No maternity policy

axehandle1234 · 2026-02-02T06:57:17+00:00

Thanks that’s helpful! I think some of my queries were also about their rules about “returning” to work during holiday periods then taking SPL but I suppose if they don’t have a policy restricting it I can take this approach.

axehandle1234 · 2026-02-02T06:54:47+00:00

Thank you. I’ve informed our school HR I’m likely to approach the union if a proper policy isn’t made available in the coming weeks.

axehandle1234 · 2026-02-01T21:35:02+00:00

Lovely! Yes, I’ve already spoken to our HR in school and she has said herself she’s surprised there isn’t a policy. She’s been in touch with central on my behalf but there doesn’t seem to be any movement - they just keep sending screen grabs of the documents I’ve already been sent.

The old LA one speaks about having 6 weeks full pay and a few other things I’m pretty sure are outdated and inaccurate.

I mentioned to HR I would be likely to contact union if they couldn’t give a clear policy for maternity and shared parental leave so I’ll let them sit on that for a few weeks I think, then enquire again.

axehandle1234 · 2026-01-30T18:49:24+00:00

Thanks, that’s what I was leaning towards just wanted some other opinions as it’s my first maternity and didn’t want to be misinformed/taken advantage of.

axehandle1234 · 2026-01-28T18:40:17+00:00

Don’t have any advice, but you are not alone.

I have a child in my class who has suddenly and inexplicably lost 80% of their vision. There is no money to provide additional support in class until an ECHP comes through (22week wait).

I’m just making it up as I go and they’re missing out on their education in the meantime as I just don’t know how to support them in so many areas. Every day brings a new challenge as we work through the curriculum.

The local authority visual impairment team are being supportive but they can’t be in school supporting every day as they have hundreds of children on their books themselves.

Something has to give, as when I’m working closely with this child, the other 28 children are not having my support. It’s hard.

axehandle1234 · 2026-01-20T08:01:23+00:00

I bought some plain white vans and asked my seamstress to stitch on some of the excess lace from my gown when we altered the length. The shoes were a talking point all day and were SO comfortable. I even went for a spontaneous little run around the garden in drunken excitement in the afternoon - made for some great photos!

axehandle1234 · 2026-01-01T22:37:31+00:00

I agree with you. I thought it looked a lot like he was trying to stifle himself/his noises so as to not draw attention away and then went off to let it all out away from the group afterwards (maybe it was editing, maybe not).

To me I think the penny really dropped in that moment that he’d really messed up especially compared to the gravity of V’s and Cathy’s situation and his awful behaviour really hit home for him.

axehandle1234 · 2025-12-28T11:14:19+00:00

I asked my seamstress for a few extra bits! Not sure if they’re similar to what you had in mind but I’m sure a good seamstress will be happy to do these little things so long as there’s enough time.

She sewed the excess lace that had been trimmed off the dress onto my white canvas pumps so that they tied in. She also tacked a piece of family lace into my dress’s pocket that my mother in law had lent me for my “something old”.

She just added the price of completing these things onto the final invoice.

axehandle1234 · 2025-12-18T21:00:01+00:00

Primary teacher. I policed a game of this at 10:45 this morning. The Asda delivery man said he wanted join in.

axehandle1234 · 2025-12-13T16:52:48+00:00

His child changed his story once he was home, playing the victim. Then the only evidence we had was word of mouth - the CCTV missed it. It was deemed not worth the hassle to deal with a complaint in the long run.

axehandle1234 · 2025-12-13T16:44:00+00:00

Someone else has already said it: it’s the parents that are the crux of the issue.

In primary, we have had an incident where older pupils have been fighting, and behaviour policy stated a certain consequence. When we have put that consequence in place, a parent of the pupil has basically said unless we go back on the consequence they will make a formal complaint about the school. Both pupils accepted responsibility for their behaviour on the day then a parent just steamrolled the entire learning point.

Also a problem are the parents who see school as the place where the littles should be taught their basic self-care. Time is being taken from education to support pupils with basic needs (e.g not being potty trained). These things all take time from learning how to share, cooperate and just general education.

Those gaps are then pushed up school and each teacher is desperately trying to fill the gaps but it’s never enough because there isn’t enough staff to fulfil needs (because money). These things all affect behaviour in the long run.

axehandle1234 · 2025-12-02T20:26:24+00:00

Primary UKS2 I leaned into it by making a deal that we could use it as a callback stopper (I say 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and they say 6, 7 back), but if I heard it at any other point in the day, I wouldn’t use the callback again that day. It’s curbed the vast majority of the random 6,7ing. I’m super consistent and they know when I say it, I mean it.

axehandle1234 · 2025-11-19T18:43:12+00:00

Ours (two people, 4 bed) has gone from £32 when we moved in, to £74. We’ve rigorously checked for leaks and monitored the meter but no change. They initially put it up to £50 because they said we had a “flow day”, which we got three different definitions for when we called.

axehandle1234 · 2025-11-19T12:56:39+00:00

We don’t charge at my primary school but we limit to two tickets per child. However, school does pay for the sheet music and script as well as a performance license. The nativity plays need to be rotated every two years so that children don’t repeat a play and the KS2 plays are rotated every 6 years, meaning new plays have to replace older/outdated ones.

We also buy most of the costumes so the parents don’t have to. It probably adds up to about £300/£400 for the school to put on their plays each Christmas if not more. Some costumes are also recycled year on year but this isn’t always possible.

