We hired Catrina for our 5 week old son because we were feeling overwhelmed and lacking in confidence in dealing with a baby who seemed to cry all the time and never sleep. We asked Catrina to help us establish a feeding and sleeping schedule, help with getting our son to sleep in his own bed, advice on how to minimise disruption when travelling abroad to the grandparents and also to give us a break from caring for him.
Over the 4 and a half days and 1 night Catrina spent with us, she was invaluable in reassuring us that our son was "normal" for a colicky baby. As well as offering advice and options on the feeding and sleeping schedule, Catrina gave us lots of other helpful and useful tips and information that for us as baby novices we found really helpful. Catrina clearly has a lifetime of experience with babies and her calm, confident and friendly manner works wonders with babies and parents alike.
Maggie came to us when our daughter was a week old for eight weeks. Within a week our first born three year old had nicknamed her Magaloo and was eating out of her hand. On top of the nightly duties she undertook with Alice she quickly lent a helping hand with some of the problems she saw we were having with our son, poor eating and sleeping habits, sibling envy and attention seeking behaviour. We were frazzled, stressed and sleep deprived but she gently and unassumingly dispensed sound advice and offered practical suggestions which genuinely helped us tackle some long term issues successfully. When Alice was eight weeks old and just as Maggie was due to leave us Alice became ill with Bronchiolitis and was hospitalised. Maggie agreed to stay with us and care for her. Overnight our previously ‘seven ‘til seven’ baby completely lost her excellent routine and day and night seemed to be one long blur but night after night Maggie would sit up and comfort Alice whose wracking and persistant coughing was a most distressing experience for the family lasting almost three months. As Alice recovered it took Maggie about a fortnight to tease her back into her previous routine and to this day we have a baby who settles herself and sleeps soundly throughout the night. We will never forget the backbone Maggie provided for us as a family when Alice was ill and the support she offered to all of us. Our children love Magaloo and we will always be indebted to her for her consummate professionalism, her intuitive sensitivity and her abundant generosity.
Karen and Andrew Matthews
September 08
“Two weeks ago, Rae spent one day with us and in that day she managed to completely change our lives! Before then our two year old son had been waking up throughout the night, often at hourly or even half-hourly intervals. Rae’s approach to changing the situation was fantastic. She was calm but firm and knew exactly what to do. She has a very friendly manner and our son took to her straight away. She managed to settle him in his cot for a nap in just a few minutes. She is very easy to talk to and is genuinely committed to helping people to resolve problems. We are so grateful for Rae’s help and we would wholeheartedly
recommend her to anyone in a similar situation……” Bloom family London.
Thanks for putting us in touch with Maggie. She was brilliant and got
Ryan sleeping through in 4 days.. His day sleeps have also improved
and no longer have any problems putting him down. No dummy either!!!
Would highly recommend Maggie to anyone..
Shelley Hammet
Catrina worked for us caring for our new born premature baby boys. Catrina was extremley helpful in helping us to establish a good feeding and sleeping routine for the boy's and her experience has provided invaluable throughout the time she has been with us. She coped extremley well with feeding two hungry boy's on her own through the night enabling us to get some much needed sleep. We highly recommend her as a maternity nurse.
S. Thomas (Essex)
Thank you so much for the help and advice, Alice is now in the best routine she has ever been in, Joanna was a great help and a lovely Night nanny.
C.Goldstein (London)
Rae spent two days with us and turned our chaotic household into an oasis of calm! Our 6 month old baby was feeding throughout the night and only ever napped for 15 minutes at a time during the day. Rae introduced a routine for him and within a day had him sleeping through the night and taking 2 hour naps. It was miraculous! She gave us advice about all aspects of his life and helped introduce him onto solids. She was also very loving and affectionate towards him. Rae herself was sweet and gentle, and she had an air of competence and experience that immediately comforted us…….” Van De Merve family
Catrina worked as a night nanny for our daughter for four weeks, during this period, not only did she allow us to catch up on some much needed sleep, but she also helped our daughter to establish more regular eating and sleeping paterns. If we were to need help again in the future we would not hesitate to call on Catrina again, her help and advice was very much appreciated and we would highly recomend her as a night nanny.
L. Dilorio (Hampstead, London)
Rachel worked for us as a maternity nurse, looking after our twin boys for 2 weeks in March 2008.
Our twins were 7 weeks premature and spent the first 3 weeks in hospital. Their first few weeks at home were made so much more pleasant with Rachel’s help! Rachel has introduced order and a routine that I would not have thought possible for such young twins.
Rachel is a pleasure to have around and I would not hesitate to recommend her to other parents. We will miss her!
