Nat's Little Cupcakes Family Daycare

Nat's Little Cupcakes Family Day Care, Wakerley is searching for a new friend to come on adventures!

A Thursday/Friday vacancy is available for a immediate start.

What do I offer?

Fun, engaging and educational care catered to individual children's needs and interests. Regular community excursions and activities form a big part of our weekly programme ( music classes, playgroups, parks etc..)

I am registered with Uniting Family Day Care, and CCS approved for eligible families.

If you have any questions, or would like to arrange a tour please message!

Nat's Little Cupcakes Family Day Care, Wakerley has a rare vacancy for 2026.

A Thursday/Friday vacancy is available for a January 2026 start.

What do I offer?

Fun, engaging and educational care catered to individual children's needs and interests. This vacancy is best suited to a child over the age of 12 months to fit with existing children. Regular community excursions and activities form a big part of our weekly programme ( music classes, playgroups, parks etc..)

I am registered with Uniting Family Day Care, and CCS approved for eligible families.

If you have any questions, or would like to arrange a tour please message!

media1.tenor.co

We’ve grown so afraid of children falling, scraping a knee, or feeling discomfort that much of childhood has been redesigned around adult anxiety.

Playgrounds are lower, surfaces softer, and supervision tighter. We call it safety, but what we’re often protecting is our own fear. In trying to remove every possible risk, we’ve taken away the experiences that teach real safety, including the kind that comes from misjudging a step and learning how to recover.

Physical play is where the nervous system learns to regulate itself. Each climb, stumble, and try again helps the body understand effort, stress, and calm. When adults intervene too quickly, that cycle stops before the lesson finishes. A minor fall would have taught awareness and adjustment; instead, the body learns to brace, waiting for rescue.

The cost of that interference doesn’t show up right away. It surfaces later in anxious adults who struggle to trust themselves, who see uncertainty as threat rather than possibility. Their bodies never got to rehearse what recovery feels like. A scraped knee heals in days; a nervous system that never practiced resilience stays on guard for years.

Children don’t need a risk-free world, but rather, a responsive one. When we allow space for movement, risk, and recovery, we teach trust, balance, and adaptability. Confidence grows quietly there, in the space between the fall and the rise.

Children NEED to climb higher, run faster, and fall sometimes. Their future depends on the freedom to move and the trust to get back up, so please, please, please let them.

At this time of the year, early childhood teachers are often approached by families asking whether their child is ready for Prep. Rather than looking at number recognition or writing their name, we encourage a holistic approach.

All children have different needs, interests and motivations, so each child’s transition to Prep will be unique. Families might consider:

1. Does the child seek help when needed, with both tasks and emotions?
2. How confident are they in approaching familiar adults and friends?
3. Are they able to respect boundaries, people and environments?
4. How keen are they do give new things a go?
5. What strategies help them to regulate their emotions when things get
tough?
6. Are they able to follow multi-step instructions?
7. Do they show independence and self-help skills as part of their daily
routine?
8. How easily does the child initiate play, or enter established play?

Your child’s Kindergarten teacher can help answer any questions you may have about your child’s readiness. The Queensland government also has a range of helpful information and resources available to assist families and educators in supporting children in their transition to school. These can be found at the following websites.

https://loom.ly/FE6cxuA
https://loom.ly/L3NOXnc

❤️🤔

We are scared of the wrong things...

We worry about skinned knees and climbing too high, while overlooking the real danger quietly unfolding.

Children are moving less than ever before, even though movement is what builds both the body and the brain. Only about one in four children meet daily activity recommendations, and outdoor free play has dropped by more than half in recent decades.

And when children are outside, they are rarely given the freedom their bodies and brains need. They are hovered over, directed, redirected, and told “be careful” every other minute. Instead of climbing, leaping, and testing their limits, they are being micromanaged.

Meanwhile, screen use is at an all-time high.

Preschoolers now average over two hours a day, and older children often five or more. Constant screen time drains the developing nervous system, disrupts sleep and dopamine regulation, and leaves children still, sedentary, and emotionally flooded (and disconnected from others).

In trying to prevent every hurt, we’ve stripped away the very experiences that wire children to handle the world. Running, climbing, crashing, wrestling, and recovering build balance, coordination, emotional regulation, and resilience. Without this, children are left fragile in every way, with adulthood being far more challenging than you'd imagine.

We are bubble-wrapping childhood and calling it safety, while it is quietly costing them their strength, confidence, and trust in themselves (short and long term consequences).

This is the conversation we need to have.

Join us next Wednesday (9/24) for our live webinar Brave Play: Risk, Weapons, Destructive Play, and the Freedom to Explore (part 3 in the summer of play series).

A full recording will be sent to all registrants so you can watch anytime.

Free Registration: https://us06web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_gauhhsCsR7usaSLppZn5vw

Catch up on Parts 1 & 2 and get certified for any or all three: https://www.weskoolhouse.com/store-webinars

Our recent art show - aren't our little people talented! 🥰🥰

Does your child need to work on their impulse control? Musical statues/freeze games can help!
https://www.facebook.com/share/1B7YY2nbhf/

A large number of children are finding it challenging to stop their bodies on cue. They hear the music stop but their arms keep moving, their feet keep shuffling, they fall over because they haven't yet learned to control their momentum.

Some children become genuinely distressed when asked to freeze because they've never experienced their body being still while alert.

This isn't defiance or poor listening. It's a neurological skill that hasn't been developed yet.

Children who find it challenging to stop their bodies during a simple music game will also find it challenging to stop themselves from grabbing toys, pushing peers, or running inside.

But here's the encouraging news, this skill can absolutely be taught through playful movement practice.

Try This Today: "Stop When the Music Stops"

Put on music and let children move freely. When you pause the music, they need to try freeze their bodies completely. Start with 3-second freezes, build to 10 seconds. Watch for their ability to really freeze and hold this position. Often we think children can freeze, but we're not pausing the music long enough to build up the skill called inhibition (stopping the movement).

This activity builds the neurological pathway for impulse control. When children master the freeze game, they discover they have control over their impulses.

Suddenly, waiting for a turn doesn't feel impossible because they've practised the "stop and wait" feeling in their bodies hundreds of times through joyful play.

Try this today and notice which children find it challenging to stop.

Our team at Play Move Improve use targeted activities like this to build the self-regulation foundation that makes all other social learning possible. If your team is interested in specialist support, message us with your location and we'll let you know if we have a teacher available in your area to run our 8 or 12 week program.