When I used to work full-time, I took my daughter to a licensed in-home daycare next to my office for - get this - $100 a week. Yeah, it was less than $2 an hour - she was there generally from 7:30/8 to 6/6:30 - and I had every intention of taking her baby sister there with her when I returned to work. Even at $200 a week it was a total bargain for 2 kids. I had no idea how good I had it!

For various reasons I won't get into here, we moved after the birth of our second daughter and I therefore left that job as well as that in-home daycare. In my new town, I'm finding that I would spend around $600 a week to send both my girls to daycare full-time. At that rate, why not get a nanny? I decided not to return to full-time employment for the time being - the cost of childcare being a major factor in that decision.

So, I'm curious. What do you use for childcare and how much does it cost per week (total or per child)? How did you find your childcare provider? Also, how happy are you with your arrangement? I loved mine - my daughter was in a home environment with other kids her age, and I could even visit her on my lunch break!

We currently spend $230 for 2 kids, to go to daycare M,T,W.
It is an in home daycare located about 5 minutes from our house. Our daycare provider is a wonderful woman and the kids LOVE going to her house to play with their friends. Three years ago, when we were looking for daycare, we did drive bys to check out the homes- to check the neighborhood, check the house, etc. If it was dumpy, I didn't bother calling/interviewing. There weren't a lot to choose from at the time-
I do remember interviewing one potential daycare provider- we walked in, she looked at my daughter (who was a babe at the time), and said "so, she's how old?" and then proceeded to give her "schpeel". The daycare area of the house was BORING and she was cold. The next woman we interviewed looked at our daughter and "oh she is beautiful, do you mind if I hold her" and on and on and on. We knew right then that she was the provider for us. Her daycare area was FUN and educational- books and activities and songs, etc. The only downside, at the time, was that she only did daycare M,T,W. Now I am more than happy to only work outside the home on M,T,and W.
peace,
earthmama

Sounds like a great setup, earthmama. I know the feeling when you just know that a person will be great with your kids. Isn't it strange that someone who you describe as boring and cold would choose childcare as her profession??

Thanks for sharing!

That is strange! Scary thought- maybe she's only in it for the money!! I am so glad we never chose her...

My daughter has 2 1/2 year old quadruplets and an older son who is 3 1/2 (gonna be 4 in July). She has 2 "work at home" jobs plus finishing her college degree online. Her husband is co-owner of one of the businesses (web hosting/development) and they also have a "bee farm" currently with 50 bee hives. They could NOT afford daycare for 5 children under the age of 4! There are family members who come to her house to help out in the mornings, from 8 - 1:30 (nap time for all kids), but after naptime until bedtime (8 pm for quads, 9 pm for big brother) they're on their own. My daughter packs in as much "work" as she can during the afternoon nap "quiet time", then after all the kids are in bed, they work until around midnight. Way to exhausting for me, but it's the ONLY way they can get their work done. She has a blog http://MultipleMayhem.com where she can rant and rave, then get back to work! To me she is a "wonder woman!"

Oh my gosh, your daughter is my hero! I can NOT imagine what life must like in that household. Actually, I can - now that I've read her blog. And I commend her! I don't know how she does it.

I don't know if something like this would fit their budget, but have they ever considered hosting an au pair to help out with the 5 of those precious bundles? Maybe a family of 7 doesn't actually have any extra bedrooms, but it's just a thought! The cost is roughly $325 a week for up to 45 hours of childcare (and that's per family, not per child). The nice part is, the hours are completely flexible so the au pair would be able to help out whenever needed, ie. the after nap till 8/9pm time frame when they're on their own, plus weekends too, as long as the au pair has one full weekend off per month.

It sounds like the extra help would come in handy to them! If your daughter would like to know more about the program, please have her contact me at caitlin.sigler@lcc.culturalcare.com.

Hadn't thought about an au pair, although I've known a few people who have had an au pair from time to time. The downside of having an au pair is that my daughter has a 3 bedroom/2 bath house out in the "country" on ten acres. They bought the house before they knew they'd be having quads. They had to do a sun room / playroom addition before the quads started to walk, as their house had NO room for them to play.

