Progress Report: Childcare Search
After my last post on finding childcare we decided that, rather than look for a family daycare for the little guy, we would look for a nanny. I just decided I wasn't that comfortable with the idea of a family daycare, and all the daycare centers I found are already full for the coming school year. Most nannies I have spoken with charge $12-15/hour and, since we will only need her for 30 hrs/week (since hubby will watch the little guy in the mornings), a nanny is actually cheaper than the daycare centers I looked at (although still probably more expensive than a family daycare), and she can also help us keep up with some daily chores, like dishes and sweeping/vacuuming, which is a big bonus.
So, I put an ad on craigslist for a nanny to care for the little guy starting in August. We got many responses, but only a few were promising. I made a list of my top three or four candidates and started calling them. The first two I spoke with sounded good on the phone, but one never sent me her references and the other one's references didn't check out (I spoke to one reference, but I got the feeling it was her mother or some other relative; the other number she gave me was a wrong number, and after I emailed her to see if I had written it down wrong she never got back to me). Another candidate did not want to work in our neighborhood.
But there was one candidate was at the top of my list almost from the beginning: she was one of the few who actually sent me a resume, even though I specifically asked for one in my ad, she had worked for a couple of families with children the same age as the little guy, and she worked for both of those families for more than two years, she also recently completed her AA degree. We met her yesterday and we liked her. I have spoken to one of her references so far and she gave me a glowing recommendation. So we are thinking she is the one. I still have a couple more references to talk to and we will do a background check, but I don't expect anything bad to turn up.
So hopefully she will work out and we will be all set for childcare for the year. I am still thinking that I will probably put him into a daycare next year, when he's 2, since I will be able to submit applications early enough to possibly get him in to one of the daycare centers(most of the ones I looked at have a winter application deadline for the following fall) and at that point he would probably get more from being around the other kids and in a more structured environment.
1 comment:
It is nice that you found your little guy a nanny, but I am curious as to what you disliked about family daycare? Your child gets individual attention unlike centers where most of the time there are more children then there are staff, they are in a home setting, much less to adjust to, and a family daycare can only have 6 to 8 children at anyone time which lowers the chance of injuries and neglect. The licensing agencies of the family daycare is very strict with a number of rules and regulations. Maybe you should look into what those rules are that they have to follow. We have to brush your child's teeth after lunch because parents are not doing their jobs so it's been pushed on to use the family daycare providers. We have to have people come into our homes, go through all of our belongings to make sure the house is safe for your child. We have to write progress reports and sit down with parents and talk to you about how your child is developing. We can't have certain play toys in our yards even if we have younger children of our own that would enjoy them, because it may cause harm to your child. Before you sit back and make it sound like a family daycare is such a bad place to send your child in comparison to a center do your homework and see what we have to put up with to take care of your child.
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