]

Am I allowed to gate-crash this thread as a 1st time grandparent? Our daughter just gave birth yesterday to a beautiful baby girl, and I'm now feeling really old at the ripe old age of 54.

I'm sure that we will be providing a mix of financial support, free childcare and a wide range of both welcome and unwanted gifts ( ) for the forseeable future.

Congratulations!

My Dad is an old school Dad; man of few words and very proud, but since becoming a Grandad 5 years ago he's a gooey mess. Apparently it's very different. Enjoy every minute

 

[dav3evans]

You're still a Dad! Just don't let the Grand-ness of your new title go to your head

Congrats! As someone who would be lost without the backup of the Grandparents, thank you for your service!

 

[TommyV]

Am I allowed to gate-crash this thread as a 1st time grandparent? Our daughter just gave birth yesterday to a beautiful baby girl, and I'm now feeling really old at the ripe old age of 54.

I'm sure that we will be providing a mix of financial support, free childcare and a wide range of both welcome and unwanted gifts ( ) for the forseeable future.

Congratulations!!!

 

[fez]

Congratulations!

My Dad is an old school Dad; man of few words and very proud, but since becoming a Grandad 5 years ago he's a gooey mess. Apparently it's very different. Enjoy every minute

I think a lot of parents came from the age of hard knock parenting, especially for the dad who wasn't super hands on and his job was sports. Now they don't have jobs and pressures on them they are magically happy fun grandparents who think its brilliant to spoil your children in ways that would have been unthinkable when they were parents themselves.

 

[Priapus]

11000000%. People go on about childcare as a pure expense; but my girl has benefited so much from "renting full time adult attention" in an environment that is fun, safe; and they feed her. I wouldn't accept a salary equal to what I pay my childcare provider to do what they do; I just couldn't compete even.

100% agree. I am also comparing the service to what we had in South Africa. South African daycares are pretty good. But from what I have seen here, my son is getting so much more value out of it. We also used to have to supply consumables - here we don't.

So yeah, it's stupid expensive; but imho it is worth it and very important for their younger years.

 

[TommyV]

Eldest Daughter turns 2 tomorrow. Honestly, where does the time go????

My phone compiled a ‘one year ago’ thing for my photos, it’s already hard to remember her at that age and all her mannerisms etc at that time. Madness!

 

[TommyV]

I think a lot of parents came from the age of hard knock parenting, especially for the dad who wasn't super hands on and his job was sports. Now they don't have jobs and pressures on them they are magically happy fun grandparents who think its brilliant to spoil your children in ways that would have been unthinkable when they were parents themselves.

This 100%, it is indeed expensive but invaluable from a developmental perspective in so many ways.

My elder daughter was taking her sweet time to start her walking, within 2 weeks at nursery she had it nailed!

 

[theone8181]

I didn't mind sending the kids to nursery although it was expensive. I think someone owning the business was making a lot though as most of the workers seem to be on minimum wage, when they were in the oldest group it was something like 50 quid a day and 5 kids to an adult. This was a few years ago before the extra hours came in, but I don't know how much you'd have to earn to make it worthwhile without the free hours.

 

[Priapus]

Talking of grandparents; we had the in-laws round the other day and they mentioned they don't get to take Logan much. We told them all they had to do was literally just ask and we'd happily let them take him for the weekend or day etc.

We have not asked them to take him much, because we don't want to feel like we are taking advantage or something. But maybe some grandparents really do want to see their grandchildren more and spend more time with them - wasn't that way when I was younger.

 

[t2na]

Talking of grandparents; we had the in-laws round the other day and they mentioned they don't get to take Logan much. We told them all they had to do was literally just ask and we'd happily let them take him for the weekend or day etc.

We have not asked them to take him much, because we don't want to feel like we are taking advantage or something. But maybe some grandparents really do want to see their grandchildren more and spend more time with them - wasn't that way when I was younger.

It feels like the other way round for us, we joke between us that both our parents are very much grandparents at their own convenience.

I wonder if it's partly because my own grandparents were retired so much younger than my parents (my dad has only retired this year, my wife's parents retired two years back) so we spent so much time with them as they'd already been retired for 5/10 years by the time they became grandparents - whereas our parents are retiring around the same time as us having kids.

 

[fez]

I didn't mind sending the kids to nursery although it was expensive. I think someone owning the business was making a lot though as most of the workers seem to be on minimum wage, when they were in the oldest group it was something like 50 quid a day and 5 kids to an adult. This was a few years ago before the extra hours came in, but I don't know how much you'd have to earn to make it worthwhile without the free hours.

I think you would be surprised. Ours runs from 7 til 6 I believe so 11 hours. They are buying in a lot of crap for the kids to play with, equipment etc. Most people don't send their kids in 5 days a week so you have to try and sort staffing levels out based on a massive variance in attendance so its probably hard to be efficient with staffing. I imagine the staff get sick quite a bit as well. Then you have the building cost, the utilities costs.

I don't think they make much money at all. If you want to make money you open an old peoples home. Now thats good money.

---

Went to a soft play with our 19 months old for the first time and they literally just ran laps for about an hour and a bit on a slide. Up the "stairs" and down the slide. Repeat. Had a wonderful time. They were some of the smallest there and struggled a bit with the stairs but they were mad for it. Was lovely to see.

 

[ci_newman]

I think you would be surprised. Ours runs from 7 til 6 I believe so 11 hours. They are buying in a lot of crap for the kids to play with, equipment etc. Most people don't send their kids in 5 days a week so you have to try and sort staffing levels out based on a massive variance in attendance so its probably hard to be efficient with staffing. I imagine the staff get sick quite a bit as well. Then you have the building cost, the utilities costs.

