Thank you everyone for the suggestions!
I would also look to your community recreation & education dept. While you mentioned helping with sports teams, there are a lot of other activities for younger kids, too: crafts, summer day camp, halloween events, swimming lessons, etc. And they always need help beyond the teacher / skilled leader.
Also, your local library probably has some reading or open kids times that need assistance.
Thanks for the suggestion of other activities to help out with - especially the library. Do you have a sense of how often these fall outside a 9-5 schedule?
I'd recommend a community center and see if you can volunteer with programs- I taught toddlers (age 2-5) ice skating for about 10 years, that was fun.
Ice skating would be so much fun! I'd need some qualifications to do that here (Canada, eh?), but maybe an on ice helper for something would be a lower bar.
What’s this about free child care in Ottawa? I’ve got two under 6 and I like saving money.
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If you do advertise your child minding services on the local parenting Facebook groups I would suggest maybe including a price, even if it’s on the lower end. Online ads for free babysitting probably set off all kids of red flags.
Whereabouts in the city are you? If it turns out we're neighbours then maybe we can connect :) (either way hopefully we can meet at one of the ottawa meetups eventually) Agree that a lot of activities have built in adults already. Thanks for the tip about price.
I don't think you need to stress this one very much.
I had almost zero experience with babies and toddlers when I became a parent, to the point that my mother tattled to the nurse that I had never changed a diaper in my life. The nurse immediately brought me baby and a diaper and showed me how to do it.
I appreciate your thoughts on this - I wouldn't say I'm stressed about this, merely aware that unlike most humans throughout history, I could easily have my baby be the first baby I cared for. If there's a reasonably easy/cheap way to avert that, I'd like to - I'm asking now so I have years to solve the problem. And of course I plan on taking a prenatal class when the time comes.
The other reason I'm interested in this, is that my partner and I have spent a lot of time on summer jobs working with kids and really enjoyed it - but there's no easy way to stay involved with kids when you're childless adults moving into office jobs, and we (he more than I but also myself) miss that. Kids are fun! (and annoying, and frustrating and a lot of work... I know).
Again, thank you everyone for the suggestions - I'm going to look into what kind of evening/weekend programs the local community centre and pool has, as well as the library, schools, sports leagues and misc clubs... a friend of mine is a brownie leader so there might be an in there. Between all of those, given that I'm not in a rush and can wait for the right season of programs, I'm hopeful I can find something!