School Hols – how to balance work etc.

I prefer to beleive that we are in our situation through hard work and planning and not ‘random chance’

False dichotomy.

How did you get to such a lofty station in life with such poor communication skills?

Luck obviously

I prefer to beleive that we are in our situation through hard work and planning and not ‘random chance’. I have never said i havent had ‘luck’

Luck and random chance are the same thing.

It is not belittling your wife’s hard work to say that luck is involved. Of course it’s not. I acknowledged in the first place that you need hard work AND luck. But we’re all fortunate to be born in a stable prosperous country with good opportunities for most people, and not born to die of malnutrition aged 3 or be chopped up by machete-wielding militias.

You need to remember that, and be thankful for it. Sorry to be didactic about it but I do feel strongly.

But we’re all fortunate to be born in a stable prosperous country with good opportunities for most people, and not born to die of malnutrition aged 3 or be chopped up by machete-wielding militias.

Yes, and within that stable, prosperous country, I was born to parents who wanted me and provided a secure home, cared about my welfare and education, and supported me through university. Without that background, it’s very unlikely I would find myself in my current, comfortable situation.

If that’s not luck, I don’t know what is.

Yes, and within that stable, prosperous country, I was born to parents who wanted me and provided a secure home, cared about my welfare and education, and supported me through university. Without that background, it’s very unlikely I would find myself in my current, comfortable situation.

If that’s not luck, I don’t know what is.

Did your parents make a ‘choice’ to live in this country or leave it to random chance?

Summed up perfectly ransos! Just some of the many pieces of good fortune we all encounter on a daily basis. Call it luck, if you believe it exists, of course.

Though some have the good grace to acknowledge it, with a quiet thank you to God/Allah/Karma/The cosmos/the tooth fairy, and others think that its all down to their own undisputed, grandiose genius, boundless talent, and faultless decision making. And all these people seem to consider it an almost religious, evangelical mission to let the rest of the world know that if only we were all just, well…. just more like them……..

I’ve met a thousand of the latter. Unfortunately. Now I’ve encountered one more 🙄

Summed up perfectly ransos! Just some of the many pieces of good fortune we all encounter on a daily basis. Call it luck, if you believe it exists, of course.

Though some have the good grace to acknowledge it, with a quiet thank you to God/Allah/Karma/The cosmos/the tooth fairy, and others think that its all down to their own undisputed, grandiose genius, boundless talent, and faultless decision making. And all these people seem to consider it an almost religious, evangelical mission to let the rest of the world know that if only we were all more like them……..

I’ve met a thousand of the latter. Unfortunately. Now I’ve encountered one more

Lucky you

Did your parents make a ‘choice’ to live in this country or leave it to random chance?

What about my grandparents? And my great grandparents – don’t forget those.

deadlydarcy – Member
Kryton, how do you feel about starting this thread now?

Quite proud so far. I’m wondering if there’s a possiblity it’ll make it into the classics before it gets locked….. 😉

Late to this but…

Lady Gresley – Member
cinnamon_girl – Member
My adult kids know full well that if they have kids then the last person they would ask to babysit would be me. After all, I do have a bike to ride!

+1
First world problem – parents want kids, but don’t want to give up doing what they want to do, and have to look after their own kids. Not a dig at OP, just modern day parents in general

It’s a first world problem because we make it one. Perhaps by caring more for grandchildren, you may build a relationship where taking an interest and putting effort into your wellbeing when you are older may be important to them. ..? Isn’t life about caring for one another…?

Summed up perfectly ransos! Just some of the many pieces of good fortune we all encounter on a daily basis. Call it luck, if you believe it exists, of course.

Thanks. You only have to look at the life prospects for children taken into care to see how it could all be so very different.

jamj1974 – Member
Late to this but…

Lady Gresley – Member
cinnamon_girl – Member
My adult kids know full well that if they have kids then the last person they would ask to babysit would be me. After all, I do have a bike to ride!
+1
First world problem – parents want kids, but don’t want to give up doing what they want to do, and have to look after their own kids. Not a dig at OP, just modern day parents in general

Not true. 40 years ago, my parents worked 5 jobs between them and I rarely saw my father until the age of 7-8*. My kids see me twice a day every working day, and my wife spends two working days a week with them. We share many activities over the weekend – and we have one job each. My kids are far better off in that respect than I was. Yes one of us could give up work yet we’d be poorer for it in all respects. I’d like to feel that we have achieved a balance which gives my kids more opportunity than I ever had tbh.

*Its possible thats this is why I don’t have a relationship with my parents now – go figure.

Did your parents make a ‘choice’ to live in this country or leave it to random chance?

Mine didn’t. Pure chance.