I don't think they make much money at all. If you want to make money you open an old peoples home. Now thats good money.

---

Went to a soft play with our 19 months old for the first time and they literally just ran laps for about an hour and a bit on a slide. Up the "stairs" and down the slide. Repeat. Had a wonderful time. They were some of the smallest there and struggled a bit with the stairs but they were mad for it. Was lovely to see.

I actually miss my kids being able to go on the softplay (too old now). Watching their mindless play and excitement is quite enjoyable

 

[Dis86]

Snot.

Everywhere. Yuk.

 

[alchal]

Snot.

Everywhere. Yuk.

Best part is when they share the slime, or ask you to pick their nose for them...

 

[theone8181]

I think you would be surprised. Ours runs from 7 til 6 I believe so 11 hours. They are buying in a lot of crap for the kids to play with, equipment etc. Most people don't send their kids in 5 days a week so you have to try and sort staffing levels out based on a massive variance in attendance so its probably hard to be efficient with staffing. I imagine the staff get sick quite a bit as well. Then you have the building cost, the utilities costs.

I don't think they make much money at all. If you want to make money you open an old peoples home. Now thats good money.

---

Went to a soft play with our 19 months old for the first time and they literally just ran laps for about an hour and a bit on a slide. Up the "stairs" and down the slide. Repeat. Had a wonderful time. They were some of the smallest there and struggled a bit with the stairs but they were mad for it. Was lovely to see.

I've heard they are very expensive for what you get. Ironically not that dissimilar to a nursery in some ways.

I quite enjoyed going on the soft play with the kids (the bigger multiple tier versions), of course now they are bigger we can do different stuff together like laser quest, or (as a trip away next year), the Legoland/Chessington combo. They enjoy competitive things.

 

[RobDogDog]

Our childminder, who the twins loved, shut up shop so we had to move them to preschool.

The times are less but they've been massively struggling towards the second half of the day. We've had numerous phone calls saying could we pick them up early as they couldn't get them to settle. Soon as we got them on the way home they'd be fine. We're going to do half days until Christmas and they try to incrementally up their time again. I just can't be dealing with not knowing if I need to go and pick them up as it just messes me around with work. We had a couple of rough nights recently too where they just wouldn't settle (snot and coughs).

Genuinely think I had an anxiety attack earlier in the week as felt like things were just getting on top of me. Since then, I've ticked off quite a few things on my to-do list which has helped bring me down again.

 

[Freefaller]

Talking of grandparents; we had the in-laws round the other day and they mentioned they don't get to take Logan much. We told them all they had to do was literally just ask and we'd happily let them take him for the weekend or day etc.

We have not asked them to take him much, because we don't want to feel like we are taking advantage or something. But maybe some grandparents really do want to see their grandchildren more and spend more time with them - wasn't that way when I was younger.

I send my eldest away to France to spend time with my mother. She asked so I was delighted. It's a good grounding experience for my eldest but also learning to cope without all your children around you.

That said I prefer being with my kids as much as possible.

 

[fez]

The times are less but they've been massively struggling towards the second half of the day. We've had numerous phone calls saying could we pick them up early as they couldn't get them to settle. Soon as we got them on the way home they'd be fine. We're going to do half days until Christmas and they try to incrementally up their time again. I just can't be dealing with not knowing if I need to go and pick them up as it just messes me around with work. We had a couple of rough nights recently too where they just wouldn't settle (snot and coughs).

Genuinely think I had an anxiety attack earlier in the week as felt like things were just getting on top of me. Since then, I've ticked off quite a few things on my to-do list which has helped bring me down again.

How old are your two? Ours tend to sleep 2-3 hours, sometimes more in the day when they are at home. At nursery? 25-75 minutes is standard. They are cream crackered when they get home. As you say though, its a nightmare when you have to keep collecting them half way through your day. I have both boys at home today because they have the squits and nursery would just send them home and then not want them back on another day they should be in nursery. Luckily their grandad is coming over this afternoon but I would genuinely have missed about 20 days work over the past 8 months they have been at nursery (only in 2 days a week as well) if it wasn't for grandparents and my flexible working from home.

Its a nightmare.

I've heard they are very expensive for what you get. Ironically not that dissimilar to a nursery in some ways.

Care homes are insane. Think thousands a week potentially and yet again, paying their staff minimum wage.

 

[RobDogDog]

How old are your two? Ours tend to sleep 2-3 hours, sometimes more in the day when they are at home. At nursery? 25-75 minutes is standard. They are cream crackered when they get home. As you say though, its a nightmare when you have to keep collecting them half way through your day. I have both boys at home today because they have the squits and nursery would just send them home and then not want them back on another day they should be in nursery. Luckily their grandad is coming over this afternoon but I would genuinely have missed about 20 days work over the past 8 months they have been at nursery (only in 2 days a week as well) if it wasn't for grandparents and my flexible working from home.

Its a nightmare.




Care homes are insane. Think thousands a week potentially and yet again, paying their staff minimum wage.

3 in April. I think the environment is good for them, but not for 6 hours.

At least we have a plan now. My wife and I are in agreement too which helps.

 

[fez]

3 in April. I think the environment is good for them, but not for 6 hours.

At least we have a plan now. My wife and I are in agreement too which helps.

Yeah nursery is great for their development and learning social skills. Our boys need to learn that not everyone likes/tolerates being generally beaten up and climbed on all the time. Both of them are so used to it that they think other kids won't care either.

We have ours in from about 7:30 - 16:30 on a Friday and 7:30 - 15:30 on a Wednesday so its a long day for them but they absolutely love it. One of them just says bub bye and toddles off when we get there and the other one is always happy to go. They got very grumpy this morning when they realised they weren't going