What Keeps You Doing Childcare?

[Country Kids]

I love reading everyones responses!!! I love being a able to guide these little ones and teach them new things. Deep down in my heart I should have been a teacher but had no interest in it when I was in school. Really kick myself for not doing it but oh well.

My biggest thing is my children are needing me more and more it seems as they become older. Yes, I know if I worked in the "outside" world I wouldn't have all the perks I do know but I swear everyone I know can just take time off when ever they need to but me. I'm starting to think employers have had to come to the realization that families will come over jobs anyday. You hear all the horror stories of parents not being able to have time off but you really have to wonder about those stories.

Now that I have no one at home, one of my biggest fears is something happening and I won't be able to get to a family member. To be honest, I have had 4 family emergencies where I had to leave the house immediately and what held me up-calling all the parents to let them know I was needing to leave right away and had to take the kids with me. I was only able to go to two of these emergencies because one of them I was able to wait for my sub at the time and the other time, none of my parents could get to me in a resonable time frame because we were actually have a hurrific snowstorm. Two of these involved family members having to be transported by ambulance from where they were at and my heart broke because I couldn't be there. My husband actually tore out of work for one of them.

There are some other things going on right now where some of my children are needing me and I always have to say wait till I'm done and the kids are gone or wait till I get things done for tomorrow,paperwork, etc. I just have a feeling some of mine will feel like BlackCats husband and I'm not sure what to do about that. They only know me being home so they have no idea what what it would be like for me to work away. Alot of their friends have parens who either work school hours, stay home or own businesses but have more flexibility then me.

Anyway thanks for the responses! Great to read and see what everyone says.

[Childminder]

I don't know what else I would do. After forty-seven years it's kinda all I know. At my advanced age of 56 it's kinda late to change. Besides I'm good with children and like waking up and walking into the next room to work. It does have it's cons and pros like mentioned above in many posts.

I taught art/painting for a few years in addition to watching children, worked as a nail tech for a few years part time while I was a nanny, and worked for a few years as a framer in an art gallery on Saturdays and Tuesdays. None of the jobs gave any job security or retirement benefits but did not think it was ever going to be any problem cause I was married to someone that had all I would ever need/want. It is now an issue cause I divorced him and my now DH lost all of that in a moment 3.5 years ago when the big 3 went down.

[karen]

This is the right job for me! I have been doing this forever. I started in daycares from the ground up, started in the infant room as just a caregiver but worked up to lead, worked in every room until I became the preschool teacher and knew that was the job for me, but After working with abused children I was burnt out! I needed a break so I went to work in the office world. I HATED IT! Hated being chained to a desk, hated being told you couldn't go to the bathroom, hated being told no you couldn't go to your son's baseball games, hated the office politics and so many other reasons. I quickly realized that I am not office material and found a job working back into childcare/preschool teaching.

[permanentvacation]

Being my own boss

being home with my kids - well, one is in college now, but when she comes home for breaks, I'm here and not at some office - and my other child is in middle school, but when she's home sick, or off school for the day and when she gets home after school, I'm home

being able to hire someone else (my helper) to do my job if I don't feel like doing it myself that day!

not having to drive to/from work

not having to go out in bad weather - rain/snow - BLIZZARDS!

being able to wear whatever I want to work - being comfortable

being able to write EVERYTHING off on taxes!