I will give her your information - thanks for passing it along to me.

Our daycare is by the month and it's $655 per month, which comes to about $167 per week per child. However, there is a registration fee each year. The registration for babies is only $185 per year. As they get older, however, the registration goes up alot but the monthly payment goes down. From what I understand from my friends in other states, this is one of the cheapest monthly prices for the quality of care and learning that he receives. Most of my friends, even in small towns, pay a lot more. The only downside is that they are closed for teacher's workdays and they close promptly at 5pm, not 6 or 7pm so my job had to be accomodating as this was the only worthwhile place where I live. There were places much cheaper than this but I would never leave my son there.

I figured space would be at a premium in their house. Oh well, maybe if they build another addition!

That sounds pretty darn reasonable. Most of what I've been seeing is about twice that.

Isn't it funny how the term "you get what you pay for" really doesn't seem to apply in childcare? I mean, my $100/week in-home daycare was fabulous! Then I hear about a pricey daycare facility in my area actually *losing* three children under the age of 2 - and they didn't even know they were gone! The children wandered off and were found a block away on a busy street where passersby noticed them, took them in and called the police. It took them forever to find out where they were even missing from, because the daycare staff were unaware that anyone was missing. Scary stuff.

We pay 140/week for daycare. The ratio is 8:2 and I get a little report card about his day! We are happy with this set-up.

I currently pay $240/week for my 2 year old son. The day care is open from 6:30 am to 6:30pm (but I drop my son off at 8:30 for bkfst and then he is picked up by 5 or 5:30). I live in the DC Metro area and that seems to be the going rate around here (unless you do a home day care and many of those are not much less). I am happy with the place though and my son loves it.

He initially was in a home day care and for an infant the cost was $250/week and went down to $200 when he turned 1. I loved that place b/c he loved the women there who took care of him and he had friends of all ages, but we moved and couldn't keep him there.

I live in an expensive city, and my caretaker is considered a bargain at $ 1640.00 per month, for four days a week. I'm looking at a daycare now, which runs around $ 600.00 per month for a three year old child. Not cheap, is it?

You know the crazy thing about daycare, besides the outlandish prices, is also the fact that we're dealing with FIVE little ones - four that would be in the same age group. At one time I did a bunch of calling around to places that offered a "mom's day out" program - at least a break for one day. Again the prices were high, but not one of them would "take" the quads - each and every place told me "we would have room for the 3 year old". One place actually said they had "room" for the 3 year old and perhaps one of the quads. I don't think so!

I am in NY (Long Island) I used to pay (quit my job in April) $825 for one child M-F 8:30 to 3:30. I LOVED the corporate daycare center I sent him to. Great security, large rooms, indoor playroom. I would move back....ha ha

I'm in Northern, VA (15-mins outside of DC) and I have an in-home child care provider. She charges $180/wk for a toddler (over 2 yrs old). The price also includes two meals and snacks, 5-days a week. She's fantastic (better than fantastic). I used her for my son who is now going into the second grade and he was reading at 4 yrs old. Her hours are 7AM to 6PM and she never takes a vacation. She has one or two helpers depending on the number of children. I thank God every day that I found her.

We have been pretty happy with the overall costs of having an Au Pair-- we have had 9 over the years, and it has always worked out to be the best option, both in terms of cost and in terms of flexibility (which is important, because my work schedule varies week by week).

If you would like to know more about how working moms feel about having Au Pairs, and what advice they have to offer to make their Au Pair relationship work, check out the blog at www.AuPairMom.com. It is not affiliated with any agency, and it offers advice to host moms, from host moms. It can give you a pretty accurate view of the Au Pair option.

I have a 4 1/2 year old and an almost 9 year old my current daycare bill for the month of July is: $1,078.15. This is for my son to attend 15 days and my daughter to attend 12 days this month.

