During The Day School Events While Doing Childcare

[WImom]

How do you manage? It's really bothering me that I can't go to everything the school has during the day. My DD8 has a cello concert coming up in May and it's at 1pm. At christmas time I closed for the day and went to it but I have more kids now and would be out $200 (parents don't pay if I close except holidays) for a 30 minute concert

I've also got their spring sing concert (missed the last one) and I know there is a mothers day brunch for my K5'er and a last day of school celebration for my k5'er. I plan on having DH cover for one and take off for the other.


How do you do it when your kids have school things you want to go to???

[cillybean83]

my kid is homeschooled, but his homeschool group does a lot of "during the day" activities. If I know about things in advance, I have my hubby take a personal day and either he stays with the DCK's or he takes our son to his school activity, or, my parents take my son, or they stay with the kids...

[Michelle]

hire an assistant

[melskids]

i take 'em with me. yup. all of them. the teachers run when they see me a-comin'

(or sometimes my hubby goes, or i close for the day)

[JenNJ]

I have my back-up come in while I am gone.

[SimpleMom]

I take 5 paid days off per year for sick time, school events, or appts. for my kids.
If I have used up that time, then i take off half a day or just one-two hours and pro-rate it for the parents.

I never used to, but I'm not missing out on my kids' events. They grow too fast as it is and I missed a few things for my oldest before I implemented this. Parent's are aware of this at the time of the interview.

good luck and don't miss your kids' events...if your anything like me (and I am guessing it's important since you posted about it) you'll regret it and you just can't get that time back.

[Cat Herder]

DH plans his work schedule around them (there are perks to being the boss man : and we take turns attending with our kids or staying with the DCK's....

[kathiemarie]

I take them with me. I have for years! I have never missed a performace or special school acitivity. We just finished up basketball season and I went to every home game. I would tell the parents they could either pick before we went to the game, durring the game at the school or after the game back at my house. Sometimes it ment that I had the kids later than regular pick up but it works.

When the kids aren't not walking I have a triple stroller they would go in and the walkers hold on while we walk. Is it perfect? Is it easy? No, but I'm able to go to the school activities that I want to go to. Have I missed some things? Of course, but my daughter understands that this is my job and if I worked out side the house I would miss alot more.

[Michelle]

I take them with me. I have for years! I have never missed a performace or special school acitivity. We just finished up basketball season and I went to every home game. I would tell the parents they could either pick before we went to the game, durring the game at the school or after the game back at my house. Sometimes it ment that I had the kids later than regular pick up but it works.

When the kids aren't not walking I have a triple stroller they would go in and the walkers hold on while we walk. Is it perfect? Is it easy? No, but I'm able to go to the school activities that I want to go to. Have I missed some things? Of course, but my daughter understands that this is my job and if I worked out side the house I would miss alot more.

I've done this before too, and started all kinds of gossip when people saw me with a stroller full of babies, they thought they were ours and I could here the whispering and gasping because we have 6 of our own kids(4 are grown and in college) especially when some of the kids are not the same race as us

[kathiemarie]

I've done this before too, and started all kinds of gossip when people saw me with a stroller full of babies, they thought they were ours and I could here the whispering and gasping because we have 6 of our own kids(4 are grown and in college) especially when some of the kids are not the same race as us

Me too! It's unreal what some people say. Though I would rather hear...They all yours? than....You'r the baby sitter?

[e.j.]

As long as I had enough space in my van to transport the day care kids, I would just bring them with me to school functions. I wasn't able to go to everything, but I was able to go to most functions.

[afmama]

This is one of the reasons why I want to start out doing drop-in care. My husband is TDY randomly and hopefully this will help when I want to go to my kids things. Or take a day off to coincide with my hubby's day off. I figure if I don't like it for whatever reason I can switch to full time. Where is starting with full time and switching to drop in would be close to impossible.

If I were you though I would just take the dck's with you! And if you have young one's maybe have your substitue help you out.

[snbauser]

I am lucky that since I have a large home/center in a residence, I have other teachers that work with me. When I didn't, my husband and I tried to arrange for him to be at the important events. Then I hired someone to work a couple of hours a day so that she could be my back up and I could attend these events.
It's hard because a lot of us get into this field to be there for our own children and then find out that we can't be there because we have others relying on us.

[JJPlaycare]

If you don't mind sharing, what do you pay your helpers/ assistants? Like if you would like them to come for a couple hours? Or what if you want them to come for entire day or a couple of entire days, what or how would you pay them?

[snbauser]

If you don't mind sharing, what do you pay your helpers/ assistants? Like if you would like them to come for a couple hours? Or what if you want them to come for entire day or a couple of entire days, what or how would you pay them?

When I was paying someone to just come help out and to cover for my time off, I was paying them for 3 hrs/day, 5 days/week and I started them at $120/week. Additional hours were paid at $8/hr.

Of course a lot of the rate depends on the area you are located and what type of person you were looking for. I didn't have any luck finding someone who could just work occassionally so I had to come up with a minimum number of hours I would pay them each week. If you could find someone who was say a stay at home mom or grandmother who might be willing to just be on call you might be able to get away with less.