S. Maulie (London)
Hi Catrina,
Just wanted to thank you again for you're help over the past couple of weeks. Things are going really well. Henry slept until 6.30am last night - fed at 7am. Also the daytime naps went well today, he managed a whole hour and half without waking once during the afternoon nap and a whole hour without waking during this morning's nap. We've still got a way to go but it's a massive improvement on 45 mins!
Suzanne Messinger (kent)
Lydia has been an Angel in disguise. She not only helped get william into more workable routine, she also gave us lots of advice on imroving his digestion as he was suffering terribly with colic. Thank you so much Lydia. Should we need a Maternity nurse in future we would certainly use happy babies again.
Claire Lewis (Finchley)
Catrina has been nothing short of brilliant, we found her friendly, capable and reliable. Both my husband and I felt totally relaxed and confident about leaving our very new baby in her care. She has been flexable and helpful with all areas we wanted to improve upon with Olivia's sleeping and feeding patterns, as well as being supportive and understanding about some of our concerns as new parents.
Catrina helped us to get through the difficult first weeks of little to no feeding and sleeping routine, and with her help and guidance, olivia is now going 5 to 6 hours between night feeds, and has a more defined sleeping routine which makes the more noctural aspect of looking after her more enjoyable and managable.
I would not hesitate to recommend Catrina to anyone else, and in short, we could not have asked for a nicer person to come into our home. Were we in a position in future in which we needed a night nanny in the future I would be sure to call upon Catrina again, We will miss her!
Lizzy Stephenz (Colchester, Essex)
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Reference for Maggie Swarts
August 2008
Maggie came to us in the sumer of 2008 to help sleep train Miles.
Miles is 20 months old, an angel by day, somewhat devilish by night!
In his entire life he has slept through the night only a few times and
was becoming increasingly reliant on milk and nighttime visits to
settle back to sleep. A habitual night time waker (and moaner). This
of course meant that the whole family were sleep deprived, and had
pretty much lost all sense of humour! The household had become
fractious and, lets be honest, miserable!
Maggie arrived and immediately made us feel at ease. She was very
intuitive to the family dynamic and fitted in really well. She had a
great impact on both our boys instantly!
It can be completely awkward inviting a total stranger into your
house, into your life, into your problems and giving them such
responsibility. Maggie was very discreet and unassuming yet made
everyone feel at ease. She really gave us the confidence to go forward
and get sorted. It felt very natural to let her take over.
We started off by reviewing Miles' day time routine, his eating
habits, his diet and napping patterns. We were given sound advice on
what to tweak and change and Miles easily fell into his new daytime
routine. After the five nights, Miles had showed great improvement.
He had given up his milk, given up water, had not required a nappy
change and was beginning to settle himself without the need of any
night time visits. Now, a couple of days later, he has successfully
managed to sleep through the night (not even a peep!) and we are
hopeful that this will continue and soon become natural to him. His
new habit.
During her time here, Maggie gave us invaluable advice and tips to
help with our elder son too. A veritable 'Super Nanny' indeed!
Thank you Maggie.
xx
Steve and Leila Denning
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Catrina worked for our familly as a maternity nurse for four weeks following the birth of my son Oliver. During this time I was going through a difficult time with Oliver as he was suffering from chronic digestive discomfort and was crying all day and night which was affecting my confidence as a new mother.
Catrina was an invaluable aid in me gaining my confidence with Olly, giving advice guidance and enabling me to get plenty of rest. I would highly recommend Catrina as a maternity Nurse to any future family, she is kind caring and extremley understanding.
G. Minter Chelmsford,
“From the moment Rae walked into our home, I knew she would be a very warm, gentle and wise person to have around the house, and I was right. She has not only worked for countless mothers with their babies but has had a few of her own. She has an innate understanding of babies and a deep founded chore of common sense which is indispensable for this type of work. She always made me feel so secure without feeling like my control as a mother was being taken away. Rae gages personalities very well, and in so doing, fits into the family environment very easily. Her gentle, spiritual character enables her to do this. She is discreet and her passion for her work shows in everything she does. All mothers and babies are very lucky to have Rae to look after them……” Mrs Peck, London
We employed Catrina as a maternity nurse for a six week period for our seven week premature twins (boy and a girl). Catrina was with us from the first week that the twins came home from the neonatal unit at which point they were four weeks old. We chose Catrina because she had previous experience with twins and this was very importaint to us. It turned out that we could not have made a better choice.
We are new parents and so Catrina has proved to be an invaluable help to us both from a practical point of view and also from the advice she has given us. She is capable and caring and from the outset we felt confident putting the care of our precious babies in her hands.
We were keen to establish a routine for thw twins and Catrina was happy to be flexible and worked with me to create one that worked for us as a family. What was most importaint to us is that she clearly loves babies and she was always warm and loving to our twins.
Catrina is a lovely person and it was a real pleasure to have her live with us during her employment. She is easy going and good company, however she also went out of her way to make sure we had time together as a couple too.