Ranson …. binners anything else to say before I tootle off, feel free to resort to insults it would appear to be the mainstay of your posts.

feel free to resort to insults it would appear to be the mainstay of your posts.

No thanks, I’m trying to achieve 205 posts on here….

176 – Page 6

It’s only through hard graft that we’ll get this onto 205 for the OP.

It’s a first world problem because we make it one. Perhaps by caring more for grandchildren, you may build a relationship where taking an interest and putting effort into your wellbeing when you are older may be important to them. ..? Isn’t life about caring for one another…?

Bollox. Am happy to build a relationship, one that excludes having grandkids dumped on me and being used.

I would suggest that you folk open your eyes and realise that ‘mature’ people are having a ball ie travelling the world, holidays, interests such as riding a bike. The days of a ‘small world’ mentality that revolves only around family is well and truly over.

🙂

feel free to resort to insults it would appear to be the mainstay of your posts.

If you think these are insulting the you’ve led a very sheltered life. But I suppose that’s just the luck of the draw! 😉

Incidentally, what does a yummy mummy like yourself do with the day? Do you nip down to the local coffee shop for frappachino and cake with the girls, before a spot of exercise?….

I’m just interested, as it obviously makes you very pleased with yourself happy

Ranson …. binners anything else to say before I tootle off, feel free to resort to insults it would appear to be the mainstay of your posts.

If you think you’re being insulted then I assume that your comprehension skills are as lacking as your communication skills. Either that, or you’re playing the victim because the debate isn’t going your way.

Either that, or you’re playing the victim because the debate isn’t going your way.

Unlucky, that.

deadlydarcy – Member
176 – Page 6

It’s only through hard graft that we’ll get this onto 205 for the OP.

Only if this thread is lucky …

cinnamon_girl – Member

I would suggest that you folk open your eyes and realise that ‘mature’ people are having a ball ie travelling the world, holidays, interests such as riding a bike. The days of a ‘small world’ mentality that revolves only around family is well and truly over.

Thats a sweeping generalisation. Some of choose your so called small world mentality, some dont. I’ve done my around the world trips, Dinner at Michel Rouge’s etc etc etc and myself and my wife CHOSE to get in the family way at this time of our lifes.

Some, (presumably like you) have chosen not to, but each to thier own.

double post.

We need 206 now, damn…

Ooooh…unlucky Kryton!

Thats a sweeping generalisation.

😆

🙄

I would suggest that you folk open your eyes and realise that ‘mature’ people are having a ball ie travelling the world, holidays, interests such as riding a bike. The days of a ‘small world’ mentality that revolves only around family is well and truly over.

My parents did a lot of that. They’ve scaled back though because they prefer to spend more time with their granddaughter.

Of course those with the time and money to do what you describe are very fortunate indeed.

Back on topic (sorry – how dull)

Somehow you manage to cover all the holidays, but don’t just concentrate on the ‘big’ summer one, I find its the half terms ones that come up quick and catch me out.

I work part time so have x2 none work days, and take 1 days annual leave. Husband takes 1 day leave a week and his mum also does one day.
We *just* about cover most of the school holidays this way, and manage to squeeze a 2 week family holiday in August.

However we have run out of leave before after the xmas hols depending on when the bank hols fall and the length of the break, sometimes it under 2 weeks and sometimes its nearer to 3. So have used kids clubs and/or friends.

You make friends with other parents in the playground and your kids friends parents when arranging after school play so utilise these contacts.
Who-ever you use for afterschool care on the days your wife works (I assume she will be doing full days??) will often offer holiday clubs too.

As someone else said when he (or her)is little a lot of the kids clubs might be a bit overwhelming to begin with as they are a lot of older 8-10 kids. My son goes into after school club once a week and when he started school he was only just 4 and found it way to much and hated it, but started to really like it after a couple of months and now loves it.

cinnamon_girl – Member
Bollox. Am happy to build a relationship, one that excludes having grandkids dumped on me and being used.
I would suggest that you folk open your eyes and realise that ‘mature’ people are having a ball ie travelling the world, holidays, interests such as riding a bike. The days of a ‘small world’ mentality that revolves only around family is well and truly over.

I don’t ‘use’ my parent for caring – in fact she doesn’t take the children out more than twice a year and at her instigation, let alone looking after children in the holidays… When my children spend time with Grandma, we as parents are there too.

I was simply suggesting that a more cross-generational approach to family life is positive for all. How you spend your time is your business, I wasn’t commenting on that.

Kryton. We use a blend of holiday, parental leave, unpaid leave, holiday clubs and a very tiny amount of WFH. Occasionally we share the responsibility with my BIL and even more occasionally my brother (& partner) or mum take them out for a day.