Making more income than I would if I went out to work

Being able to eat and go to the bathroom whenever I want/need to

the overall comfort of being home - being able to sit on the sofa instead of stand at work all day or sit in a desk chair all day, being able to go outside and get some fresh air, being able to pet my household pets throughout the day, etc.

being able to get dinner made at an acceptable time every night

being able to get my house cleaned during the day (at naptime) instead of being stuck cleaning the house on the weekend

Being able to run a daycare the way I believe it should be run - I really like my job and want to do the best that I can at it. However, I disagree with the way some daycares operate. I worked in a center once and actually got yelled at for teaching 4 year olds how to write letters and their names! I had already been in trouble before that for teaching children scholastics. They wanted the children to only have a 20 minute circle time then be allowed to play all day with no teacher directed education. I disagree with that. Yes, they need play time, but they also need and actually like to learn things. So when I got yelled at for teaching them to write, I decided right then and there that I had to re-open my own daycare! My parents love the way I work with and teach my kids.

not being stuck in some cubicle or building all day everyday

Not having co-workers/boss that I might not get along with or have to put up with - no office politics

I could go on, and on, and on!!

[permanentvacation]

In response to op's last line - how do you balance things and not let childcare take over your life? Actually, doing childcare ALLOWED my chilren and me to HAVE a life.

I used to have a 15 passenger van for daycare which I bought so I could load up all my daycare kids and my personal children to be able to take my personal children to their sports/church activities that started BEFORE I got off work or would have gotten off work if I had gone out to work. If I didn't do daycare and had either a big van to fit everyone in or a helper to leave the kids with, I would have had to tell my kids that they couldn't do any sports/activities that started before I got home from work. Most of them started before 5:30.

I also would not have been able to go to as many school functions and other things that happen during the day. If I had to tell my boss that I needed all that time off work, I'd be fired! But doing daycare and being able to hire my helper to work for the day or a few hours for me allowed me to go to any function/activitiy that came up with my children.

And since I could clean the house during my work hours at naptime and make dinner during the day, evenings and weekends, we went to the park, on walks, shopping, etc. We weren't stuck at home doing household chores like we would have been if I was off at work all day.

[permanentvacation]

Me again, I'm sorry that I keep posting! Countrykids, maybe you can get things ready for the next day/week during naptime. Or if you can, maybe get up a bit earlier to get things done in the morning before your kids are up and before daycare kids arrive. If your group gets along well during indoor free play time, you can use some of that time as well for planning/preparing activities. I do ALOT with my daycare kids and if I plan my time right, I really don't do much daycare related after daycare hours.

If you think you might need to be able to leave work with no advanced notice, you might want to consider hiring a daily helper. I had a lady that worked for me all day every day - at that time I went out to 3 schools every day, to drop off in the morning, drop off my 1/2 day kindergartener mid-day, then go and pick everyone up in the afternoon. So my helper would stay with the little ones at home while I did the 'bus runs'. If you could hire someone to work for you, then you could leave whenever you need without having to call your parents and make them leave work just because you need to leave work.

As far as my personal children needing my help while I'm doing daycare. They have always known that they have to come to me with their questions so I can still be in the daycare area. If they have a quick question about homework, they bring it to me in the daycare area. If it's something that they know we need quiet time to focus on, they hold that aside til after daycare. If I went out to work, they wouldn't be able to ask me ANYTHING til I got home from work. At least with them coming to me in the daycare area, they can get some of my assistance before I would be getting home from an out of the house job.

You said that your husband is home and takes care of problems while you are with the daycare kids. Could he sit with the daycare kids on ocassion while you tend to your personal children? That would give him a break from the family issues and let you have a little more 'mom' time.

Can you hire a helper to work in the afternoons (either every day or just a couple of days per week) after your personal children get home from school til you close? You would lose some money, but probably not as much as if you closed your daycare and went out to work. And it would give you more time to tend to your personal children and be able to get things ready for the next day while your helper is working with your daycare kids.

For me, working at home doing home daycare, being at home, and being able to hire a helper makes it MUCH easier to juggle being a mom, house chores, dinner, running my children to and from activities, taking off work to get my child from school when she's sick, and working full time.

If you go out to work, you have a set time every day that you absoutely CAN NOT even try to juggle work with anything else.

By the time I get off work at 5/5:30, I have dinner made, anywhere from 1-4 loads of laundry washed, dryed, and folded, entire first floor has been vaccuumed and swept, dishes are in the dishwasher and it's turned on to wash them, and daycare activities are prepared for the next day.

