New mirror owner

Welcome to Mirror Dinghy sailing. I think since you are brand new to Mirrors and to sailing one of the best things you could do is search for a Mirror Dinghy sailing club near you. That is what I did 32 years ago and I learned a lot from the members who were anxious to help a newbie.

See if you can find a copy of Sailing the Mirror, by Roy Partridge. It was published in 1980 by Fernhurst Books, London. It is a great book with loads of useful information.

You did not say where you are located. If you let this forum know, perhaps nearby Mirror sailors will make themselves known to you.

Good luck and I know you will enjoy yourselves. The Mirror is a great little boat.

Pete

Welcome from me, too!
Although I have vowed never to put one on my Mirror, I see the advantages for cruising around narrow waterways and for fishing excursions etc. The 2 1/2 hp two-strokes by Tohatsu, Mercury etc. (now deprecated) are quite common on boats of the Mirror size range (see "Curlew's" youtube channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCziN0L3EJ43fqxuVMIyTI1g for example). The little air-cooled Hondas are even lighter and are 4-strokes, but being air-cooled, not really quieter than the more powerful 2-strokes. Electric outboards are limited as far as running time is involved and call for a heavy battery to go any distance.
I have a 2.5 kW 2-stroke Tohatsu that I use to push my 5.2 metre long daysailer (ballast keel/centreboard) which is a heavy boat and it's adequate to push us along at hull speed, so it would actually be overkill on the Mirror. Unfortunately there are not many very small 4-strokes on the market.
Try getting someone to take you out as crew on their dinghy, it's the best way to get into sailing and get a feel of dinghies. Be careful with a small child, as one nasty or unpleasant experience may put him or her off boating for life.
Have fun messing about in boats!
Cheers,
Gernot.

If you're rowing or motoring you can treat a Mirror like a rowing/motor boat, but it is much more fragile and you can punch holes in the hull by relatively gentle collisions with rocks, so your aim should be to avoid hitting any. Ever. Avoid scraping the paint too by using the trolley rather than pulling the boat ashore without it, though it's often okay risk it on sand or grass. This does limit what you can do with the boat at times, but the gains are in its light weight and good sailing performance.

When sailing there is always the risk of a gust of wind capsizing you, so you need to be wearing the right clothes, and in Britain that means a drysuit or wetsuit. I prefer the latter, and it isn't important for it to have long arms and legs as cold limbs during a swim won't kill you. I'm thinking particularly about keeping the costs down here, and a wetsuit without long arms and legs will last a growing child longer while still providing adequate warmth. Ask other people for advice though because they may disagree - I'm only judging by what I preferred wearing while sailing as a child, and that wasn't recent.

Once you've got the clothing sorted, there are two more essential things to sort out: you need to gain sufficient sailing experience to be able to control a boat safely, knowing how to avoid collisions (there are rules about who has right of way), how to stop whenever you need to (there are situations you have to avoid getting into because if you're going downwind in a narrow space and can't turn, you can't stop), how to avoid a slam gybe (which can kill), and how to land without damaging anything. You may be able to gain all of that in a single day by sailing with someone experienced, but it will likely take longer: you'll only be ready to sail on your own when that experienced person judges that you're ready. The other essential thing is being able to right the boat from a capsize, and that doesn't just mean knowing how it's done, but actually having successfully done it a few times, so that's something else you need to do while sailing with someone experienced. Furthermore, if you are going to sail with a four-year-old, that is equivalent to sailing alone, and recovering from a capsize while sailing alone is much harder than it is for a crew of two - just climbing back in can be impossible unless you fit extra equipment to the boat to help you climb in over the stern. You need to prove to yourself that you can right the boat on your own before you think of sailing alone (with or without a young child).

Sailing on a calm day should be treated the same way as sailing in a strong breeze - the wind can get up suddenly at any time without warning, so you must be able to handle whatever happens and never just assume that you're safe because the wind's light. Go and get the experience you need and then you'll be fine once you know what you're doing - it doesn't take long to learn everything that matters, but it makes a huge difference to how safe you are.

Good luck with it all, and have fun,

David

I agree with everything David said above. There is one more thing I would recommend in your first hours sailing the Mirror. Do it on a fair sized lake where collisions and the need for sudden unplanned turns (tacks) are reduced. This will make getting used to sailing the Mirror much easier than sailing on narrower rivers.

Pete

A few other things worth mentioning, and these apply not only while sailing but at all times. Avoid climbing forward onto the foredeck as the weight of an adult there tends to lead to the boat tipping over and dumping you in the drink. Also be aware that the wood of the foredeck is thin and you can punch a hole in it easily if you put too much of your weight down in the same place rather than trying to spread it out. Any small child going forward onto the foredeck needs to know never to jump about on it if you allow them up there at all. The floor is made of thicker plywood but it is also weak when the boat is out of the water, so never stand in it unless it's fully supported by water underneath - it seems unlikely that having water underneath can add so much strength to the plywood, but experience says that it does. I've seen a hole punched in the bottom of a Mirror hull by a 12-year-old girl who was climbing on it during a capsize (with the hull upside down) and managed to put her knee through it. Again you have to spread your weight out carefully in that situation. Having a child stand in the boat when it's on its trolley can also damage the hull at the points where it rests on the trolley, so it isn't a risk worth taking (although a four-year-old is unlikely to do it any harm unless he jumps up and down).