Basement Only or Use of Whole House?

[SimpleMom]

I recently moved into using mostly just my basement. It is set up really cute and specifically for daycare. There's TONS of space as well and three different rooms aside from the bathroom.

I have up 10-12 kids per day and two are VERY active. Having daycare in one area is really trying on my nerves some days with the active ones. Napping in the basement has not worked well, so I have switched to napping upstairs with Planet Earth videos (works AWESOME for my current group). The older kids can play downstairs or outdoors easily while the others nap.

How do you gals run the day. I started out wanting to run it like a center as I used to work in one. Now, I am finding there is one of my and lots of different ages all under one roof. running it like a center is very difficult. Do you use all of your home? Carefree for the day? Center-like? what helps to keep the chaos down the stress levels at a minimum?

[Pammie]

Years ago when I first started daycare, I used my basement exclusively for daycare - set up to look very much like you would expect a "daycare" to look with centers, little tables/chairs, posters on the walls, etc.

Then after a period where I was facing "severe burnout" and thought seriously about quitting daycare all together, I did some soul-searching and with the help of my family, discovered that much of my burn-out and stress was self-inflicted--because I felt locked away in my basement with my job all day long!

What worked for me was to turn my home and daycare back into looking and feeling like a home. I turned my daycare basement into a "family room". And made my entire house feel like "home" again. All of my daycare gear (highchairs, pack-n-plays, toys, etc) gets stored away after the last use of the day. All of my toys are in bins that I rotate in-and-out of a storage room for the kids to use. I keep one small basket of books and one small basket of toys in my front livingroom - where all of our drop-offs/pick-ups happen. Outside of daycare hours it would be difficult to know that a daycare business is run in my home. And helps me not to feel like I live at my job 24/7.

My bedrooms are used exclusively for my family's personal use, except for 2 hrs/day for naptimes. I use my kitchen for meals and all of our arts/crafts and messy projects. The kids and I move between my livingroom on the first floor, the basement family room and outdoors throughout the day. It really saves my sanity!

During interviews with prospective clients, I simply explain my philosophy that kids will spend enough of their lives in institutional type settings, that the longer that I can keep them in a "home" environment the better - in my opinion.

It works for me - best wishes in finding a system that works for you!!!

[DCMomOf3]

I have been using most of my house until recently and have started bringing them back to just my walkout basement. I needed my house back, the kids were starting to treat my house as theirs and going into spaces they didnt' belong.

What are your rooms set up as in the basement right now?
If they are sized appropriately, I'd have one for the cribs with music playing during naps to help drown out play noise. One for younger kids to play and mats for the toddler nap time. Maybe mount a tv to the wall so they can have movies right in that room. The third could be for older kids to play.

If the older kids are disrupting naps, and they can't go outside, could you think of quieter things they could do, like board games, reading, or watching their own movies?

[Lianne]

I prefer to be on the main level. I lived too long in basement apartments/rooms that I really crave being up on the main level with the world just outside my windows and full light coming in my windows. I don't have a usable basement but if I did I'd use it for daycare in some ways but the bulk of our inside time would still be upstairs.

[DanceMom]

Years ago when I first started daycare, I used my basement exclusively for daycare - set up to look very much like you would expect a "daycare" to look with centers, little tables/chairs, posters on the walls, etc.

Then after a period where I was facing "severe burnout" and thought seriously about quitting daycare all together, I did some soul-searching and with the help of my family, discovered that much of my burn-out and stress was self-inflicted--because I felt locked away in my basement with my job all day long!

What worked for me was to turn my home and daycare back into looking and feeling like a home. I turned my daycare basement into a "family room". And made my entire house feel like "home" again. All of my daycare gear (highchairs, pack-n-plays, toys, etc) gets stored away after the last use of the day. All of my toys are in bins that I rotate in-and-out of a storage room for the kids to use. I keep one small basket of books and one small basket of toys in my front livingroom - where all of our drop-offs/pick-ups happen. Outside of daycare hours it would be difficult to know that a daycare business is run in my home. And helps me not to feel like I live at my job 24/7.

My bedrooms are used exclusively for my family's personal use, except for 2 hrs/day for naptimes. I use my kitchen for meals and all of our arts/crafts and messy projects. The kids and I move between my livingroom on the first floor, the basement family room and outdoors throughout the day. It really saves my sanity!

During interviews with prospective clients, I simply explain my philosophy that kids will spend enough of their lives in institutional type settings, that the longer that I can keep them in a "home" environment the better - in my opinion.

It works for me - best wishes in finding a system that works for you!!!

I could have written this post myself..this is exactly to the tee what I do !

[SimpleMom]

Okay, I tried doing the naps in the basement again today WITH Planet Earth. Didn't go very well. Too many toys to look at or something. The two active kids wouldn't stay put on their cots and I was constantly having to redirect them again and the other kids picked up on this. Urgggh. I know something is going to work out.
The only thing I know for sure is naps are now upstairs and I'm not getting book shelves for dividers (i.e. climbers)

I tried to seperate the centers more and this led to climbing the items used to seperate the areas. Ha--so that was a no-go. Group Time and the other activities worked well. I know I don't want any toys upstairs, other than that, I'm still at a loss. I feel that if I start using part of my basement for a living area I might feel frustrated by the climbing on my furniture and such.


Kinda liking the idea mentioned above of having my house back in general

[DCMomOf3]

Do you think something they would pay attention to something more attention grabbing than planet earth? Would you consider something more like School House Rock that's geared to younger audiences?