I get started at 6am. I have 2 kids that come in at 6 and lay down til
7:30/8am. During that time, if I have laundry to do, I start it. While the laundry is going, I cook breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I cook all the day's meals at once so I don't have to try to be at the stove cooking while trying to keep an eye on the daycare kids. ( I provide all meals for my daycare kids and I actually cook homecooked meals - I don't make sandwiches). While the food is cooking and laundry is going I check out that day's daycare activites and get them ready for the day. It's alot to do at once, but really, you only have to be at the washer/dryer for max of 5 minutes at a time. You go back to the stove and stir/flip food for a couple of minutes at a time. So you really can do all these things at once pretty easily. After each meal, the dishes are put directly in the dishwasher and after pm snack, the dishwasher is started. During naptime, I continue laundry and clean/straighten up upstairs on some days and on other days, I prepare a few days' daycare activities. Where I live, as long as the daycare kids are asleep, you can legally go one floor away from them. Towards the end of the daycare day, I run the vaccuum throughout the main floor and sweep the kitchen. After the daycare kids leave, I take a max of 10 minutes to clean the bathroom (sink, mirror, toilet, and wipe up floor in the 1/2 bath) on the main floor. I take the diaper pail trash outside. Within 15 minutes of getting off work, my family can eat dinner. After dinner, I unload the clean dishes from the day, and load up the dinner dishes in the dishwasher. And pretty much the household chores are done. I have the entire evening to focus on my personal family/interests.

I NEVER do main household chores on evenings and weekends! It's all done during the week between 6 and 8 am and during naptime. So all weekend long, I can focus on family and activities! If I went out to work, I would HAVE to do household chores on evenings and weekends which would take my time away from focusing on my family and activities that I enjoy.

I would suggest that you make a list of everything that you want to be able to do daily. List out things like make dinner, help personal kids with homework, clean house (list out every household chore you do), prepare daycare activities, grocery shop, etc. List EVERYTHING that you want to be able to do on a daily basis. Then list your typical daycare routine. See if you can find times during your daycare routine to fit the non-daycare things into your daycare day. You might have to adjust your daycare routine a bit or get up a little earlier. But you you might be able to figure out how to incorporate some of the personal household things into your daycare day. Then you will have more free time in the evenings and weekends to spend with your family.

[Lianne]

I absolutely love what I do. There are parts of the job that I don't enjoy and not all of my days are filled with sunshine and rainbows. Heck, I'm good at what I do but I'm not the best at it, either, but when it comes down to it, I truly love my job.

[SilverSabre25]

I do not need to do this anymore. My DH got a new job and an enormous raise...but I'm still doing it for the money (aren't we all?) as my yearly income just about equals our credit card debt ( not for long), and more importantly...

I can't bear to send these kids off to other places. I feel absolutely 100% committed to seeing them off to school.

Probably.

Some days, I seriously consider throwing in the towel, and I still might, but for now...I can't bear to see them go.

[cheerfuldom]

I think there are a lot of benefits to home daycares like mine but by far, the main reason I do this is for my own children's sake. I will be honest and say I would not have considered this job if I didn't want to keep my own kids out of daycare. I am content for now but looking forward to leaving my daycare behind me. I only keep what kids I have to in order to make ends meet. I probably just need a long break and then maybe would consider working with kids again down the road. Actually, I really do enjoy kids for the most part but as we all know, kids are only part of this job.