Oh and Bernard, one of my parents chose to live here and another has been here as long as we can trace back. Choose to acknowledge it or not, but chance has had it’s hand in your current circumstance for good or ill. It’s not entirely your fault or due entirely to your application.

Unpaid/Parental leave huh? I’ll ask my employer about that – we do have a policy but it seems to be for “emergencies”.

Oh and Bernard, one of my parents chose to live here and another has been here as long as we can trace back. Choose to acknowledge it or not, but chance has had it’s hand in your current circumstance for good or ill. It’s not entirely your fault or due entirely to your application

I did right near the begining of this

No, you misunderstand. I’m not trying to say anything about you personally. What I mean is that to do well, you need an element of luck. Or if you prefer, you need to avoid bad luck.
I’ve not said people succeed ONLY because of luck. But you need good luck AND hard work, as I said earlier. Some need more luck than others, some need to work harder than others

maybe I have, as above the original post was ‘ you are lucky you can afford to ‘ I hear this alot and as I said it gets on my tit’s it would imply the reason for our cicumstances is down to ‘luck’ it is not, not once did I say I have never had luck but theoveriding reason we are in the position is due to the efforts mentioed before. I will not repeat them because certain individuals appear to take offence at this and throw accusations around about my intentions.

See I said I had misunderstood what Molgrips was saying and I said I had not been clear in what I had said (due to poor language skills apparently)the bit in bold I should have put in my original post. The discussion with Molgrips was interesting though.

Kryton – its worth asking them. When I started my present job I hadn’t accrued enough leave to take much time off in the summer holidays with the girls. As I was fairly new, I’d convinced myself that they were bound to take a dim view of taking unpaid leave. When I finally got enough courage to say ‘sod it!’, and just ask them, they were fine with it, and said it was no problem at all.

I then seized the moment to take that a bit further and asked if I could change my working hours so that I could do the school run a couple of times a week as well. They were fine with that too.

So… you never know til you ask. They can only say no. Actually they could engineer your immediate redundancy, but its unlikely 😀

Obviously this sense of selfless sacrifice by me, for the benefit of my offspring, is worthy of suitable admiration by everybody. I’ve even thought about writing a book, advising other parents about how they should conduct their childcare duties, as I’m clearly a lot better at it than most. Its all about hard work and planning, and it seems wrong to deprive other admittedly less worthy people of my wisdom 😉

binners – Member
….as I’m clearly a lot better at it than most. Its all about hard work and planning

No luck involved then? 😉

Seriously, I will ask. I do have the added problem / benefit of working in a sales role whereby all leave in “last month of the quarter” is likely not approved – therefore its in theit interest to let me have August off work 🙂

It’s only through luck and a bit of hard graft that we’ll get this onto 205 for the OP.

Are we nearly there yet ? 🙂

Nearly…

Btw its 206 as I double posted earlier – 1 doesn’t count.

I will add another one, having just read my original post I now realise what all the furore was about… 😳

molgrips – Member
Part of it is luck. If you are born with the aptitude to do well in something that pays well, that is fortune. Plenty of people work their fingers to the bone and still can’t earn enough to buy a house on two salaries never mind one.

I know how lucky I am that my wife does not have to work. Even though it would help a lot if she did.

Anyway this is a stupid argument. The OP did not plan, he knows this. So why are you queuing up to berate him for it? Are you trying to act like parents to a wayward child or something? OP is an adult. What are you expecting? The OP to issue a statement of surrender admitting that you are better than him? Would that make you feel warm and fuzzy inside?

bernard – Member
Mole grips…rubbish, she worked f..ing hard all through school, uni, job to get where she is. And as for the rest of your post I past no judgment on the op’s position or stated that I am in anyway better than him. So you can politely stick your post where the sun does not shine if any of it is directed at me.

I’m holding my hands up to my post being ill judged, red mist must have desended and I did not fully comprehend what Molgrips had said can’t even remember reading the bit about other people working etc

What I should have said was

‘Mole grips she worked f..ing hard all through school, uni, job to get where she is and I beleive the overriding reason she has acheived what she has and we are in the position we are in is due to hard work and planning’ When people say ‘you are lucky to be in that position’ the impression I get is they beleive luck played the major part and the hard work/planning is not recognised

And as for the rest of your post I past no judgment on the op’s position or stated that I am in anyway better than him. So you can politely stick your post where the sun does not shine if any of it is directed at me

In summary I agree with molgrips, I have poor language skills, it has however proved entertaining oh and I think binners is an arse

I think binners is an arse

😀 😯

That’s unfortunate. And quite hurtful, if I’m honest. But your certainly not alone in your opinion. Or wrong, for that matter.

I was going to ask you if you fancied nipping out for a pint later? Fancy it?

[Quote]I think binners is an arse[/quote]

That’s the nicest thing I’ve ever read about him. 😀