We would highly recomend Catrina to anyone looking for a maternity nurse. It was not until she left that we appreciated how much she had done for us and how much we missed her.
Sarah Fothergill (chelmsford)
Catrina was employed by our familly as a maternity nurse for a three week period, caring for our two month baby girl. We were having problems with Sarah sleeping at night and she seemed to sleep more during the day and less at night. Catrina was extremley helpful and gave lots of advice and help with regards to getting Sarah into a more efficent sleeping patern. We highly recommend her to any future parents wishing to employ a maternity nurse and we wish her all the best for the future.
M. Cohen (Golders green/London)
Catrina first came to work with us when our twin boys were 9 weeks old. We were struggling to get into a routine during the daytime that worked for both of our boys but very quickly Catrina helped us to establish a 4 hour feeding routine and really helped me to get in control. With Catrina's help and guidance I was able to cope with having twins far more quickly that I would have done without her help - I don't think I would have been as relaxed and confident with my twin boys without Catrina's support.
Catrina returned to work with us when the boys were 5 months old, spending 2 days a week with us whilst I recovered from an illness. Catrina's help was invaluable at this time, providing lots of advice and guidance on weaning.
Catrina was incredibly loving towards our boys and they clearly enjoyed having her around, as we all did. I would definitely recommend Catrina.
Jennie Thrower (Chelmer village, Essex)
" Catrina really helped me to gain the confidence in looking after my daughter who was suffering from digestive pain at 5 weeks old. She established a kind and loving routine which is still in place 5 months later, and her gentle advice and loving approach towards my daughter was important to me as a first time mother. I would recommend her highly" Petra Kuzev (Chelmsford)
Catrina came to help us with our twin girls in September 2008. She was there when we got out of hospital and helped us soon get into a feeding and sleeping routine.
She helped with the initial night feeds while I was breast feeding, bringing the girls up to me to feed at night and then settling them for me so I could get some much needed sleep.
Initially I was worried how I would feel having someone in our house, but Catrina is such a professional and just seemed to know when to give us some time alone as a new family, but I always knew she was there when I needed help, advise or support.
I honestly do not know how we would have managed if it wasn’t for Catrina, I am sure we would have muddled through, but with Catrina’s help, we have contented happy babies and I am a confident new mummy, and I credit Catrina for all of that.
It is clear that Catrina, loves babies and my girls adored her. We couldn’t wait till Sunday nights when our ’Mary Poppins’ would come back !!!
We initially booked Catrina for one month but we loved her so much that she ended up being with us till December 2008.
I can’t recommend Catrina highly enough. From coming to work for us as a maternity nurse in September, when she left in December we all considered her part of our family, and we hope that she will always be in our girls life.
Anna and Will Mcdougal (Highgate, London)
To whom it may concern,
Catrina joined us on our first day back from hospital with our two little bundles of joy. We had organised a welcome home package with her, which consisted of three 24 hour periods to help us establish some sort of order into our lives. She quickly settled us into a four hourly feeding routine, which meant that I could get some much needed sleep.
Catrina was very flexible with dates -since we weren't able to predict when our twin boys would be born with real certainity. We kept in touch with Catrina from the moment we got to hospital and it meant that she was able to join us the night we returned.
Catrina helped us organise our home so that it was baby friendly. Within hours we had a feeding station, changing station and had organised sterilising and making up top up feeds. Catrina geniunely seemed to care for the welfare and happiness of our boys, which meant we did not need to worry about them while they were in her care.
It was wonderful to have someone with such experience on hand in the early days to answer our many questions. She was a very calming influence on us and our babies. Overall we felt that Catrina was worth her weight in gold and I would not hesitate to recommend her.
Liz Simpson
We had twin boys born at 31 weeks, they stayed in hospital for 6 weeks then were allowed home once they were able to take their full feed. They were in eating every 4 hours however they were very unsettled in between. At hospital they were picked up if they cried and couldn't settle themselves in their own bed once home. They were waking up several times during the night and only settling once I held them or bought them back to bed with me.
Trouble shoot:
Rae spent 2 days with us observing the boys and our routine (or lack of it). She immediately settled them down got them feeding and sleeping properly. They turned from rather frenetic babies to very content and happy ones, it was incredible to have our baby boys back who weren't screaming the house down. They no longer wake up randomly at night and are growing healthy and strong.
Night nurse:
The boys get on well with Rae and having her look after them a couple of nights a week is a god send and keeps me sane whilst they still have the 2am feed. She looks after them like they were her own and her care is impecable. I would and have recommended her to anyone looking for someone to help. She goes above and beyond to make sure that the routine is kept during the days and is always on the end of the phone should we have any problems.
Alison Lewis Jones (Kensington)