It is a great center that has a pool, playground, fenced-in yard. The staff have a degree in preschool or elementary education and also have aids. The school age kids go on a field trip each week during the summer and each week has themed activities to coincide with the field trip.

Unfortunately, it is very expensive for us. We are trying to find alternative work for me so that I can work from home. Any suggestions?

We pay $670/mo for three days of preschool (8:30a - 3:30p) for my 3 1/2 year old. The ratio is 6:1; max number of kids is 30. Parents provide lunches. The kids garden and do yoga. It's a little bit Montessori but not overly rigid. We love it.

Hey everyone! My son is almost three and he goes to Primrose m-f from 6:30am to about 5pm and it cost me $174 a week for the Preschool class which is for kids 3 and up. We used to have him in Kindercare and all he did was color and it was costing us $179 a week so we pulled him out and put him into Primrose and absolutely LOVE it! It is an actual accredited school so they have very structured curriculum (well as structured as you can have for 2 and 3 year olds ) I see a big difference in him from the old daycare he was at and Primrose.

I'm only working part-time (and very part time at that!), and have three kids in school. So, luckily, I haven't had to deal with the child care dilemma as much as others. I have hired sitters when needed, and have had really good luck with Care.com. It's downright astounding how much child care costs... My sister works about 20 hours a week, and has an in-home nanny (she has an office in her garage-- great set up!) she found through Care.com as well. She's going to switch to part-time daycare starting in September (in addition to the nanny). It'll be interesting to see how that compares.

We will be hiring a nanny (interviewing one tonight, actually!), and the rate here is about $12/hr. We will negotiate up a little once we have two kids.

After my second was born and I was looking to go back to work full time I looked into three centers near our house and for a 28m old and 8m old it would have cost of $3200/month. The slightly cheaper place $2800/month would have added to the commute too much to make the trip worth it. I found 2 home providers that I liked and they cost only $1000/month, but i wasn't happy with the number of children and they couldn't take the baby right away.

We ended up doing a nanny. We were paying her above the table 40 hours and cash for the other 15 hours a week she was with us. It was about $800/week. It wasn't any real savings, but the flexibility of having someone at the house was worth the extra money. If the boys got sick someone was there to give them meds or be available to make the emergency drs appointment that was always "in 15 minutes". We also have our nanny do light housekeeping, cooking and laundry which are huge time savers for us. I also like the flexibility of being able to put our oldest, now 4, in a preschool. We'd drop him off in the morning and the nanny would pick him up at 2:15pm.

All of this is only possible because we are blessed to have the income we do. If we made less we would not have this option.

We are paying our new nanny 800/week for 55 hours. At the end of the week we pay 880 adding in the taxes. We could save a lot if it was all cash, but I'm just not comfortable doing that.

I'm new here,and reading everone else letters,finding ababysitter is hard especially when you have to work weird hours like I do.Sometimes I have to be in work at one in the morning.And there is noone who can watch an active ten year old from six at night til ten thirty in the morning,just so I can get some sleep.And yes I,m a single mother,who works and lives in a small town.I only work part time,and don't make enough to hire a babysitter.Thankfully I have two older daughters,one twenty one and one nineteen.So they watch my ten year old son.They will alternate back and forth,and I pay them thirty to fifty dollars aweek,depending who is watching my son during that week.When my girls were young I use to have a trade off with other mothers in my neighborhood,and we would watch each others children for free.It might be an idea for some other parents.If work hours are different,then the interesting parties can alternate watching each others children for free.It's a great way to save money.And to get to know and make some new friends.It might help,with the prices of everything going up.

I use the private daycare where I work and it is $131 a week for infants. They also provide his formula while he's there, which was a pleasant surprise. I just bring diapers and wipes. The cost is roughly half of what I would pay on the outside for care in this area so I am thankful this service is available. The staff is great and they do an individualized curriculum for the development of each child. Like if the baby is 3 months old and doesn't lift his head well, they put him down for more tummy time, etc. Of course I would rather be at home with my son, but that's not an option for at least another year when my contract is up.... so this is a reasonable alternative.