[AnythingsPossible]

My kids are 15, 13, 10. I only planned on doing daycare till they got in school, but once they were in school I kept doing daycare because I wasn't comfortable with them coming home to an empty house, and also summer's would of been an issue as I wouldn't of wanted them home alone. Even at the ages they are now, I don't like the idea of them being home alone for extended amounts of time.
I do have my moments though where I want to close down! It is a whole different ball game once your kids are in school, especially once they are older. IMO anyway. I will probably keep going another 4 to 5 years, once my oldest is 15 or 16. Then I plan to work in preschool, so the hours won't be to bad, but the pay cut will be awful.
I also keep doing it because it is nice to be my own boss. If I need a day off, I give notice and I take it. I do alot of stuff during the day to cut down on the amount of stuff I have to do in the evening. As far as the getting home from school and going to their rooms, if you worked out of the home, chances are you would work till 5 or later anyway, so you still wouldn't see them.
There is no perfect answer, and I definately have times when this job drives me crazy. But all in all, there are certainly worse jobs! So I keep going because even though my kids are older, I feel they still need me home, even if I am not there for them 100% of the time. My daughters have both been sick in the past couple of weeks and spent a decent amount of time home from school. If I would have been working outside of the home, they would of either laid home alone all day, or I would of had to of used all my time off. Things like that make it nice to be home.

[My3cents]

Well,

It goes like this.......

I have always wanted to do this for my career. I ventured it in many avenues and now am doing what I love.

Have your kids come to you for help and you just strike a balance. Your kids have to understand that some parents go away from home to work. You are lucky to be able to be at home and still work and be there for them. Have them come to you for homework help, and time with you. They just have to share. As unfair as it seems sometimes, you are really doing them a favor. They are learning to share and so many other things on different levels.

Get as much done as you can during working hours ( easier said then done sometimes) do tons of planning ahead. Don't make it all about daycare on the weekends. My motto is, work hard- play hard. Come the weekend enjoy the benefits of your labor.

It's not always easy. Enjoy what you do. I have to resurface this idea several times, especially on hard days when the kiddies are tired, whiney, sick etc.. Have someone to call, vent, an outlet during the day. This forum is one of mine. I also have another provider I can call and vent with. I do this because I love the kids, and want to make a difference in this world in my small way. The hard ones challenge me. The work, keeps me on my toes and moving. My space is colorful I am a creative, artsy person and get to explore these avenues, and I like to teach and I love to be the boss!:: I probably gripe a loooooooot. but honestly I love my little peeps and what I do. I refuse burn out. If I feel it coming on, I change things up and re-evaluate the situations.

Hope this helpslovethis

[My3cents]

My children are 20 and 23 and are both moved out. I continue to do child care because to be perfectly honest, I am good at it. I don't mean to sound vain or egocentrical. As a matter of fact, I am probably one of the only providers I know (and maybe on this forum) that never really liked kids or even wanted any of my own....but I had them (kids of my own) and became an accidental provider.

When that happened, I found that I do like the field of early childhood and enjoy what I do. I am still not one to get all gushy and stuff over an infant as babies are just not my cup of tea. I am not necessarily a warm, nurturing person and have never been one to get stuck in the old cliche' of "Oh, I just love kids and that is why I do child care" Bleh.

That is not me.

I am being very honest here and can admit that I do this because I really am good at it. I have a very strong backbone, I understand the necessity of rules and routines, I understand the need for good sleep, proper nutrition and good care. I also have no problem telling parents what I need and what I expect from them. I am able to give the kids (and families) in my program the things they need and I feel I have a good thing going here.

I continue to stay in this field because I do get up and go to work each day and nothing daycare interfears with my home or home life. I have changed my program as I have become more seasoned, more educated (and older) to suit me and better meet my needs/wants.

I take vacation when I want, I close and open when I want. I can have a relaxing lazy day or a crazy busy day and I love the fact that every day is different. I find fun in the little things the kids do and say and find even greater joy in the fact that I have NONE of the hard issues that parents do....kids up in the middle of the night, the sickness, the whining, the bad behaviors ect ect.... for me this job is kind of like being a grandparent with out the parent part. ::

I have a 20 and 23 year old that are not home too. I also have a 14 year old and a 3 year old- I think I could have wrote a lot of what you just said...