Full Time, All the Time
with Britt and Robyn
I'm Britt. I work full time as a mom, wife, blogger and salesperson with a fancy management title. And I'm Robyn. I work as a project manager and between corporate meetings manage to cook a home-made meal every day. This blog is about our experiences of juggling full-time work with family.
Check out our personal blogs:
Miss Britt and Who's the Boss?
Short term child care solutions: what to do if you don’t get spring break off work
Categories: vacation, working mom
I have come to hate Columbus Day.
And President’s Day.
And teacher “work” days.
I don’t work in a bank or a post office, so all these days mean to me is what the heck am I going to do for child care for my school aged child?
While my youngest child is in a daycare that thankfully only closes on major holidays (we’re talking Christmas and Thanksgiving), I have a son at that difficult age where he’s normally in school full time, but not quite old enough to be left home alone all day if school is closed.
With the mother of inconvenient short term school breaks coming up - spring break - I’m wondering what other working parents do for child care in these situations?
My son’s after school taekwondo program offers a “day camp” option when school is closed. It’s an extra $25 a day (or $125 a week), plus I have to provide his meals and snacks. That’s on top of the $240 I already pay monthly. Like many families, we’re watching our budget more closely than ever right now and an extra $125 for child care is tough to swallow.
Fortunately, I work from home three days a week so I can keep him home with me on those days. The other two days I am able to bring him to work with me - although I can’t imagine that’s how he would choose to spend his spring break vacation.
But what about people who work in an office five days a week? I don’t think most corporations would welcome an onslaught of employee’s children every time the local school district declares a no school day.
I know a lot of the parks, museums and zoos offer day camps. Of course they don’t usually run from 9 to 6 and there’s the issue of added expense again.
Some parents I know are fortunate enough to have family members close by who can take their children on these rare occassions. Spending the day - or week - at a grandparent’s house has to be spring break nirvana for most kids. But, again, what about those parents who don’t have retired family members living near them?
What do you do?
Do you take time off from work? Do you dish out the extra cash for day camps?
How do you handle teacher in-service and spring break vacations if both parents (or the single parent) work full time?
Subscribe to blog via RSS
We are in the midst of spring break right now. Monday & Tuesday I took off of work. Tuesday I watched my neighbor’s boys which was great for my kids as they had an all day play date. Wed. a stay-at-home mom friend is watching my boys - again an all day play date (and I am ever-so-greatful to her for taking both of my boys), Thursday the mom of the kids I watched on Tuesday is watching mine… and then my company is closed on Friday.
It’s A LOT of juggling. We don’t have grandparents or other family members nearby that we can rely on, so the majority of our vacation time gets used for all of these days off from school. Thank goodness we have some friends who are in the same situation and we can trade “babysitting” for a day so that it evens out most of the time.
I am already concerned about the 2 weeks at the end of the summer between camp and the start of school. That’s a lot of time to cover, and no camps available - after paying for 8 weeks I don’t really want to fork out more money for camp.
patsyk | April 8th, 2009 at 12:01 pm
I work full time as does my husband. We each take a day, find playdates, trade with friends, keep them at home. You know, generally panic the whole week.
patriciaj | April 8th, 2009 at 5:03 pm
This has been very frustrating for me as a single mom. Technically if it’s a 3-day weekend, whichever parents has the kids for the weekend is supposed to have them for the holiday as well. We’re supposed to alternate school holidays and of course, he gets a few weeks of visitation in the summer time. The problem is, he doesn’t want to have to provide daycare on those school holidays so he just leaves the kids with me. Too bad I have to work too! My boys are only in preschool, but the preschool follows the regular school calendar. So when school is out, I have to pay extra for daycare…a lot extra! We do what we have to do though…I wish there was someone I could trade daycare with but I don’t know any SAHMs and most of the working moms I know are in the same situation I am.
Barbara Thompson | April 8th, 2009 at 9:05 pm
My daughter’s school district came up with the most BRILLIANT idea this year: Late start days.
One day each month, either my ex-husband or I have to blow a half-day of vacation time because she can’t go to school until 12:05 pm. At which time she goes straight to lunch, then recess, then a specials class, then math.
Is there before-care coverage? Of course not!
Luckily we both have flexible schedules and understanding bosses. But I know another mom in the classroom who is about to lose her job over this (or so she complains).
Other planning days she may get to have a playdate with Grammy or Nana (about 2 days a year). The rest of the time, once again we burn vacation days.
lynn @ human, being | April 9th, 2009 at 12:43 am
well right now I work for myself, so things are different and easier in that sense.
However, when i worked full time for the man, there was one day when three people watched my son. My husband’s aunt in the morning, then my brother in law in the afternoon, and then in late afternoon from 2-6, my mother in law.
I remember telling my co-worker, I have three people watching my son today. That coworker had no kids and really had no clue or just thoughts i was crazy and should be home. And all those three were free help.
Sometimes you just have to calculate what costs more, taking a day off or working.
vera babayeva | April 11th, 2009 at 11:35 pm
It’s already time to start thinking about day camps for the summer! Since summer vacation is so much longer than spring break, it really does take some coordination.
That’s why My Summer Adventures is a 12-week camp-like program. But, it’s split up into 2-week lessons, so you don’t have to enroll for the whole summer. If you have a family vacation planned, you can take those 2 weeks off, but then return the kids for the rest of the program, and they can just pick up where they left off.
You can find more details and program locations all over the country at: http://mysummeradventures.com
Full disclosure: I work with KinderCare, but thought this would be a valuable contribution since day camp is really a different can of worms.
Jamie | April 27th, 2009 at 1:03 pm