Grab yourself a coffee and put your feet up - this could take a while, and get a bit messy!
Since I was very young I always wanted children. I love children!
I've spent the greater part of my life looking after children in one way or another. From babysitting at 12, being an Educational Assistant, Private Nanny, Early Childhood Educator, working with special needs and now a current private daycare operator kids have always been a big part of my life. I have been honestly blessed to do this line of work.
Did you know that in many places the cost for child care can equal or actually be more than a college or university education?
(By the time the child goes to school that is)
Did you also know that your child very likely won't remember anything before the age of 3?
So why do you need to pay so much for child care? It's all just glorified babysitting right?
Childs play! isn't it?
Let me tell you - it's not!!
Some of my first experiences with caring for kids were when I was babysitting.
Back then, (and I might just date myself a little too much here) parents would hire a babysitter who was often no more than 12yrs old, go out for the evening, leave a phone number and their kids and at the end of the evening come home and pay a very minimal amount to said young child care provider. I lived in a small town and things were relatively safe, however, on one particular occasion I was babysitting with my best friend (who thank God was often by my side on such occasions) and things got a little more than scary!
We were sitting in a living room watching t.v. with our little "charge" for the evening and my friend decided to go to the kitchen for a drink. As she passed the front door she saw a man who had been standing just outside the door looking in turn and head off to the side of the house. She came running up to tell me about it when we had both of our blood run cold at the same time. The back door! Being the braver of the 2 of us she ran back down towards the kitchen to double check the sliding back door was locked. Just as she entered the kitchen the man was coming across the deck towards the door in question. To this day I don't know where she found the nerve cause I'm sure I'd have froze up, but she kept going and hit the lock on the latch just as he was reaching out for it.
He turned and left toward another side of the house. Back up stairs in the the master bedroom with a baseball bat, a fire poker and some hair spray we called a neighbour who came over and stayed with us and thankfully things ended well! It's an experience that you don't forget though.
So was it worth the $6/hr?
Years passed and I continued babysitting but never alone and not quite as often. When I decided to head off to college I enrolled in Fine Arts and left child care for the time being.
As life would have it things didn't work out with the Art course and I found myself trying to figure out what else to do.
I decided on E.C.E and long story short I ended up buying a one way ticket to Australia to take a course. When your 22 why not?
Australia was ranked as one of the top countries in the world for teaching and early childhood education and when I got there I realized why.
Our courses and centers looked very similar at first glance but as you really got into them they were vastly different. I'm still so glad I took my training overseas.
The cost of living at the time was the same as Canada but the pay was MUCH higher and I planned to stay and work there. Again, however, things didn't work out that way and I ended up home.
I worked a couple of odd small jobs and by chance ended up working as a nanny for an incredible family that I still have the pleasure of being in contact with to this day. I absolutely LOVED working one on one with their daughter and thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it.
Of course, I had gone to school to work in a center or eventually one day run one so I decided to pass the position along and tried a position in a licensed daycare center not far from me.
The experience was, to say the least, awful!!
If people wonder whether all daycares are alike, I can tell you without a doubt absolutely not!
This center looked great on the outside, and if you took a tour through it I'm sure it looked just as nice. Questions were answered to suit people's needs and the business was growing.
The owner was fairly young. In her early thirties I'd say with a child of her own there and another on the way.
I ended up in the toddler room and let's just say the differences between there and Australia were overwhelming. Little kids who could barely speak were asking for "The Wheels on the Bus" to be played while their requests were drowned out by The Dixie Chicks song that was being blast as the room leader bounced balls off their heads. No I'm not kidding! This was supposed to entice them into gross motor play.
Kids were sat in cubbies while they waited to have their diapers changed. It was nothing like I'd imagined or hoped. My time at that center was short and due to illness that prevented me from continuing to work and the issues I had with the place itself I ended up quitting.
By the time I left, the center with a total of about 86 kids had 2 cases of scarlet fever, half of the kids all had chicken pox, and the director who was pregnant at the time was rubbing her 3 yr old's arm on one of the sick kids in hopes that he would get "natural immunity".
This experience and my compounding health issues took me away from child care somewhat for a while.
I eventually veered back in a similar direction and enrolled in a Developmental Service Workers course at Humber in Toronto and started an incredible career working with individuals with special needs. This job was often intertwined with child care work and I spent a fair amount of it working with younger children of all ages and abilities with varying conditions.
I, fortunately have been blessed with 3 incredible kids of my own. Once I had my second son I decided not to return to work and to put my education, experience and love for kids into creating a way I could care for my own kids and still have an income.
I created a home child care business (essentially a private home daycare) and haven't looked back.
Having my own daycare I can honestly say has been one of the most enriching experiences of my life, and the most challenging at times.
I started the journey off with some incredible families who I'm still friends with to this day. I get to see the kids continue to grow and am so glad for those connections I made.
Often you hear about how "over priced" daycare is and from a parents perspective I get it. It's costly having kids! Raising them is a lot of work.
One of the problems with having a home child care business is that while you get a much more personal experience with the families than you might in a larger licensed child care center, is that you also get the odd situation where people will try to take advantage of that relationship.
Honestly, I know I have been blessed based on stories I have heard from close friends and neighbors who were also in the same business. People skipping out on pay, refusing to pay for sick days or stat days and bringing kids with various illnesses and dropping them off knowingly because they felt the risk of having problems at work out-weighed the risk of exposing all the other kids in the care. No one likes to admit it but it happens!
The expenses of running a child care out of your home are much higher than some people realize as well......that is if you do it right! By that I mean you provide safe toys for the kids, healthy meals, crafts and sensory activities, outings and the list could go on and on. Not to mention the fact that your home should be comfortable for the kids in your care. In that case your heat, a/c, lights, and other utilities are running for long hours everyday!
Insurance on your home is higher because let's face it - little kids are high risk people to care for.
Your first aid training has to be up to date and you need police background checks.
Child care is also a business - licensed or not you have to pay taxes too! Yes, it's not just cash under the table all the time.
Then the biggest part of owning a child care business - the individual kids. You are supposed to treat them all the same, and you do. However, each one is unique and they all have different needs and different skill levels and interests. Parent's paying for the care expect a certain amount of attention and teaching if they aren't just looking for babysitters. They want their little ones to learn. So you have "potty training" (which I even wrote an e-book on you can find on Amazon called "The Dread Potty" or "The Dreaded Potty 2.0"), and you have to teach some to walk, others to talk, there's hitting and biting and simple things like ABC's!
You give all your energy to them in the day and at the end of the day you have to still have patience for your own kids, and family members. You have to dig up that extra bit of energy to spend quality time with your own kids who have had to share you all day long.
Over the years I have questioned from time to time if the daycare took me away from my own kids sometimes. Honestly in some ways I think it did, but more often it gave me the chance to see them grow, enjoy the moments I got with them other parents might've missed out on, and ultimately they made some of their best friends in daycare.
You can find people on either side of any fence. Whether it's home daycare vs. licensed center or any other parenting choice or topic you choose. In the end the decision is entirely personal.
I will always be thankful for the choice I made to do child care and for wanting to have kids play a big part in my life. I couldn't imagine my life without my kids! ALL of them!
Every little one that I had the honor of helping to raise.
One of the biggest decisions you have to make when you are parent is who to leave your children with when you can't be with them.
I cannot put into words how grateful I am that the families I've had chose me!
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