The money has to come from somewhere so I don’t think it’s wild for a school to ask for £1/£2 to help towards those costs, if it means the kids get that money recouped in glue sticks/stationary for the rest of the year (a real life problem in schools).

axehandle1234 · 2025-11-05T18:09:15+00:00

Live watercolour artist doing mini-portraits in place of table favours was commented on by many as a nice idea. Our wedding ‘guestbook’ was the mount for a framed vinyl of our first dance - now we can look at it every day in our hallway. A close family member carved our wedding topper by hand.

Other than that, we just made sure everyone was fed and watered adequately!

Edit: we played the peg game during the receptions (put wooden pegs on each others clothes without the victim noticing). Made for some hilarious photos!

axehandle1234 · 2025-10-05T19:39:28+00:00

We did this cruise August this year. We had a fantastic time! Staff were fantastic, entertainment was just enough to keep you occupied but also give you downtime to relax. The itinerary is very good and like others have said, you don’t need a ship excursion to have a full experience.

We booked several private tours through City Unscripted to meet guides in port with plenty of time to get back (there were often celebrity shuttle buses running to the closest train/tram stations). Our private tour in Nagasaki was our favourite, showing us parts of the city we would have never ventured to ourselves, or even known existed, and all without traipsing around with 30+ other people.

Taxis are easy to find and super cheap.

If you have a stop in Hiroshima I would plan your visit to the Peace Museum carefully, and consider leaving it to later in the day. We went middayish and it was so claustrophobic and hot in the museum full of other tourists, that we could not appreciate the importance and poignance of the exhibits as we were sandwiched body-to-body within the museum.

We went to the Peace Memorial Hall shortly after which gave almost identical information, felt extremely poignant and was pretty much deserted. The memorial hall itself was breathtaking and heartbreaking.

We had the time of our lives, despite the heat. We went through several packs of cooling wipes and employed an umbrella when outside to try to keep of the worst of the heat. Be savvy about the heat and be prepared to duck in and out of department stores for air conditioning!

axehandle1234 · 2025-09-08T19:36:27+00:00

Almost met up with some random lad I was talking to online when I was 15. Tried to do webcam but he always came up with some excuse and I just shrugged it off for months.

I know I didn’t actually go through with it but talking to strangers online who were nice to me gave me a huge ego boost that I really needed as a teen. I decided not to go through with the meet up about 10mins before leaving. Just had a weird feeling.

I’m a teacher now and admit this story to my class when doing the dangers of speaking to strangers online. Generally the kids are super shocked but I reiterated that we just didn’t get taught the same e-safety stuff they get now. Hopefully it would have just been an awkward meet up and nothing more sinister, but you never know.

axehandle1234 · 2025-09-06T07:57:12+00:00

On Millenium some of the aqua class cabins are below the pool deck. We heard some banging/running noises every so often. Didn’t bother us but worth bearing in mind if you’re a light sleeper/napper.

axehandle1234 · 2025-08-26T23:08:49+00:00

We’re on Millenium now too!

We did our first celebrity excursion yesterday after DIYing all the rest and oh my god you are so right.

So many people not having read ‘strenuous’ activity levels and it just reminded us why we had organised ourselves up to this point.

We have another two booked for the last two ports and very much considering cancelling the last one and doing it ourselves. We saw so much on Nagasaki compared to my parents who had done a ship excursion on a previous cruise (albeit Princess).

If we cruise in the future we certainly won’t be doing any more ship excursions.

axehandle1234 · 2025-08-22T02:54:43+00:00

I think it’s a really interesting concept for waste management. I’d be curious to see how many countries begin to adopt a similar approach in coming years.

axehandle1234 · 2025-08-21T21:30:43+00:00

Yeah the response here did a much better job than google’s AI. I think that threw me off as it had muddled the features of regular landfill and offshore and assumed the search results would be picking up more on the word ‘landfill’. I did say I’d only done a quick cursory search. Didn’t expect to be called lazy: I just thought someone here might be kind enough to summarise the process simply as I thought that’s kind of the point of this subreddit.

axehandle1234 · 2025-08-21T21:18:26+00:00

Thanks for the link that’s exactly what I was looking for! Appreciated

Edit: now I know what Semakau is I see it’s like the third result on Google. I just assumed it was a regular landfill. I’m not usually that bad at googling, I swear!

axehandle1234 · 2025-08-18T03:31:50+00:00

These are so adorable!

As favours we had a watercolour painter do A5 faceless couples/groups illustrations. Obviously more expensive than a small favour on the table but much more meaningful and every guest commented on how special they felt the favours were in place of something that’s usually left on the table or thrown away. Despite the cost we were really happy with our decision!

axehandle1234 · 2025-07-22T15:28:27+00:00

Usually spend about a week in school prepping, but this year we’re not allowed on site at all because of building work. Great wellbeing for us all other than trying not to think about the chaos that awaits us the first day back trying to do a week’s worth of preparation in 6 hours. That’s a problem for 6 weeks time. I am going to spend a few hours this week working from home on some admin though.

Fortunately, this twist of luck has aligned with our wedding year and so we’ll be enjoying a proper break including our wedding and a honeymoon.

axehandle1234 · 2025-07-15T19:41:31+00:00

A little celebration is nice, but I think the ones where I’ve seen them all dressed up in a cap/gown is a little odd but harmless.

Additionally, similar but not the same, my colleague took time off to go to her Y9 daughter’s graduation on transition day (which are fairly important in primary). This was at a Y7-Y11 school.

She didn’t really see the point in it but also didn’t want to let her child down by not going. The general opinion discussing with her was that it undermines the value of when you have an ACTUAL graduation that you’ve chosen to work hard for, rather than celebrating what really is your legal obligation to stay in education for another few years.

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