Emily, offer to share a nanny - CT18 Newington

Hi there! We have recently moved to Folkestone and moved into a house on Frogholt (which is both a street and a vague area). We're looking for help, ideally both with nannying at our house and helping with housework

We have three beautiful kids - Hazel (18 months), Charlie (3) and Florence (5). Florence has autism (like her parents :) - she has a relatively rare form of autism called 'autism with an expression of pathological demand avoidance'

This requires a particular type of approach to minimise her masking and keep her out of her threat system - it's called 'low demand parenting' but you could also interpret it as 'don't try to teach them anything, or get them to help you, and keep discipline to the bare minimum - just when safety is involved'. This is a long way away from the approaches we thought we'd be taking as parents (and indeed the way that we tried for the first 3-4 years of her life)

Florence is an incredibly kind, caring and funny child. She is a gestalt language processor, which means she doesn't learn words individually but in chunks as big as whole sentences, which she often copies (accent included) from TV. When she was younger she had a language and speech delay but she's very communicative now (as long as you're not asking her a question or to do something!)

Low demand parenting also involves letting them have what they want (with surprisingly few boundaries), which includes TV - so there's no expectation that a childminder would keep them occupied all the time without it

Charlie is a cheeky chappy who has a ready grin and adores his older sister - the jury is very much still out on his younger sister however. He's pretty good with her and can even be caring at times - but he's definitely testing out the 'I'm bigger than you' thing

Hazel is false advertising for children - she has been zero hassle whatsoever, she is very easy to love, goes down for her nap without a grumble, and is thrilled with any amount of attention

We'd want someone who'd be comfortable getting them all in the wet weather gear and spending time out even when it's a bit grey and mizzly (though zero compulsion when the rain is actually coming down)

What we're looking for is two days a week, we're very flexible on times but something like 5-6 hours a day would be ideal. If you would be interested in also helping us with our housework, we would be happy to extend that to 7 hours a day, with 2 hours on tidying and cleaning (or cooking if that's something you enjoy doing) and 5 hours on childcare. EJ is a stay-at-home mum, and Luke works most days from home

Let us know if you'd be interested in talking and organising a visit to the house. We are set in an old listed cottage in 1.5 acres of land, which includes many trees, a driveway they can bike / scoot on, a lot of grass on several different lawns, several sheds and a stream (which Florence and Hazel love playing in, while Charlie is still getting convinced)

Thank you, Luke & EJ