Author Topic: School Age summer care  (Read 4822 times)

MayDay

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School Age summer care
« on: February 28, 2018, 05:19:45 AM »
How is the summer planning going for everyone?

We are booked for June and July. I just have to sort out August. This year I am estimating our summer childcare for two kids will be 5k. Less than two infants in daycare, but not by much! To be fair we do not at all try to do this frugally. One of the things important to me about working full time again was providing a good summer experience. I remember going to full time childcare in later elementary and hating it so much.

Here is what we are doing:

2nd week June: DD to girl scout day camp, DS to autism camp
3-4 week June: both kids to autism camp (it is for siblings too). Then hired a sitter to do afternoons as camp is half day. Sitter will take them to pool, etc. These weeks are $$$ but the camp provides some therapy

1st week July- vacation
2nd week july- kids at sleepaway Y camp. This is a splurge but I have fond memories of sleepaway camp. It is 600$/week per kid
3rd week july- DD is still at Y camp(hers is 2 weeks), DS will do community center childcare. School therapist stops in.
4th week July, first three weeks August- nothing scheduled yet bit probably mix of nanny three days a week (so they can go to pool, museums, etc) and community center childcare so they can see friends and have a bit more structure. Also it's cheaper than nanny.


2Cent

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #1 on: February 28, 2018, 10:23:54 AM »
I try to get some work part time from home days. It is also nice to spend some down time with the kids at home if it doesn't cost you too much of your holidays.

mm1970

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #2 on: February 28, 2018, 01:16:14 PM »
We have done nothing.

We are planning a 2 week summer vacation.  The question is do we
1.  Fly Wed to Wed.  This is cheaper and allows us to have the weekends at our families' houses.  However, that leaves 2 days at the beginning and 2 days at the end with no childcare, so we have to work half work days.  Which is undesirable around 2 weeks off.
2.  Fly weekends.  We could fly on Friday night and come back on a Sunday.   We get 3 weekends out of it this way.  This will be more expensive for 2 reasons.  It's more expensive to fly AND we end up with a full week at the end of the month where we would need summer camp for 2.

Anyway, that part TBD.  That's June.

My kinder kid's after school program runs during the summer.  I will have him in that for July and Aug.  No word on the price, but 6 years ago it was equivalent to the cost of the cheapest weekly camp, but includes breakfast and lunch.  There's also a free drop-in program at a couple of our schools - but due to budget cuts they recently tightened the eligibility.  So, if there's space after the eligible folks get in, I could put him in there.  Problem is, I won't know that until too late to get into camp, and by then I have to give up my after care "spot".  So, after care it is.

Big kid is almost 12.  Not sure what to do with him, he's old enough to be at home alone in many ways.  If we do the Wed-Wed vacation, we are left with 7 full weeks of summer.  And some half weeks, because the fucking school district HATES working parents and are starting school on a Weds AGAIN!!!

Most likely we'll do 4-5 weeks of camp and 2-3 weeks of "home", having us work at home with him for half days or some such thing.  He really enjoyed sailing camp (2 weeks, half days) last summer.  Baseball camp if it's available when he needs it.  Maybe chess camp again.  Who knows.  Camps start to dry up after age 12.  I'll try to tire him out mostly!

EmFrugal

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #3 on: February 28, 2018, 01:30:30 PM »
I have been busy working on this as well. My goal is to alternate camp weeks and at-home weeks, with a couple 3-4 night vacations at the beach/mountains built in.

Right now my kiddos are signed up for a general summer fun camp through our community center, a couple vacation bible camps (which are very affordable and sometimes free), and we are purchasing a pool membership.

I work very part-time so am mostly a full-time parent, but I remember feeling massive amounts of stress last summer when I had all three at home. Wow, I really needed that one morning where all three were in school for at least 4 hours during the regular year. They are ages 2, 4, and 6 now. I'm trying to do a better job of lining up camps to avoid that anxiety I encountered last summer!

