I am still undecided about the job offer, I spoke to them yesterday and said I would give them a decision by Tuesday. I was hoping looking at the daycare centres would help me be more comfortable with the idea of leaving JB... unfortunately not.

We looked at one daycare yesterday which is a national organisation which looks fantastic from the outside and it is just around the corner from us.. but was so disapointing. I am not sure if my expectations are out of wack or if this place was genuinely bad. The room where JB would be was so small! There were 10 kids there and two staff, there was not a great range of toys there at all, and what there was were dirty. They were doing fingerpainting when we were looking around and it was like a production line, with no real creativity for the kids, and the woman was not very enthusiastic about it or gave much praise to the kids. The diaper change had no mat on it and that looked grubby and there were no sinks at the kids level.. Am I asking too much?

Today we looked at another one which was much better. It is hard to really get a great feel for the place as it is currently being renovated. However, the main thing that stood out was that there were a lot of toys, they were clean and neatly organised. Every age group had their own outdoor space and they had good sun cover and again lots of toys. The children had little beds to sleep in as opposed to mats on the floor as in the previous centre. We have put JB on the waiting list and he is in the top 10.

I have one more centre to see on Tuesday morning, but I am really happy with the one we saw today... it is more of a case of timing now.. if the new employer can wait for me to secure a childcare place.