NewsletterJanuary 2026

Happy New Year!

We wish you all a very Happy New Year and we hope you all had an enjoyable Christmas time with your families and friends. Firstly, another thank you for all your very kind Christmas gifts for the staff team – everyone was very touched by your generosity. Also, a big thank you to all the children who took part in our Christmas dressing-up day too – the nursery was full of festive costumes and the children had a lovely day. We enjoyed Christmas lunch and our Christmas party on 23rd December was great fun – Kat Plimmer (she also runs our Millfield sports sessions each week) came along to provide the entertainment with her disco and great fun party games. Santa also paid us a visit!
A big welcome to all the new families who have joined Millfield in December and January. We hope you will all have a happy time here with us!

Winter Weather

Just for information for all the new families who have joined Millfield recently. As the winter is now upon us, John always
endeavours to keep the Millfield car park and nursery paths as safe as possible for all who use the premises – we do have
a supply of rock salt. The remainder of the car park may remain icy in places, so please do be extra careful during
periods of extremely icy weather. We do try to ensure that Millfield remains open during periods of bad weather as we
are aware of the impact our closure would have on working parents. If the weather happens to turn very severe during the
operational day, we may contact parents to suggest an earlier pick up so that all families and the Millfield staff team can get
home safely. If parents prefer not to travel to Millfield should the weather be very bad, please just advise us accordingly so
that we are aware of the numbers of children requiring lunch - many thanks.

Rookery Corner

We have received an update from VIA about resolving the drainage problem at Rookery Corner (the junction at the bottom of Tythby Road into Cropwell Butler) which has caused so many problems with repeated flooding over the last couple of years. They have now commenced work and have provided us with a schedule of the forthcoming plans. There may be some disruption at Rookery corner over the coming 12 weeks. See the information letter below received from VIA about the work. We have been in contact with Matt Duckworth who is the drainage manager for VIA East Midlands for more specific information. He has advised that there will be a complete road closure at Rookery Corner to Tythby Road for a period of two weeks which will be sometime between the beginning of March and the middle of April. He will keep in touch with us to give us a more accurate date and we will keep you all informed. Access to Millfield will need to be via the Tythby village direction for the two week period and we will email a route map nearer the time to show the route you will need to take. Via have apologised for any inconvenience caused to us, but it is vital that the drainage work is completed so that the flooding problem is finally resolved.

Topics for the spring term

Our first topic for the Spring Term is ‘My Favourite Stories’. The children will enjoy some lovely practical activities and experiences planned by the staff linked to some of our well loved stories: Alien’s love underpants, Whatever Next, Monkey Puzzle, The very Hungry Caterpillar, Room on the Broom, The Gruffalo, Harry and the Bucketful of dinosaurs, We’re going on a Bear Hunt, Stick Man and Sharing a shell.

Moving into March we will focus on ‘Transport’ and then our annual ongoing topic  ‘Growing’ will begin with with seeds being planted and the nursery gardens being prepared for the growing season. A new garden area is being planned for Millfield Babies so they will be able to take part in this wonderful topic too. Our festivals for the first half term will be Shrove Tuesday on 17th February and Chinese New Year. This also falls on Tuesday 17th February 2026 and celebrations of Chinese New Year traditionally last for two weeks starting from Chinese New Year’s Eve to the Lantern Festival or Yuan Xiao Jie or Yuanxiao Festival. This falls on the 15th day of the first lunar month, two weeks after Chinese New Year and it marks the first full moon of the new lunar year and the end of the Chinese New Year (Spring Festival) period. The Chinese Lantern Festival 2026 will be celebrated on 3rd March 2026. We will have lots of traditional Chinese decorations and the children will take part in many creative activities as we welcome in the Chinese ‘Year of the Horse’. World Book Day is on Thursday 5th March in 2026 and we will be taking part in British Science Week again this year during week commencing 9th March. Mothering Sunday is on Sunday 15th March and then we will spend two weeks celebrating Easter at the end of March and early April. 

Along with these planned themes, we have several on-going topics apart from 'Growing'. These include the seasons, the weather, all around the world, shape, colour, numbers and pattern, healthy eating (food and nutrition), oral health, and feelings and emotions.

The spring term events poster will be in the notice boards outside the main nursery and Millfield Babies.

Nursery Staff

We are delighted to welcome Miss Hollie Keightley back to Millfield! Hollie worked for us from June 2018 to September 2023 and she is a Level 3 practitioner. Hollie will be working in the main nursery on Tuesdays and Fridays and in Millfield Babies every Thursday. Welcome back Hollie!

Cough, colds and other ailments

Now we are in the winter months, unfortunately we have already been seeing more childhood ailments returning so we are giving a reminder of our policy. Respiratory infections are common in children and young people, particularly during these winter months. Children with mild symptoms such as a runny nose, sore throat, or mild cough, who are otherwise well, can continue to attend nursery. Children who are unwell and have a high temperature (38°C and above) should stay at home and where possible avoid contact with other people. They can return to nursery when they no longer have the high temperature and they are well enough. Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is a common cause of coughs and colds. RSV infections usually get better by themselves, but can sometimes be serious for babies and older adults. RSV infections are very common and almost all children get them at least once before they’re 2 years old. They’re not usually serious, but some babies and adults have a higher risk of getting seriously See the NHS link below for full information:

https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/respiratory-syncytial-virus-rsv/

Other childhood ailments – there are many different ailments that young children can suffer from. See the NHS link below for more information:

https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/is-my-child-too-ill-for-school/
https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/rashes-babies-and-children/

Finally, just a reminder and for your information if you have joined Millfield recently, we do follow a strict policy as advised by the NHS with regard to exclusions for vomiting and diarrhoea bugs. These bugs spread rapidly and because of this, we do need children to be kept at home for 48 hours (two full days) after the last time they were sick or had the diarrhoea. We do appreciate that this does seem a long time, however due to the nature of how young children play together with lots of close contact with each other and the staff, we do need to ensure that everyone at Millfield remains fit and healthy including the whole staff team so that we can remain open at all times. If a child is sick while they are with us during the day, we will contact parents and ask for the child to be collected. With diarrhoea, there can be various reasons for occasional loose stools but if a child has very loose/watery or unusually smelly stools three times in a short period of time, we will request that the child is collected. Thank you for your cooperation with this.

Funded Hours

As always, a reminder for everyone about the Working Families Funded Hours which are available for children from 9+ months for eligible parents. Full information about when you will be eligible and how you can access the funded hours here at Millfield is provided in an information sheet. If you would like another copy of this, please just ask and it can be emailed to you. Just a reminder about the funded hours for 3 and 4 year olds (this is from the term after a child's 3rd birthday). This age group is always funded at a much lower rate for some reason and so in line with all other nurseries, we do need to make a charge for the additional items we always cover in our all inclusive fees. The funded hours only cover 'core childcare' and this does not include meals, snacks, toiletries, sun cream and all the special opportunities we like to be able to provide the children. We have updated our parent information in line with new Department for Education requirements and we have been audited by the Local Authority who have approved our parent information leaflet and we are fully compliant. If you aren’t eligible for the Working Families funded hours, once your child reaches the term after their third birthday, you will automatically become eligible for the Universal 15 funded hours which has been in place for many years. Everyone is eligible for this funding. Full information about all the different funded hours is also available on the following website:

https://www.beststartinlife.gov.uk/