MayDay

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #4 on: February 28, 2018, 06:42:46 PM »
I am now FT so I can justify spending on the needed care, but when I was a SAHM and PT I still tried to do a camp every other projects every third week for my own sanity.

mm1970, so many yeses to schools hating working parents! Our metro area has an invite only gifted summer thing. It runs 8-noon, and they sent the info out months after all the other camps had registration. And it cost more than the full day programs. Um. Thanks. But no thanks.

I am not looking forward to when DS is 12-13-14. You are right that there are ew programs, but I still don't really want him home full time. For now H works from home, so he can cover basic supervision, but if we leave the kids with him they'll just watch TV. I don't want them to spend the summer doing that.

formerlydivorcedmom

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #5 on: March 01, 2018, 08:21:48 AM »
I have my kids for 6 weeks out of the summer (the other 6 weeks they are with their dad).  During my time:

The kids will spend a week divided between my mom and my in-laws at "grandparent camp."

I partnered with another mom, and our girls (age 12) are both doing half-day volleyball camp two weeks during the summer.  I can do morning drop-offs before work, and the other mom, who is a teacher, will pick them up at lunch.

My daughter also wants to do a sleep-away church camp for half a week. 

During those 3 weeks, my 8-year-old will go to his normal day care.  It's a tae kwon do facility, and they do a lot of field trips and lessons during the summer.  He loves it!

That leaves 2 weeks.  I may take one of those weeks off.  The other week, they can stay home alone if they promise on the life of their computers not to kill each other.

mm1970

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #6 on: March 02, 2018, 11:37:47 AM »
I am now FT so I can justify spending on the needed care, but when I was a SAHM and PT I still tried to do a camp every other projects every third week for my own sanity.

mm1970, so many yeses to schools hating working parents! Our metro area has an invite only gifted summer thing. It runs 8-noon, and they sent the info out months after all the other camps had registration. And it cost more than the full day programs. Um. Thanks. But no thanks.

I am not looking forward to when DS is 12-13-14. You are right that there are ew programs, but I still don't really want him home full time. For now H works from home, so he can cover basic supervision, but if we leave the kids with him they'll just watch TV. I don't want them to spend the summer doing that.

Ha ha yes, the gifted camp!  We did that one year.  It wasn't too bad.  It was 8:30 to noon, and that year he was also in a free drop-off program.  So we just needed to be able to pick him (and his buddy) up at lunch and drop him off at the drop in program.  Some extra driving.

The funniest thing is all the "full day" camps which are 9 to 3.  Um, that's not a full day!  I've kind of even just given up and figure half day is fine.  We can drop him off at home when it's over.  TV all day!!  He has friends who occasionally biked down to visit last summer, but most of the time he/we weren't home.  Maybe that's an option too.  I'm pretty sure we'll have to upgrade his phone at the beginning of the summer to give it an actual phone #, not just WIFI.

Sibley

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #7 on: March 02, 2018, 12:19:12 PM »
Get rid of the tv? Can't watch what you don't have...

kanga1622

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #8 on: March 03, 2018, 06:22:12 AM »
DH is off work June and July every year so that works great. He takes them to the library, runs errands, and sometimes they go visit Grandma for the day. We will also be doing some pool time in the evenings when I am able to help supervise.

We will have 2-3 weeks in May (depending on when school gets out) and 3 weeks in August to cover. We are hoping Grandma can cover 2 days a week and I will be home 3 days a week then. I can make up hours on the weekends or complete work from home if the kids are busy on their own.

We’d love to do the electrical/circuit/Robotics summer program for our oldest but it is crazy expensive and happens during a week when DH is home so we don’t need care.

Oddly, our after school program runs a summer program for child care but it only runs June 1-July 31. So basically drops a lot of parents in our situation where there are still 5ish weeks to figure out.

This will be our first summer with no daycare as a backup option so we are struggling with the change. Last summer was DH’s first on a 10 month contract rather than his old 9 month contract. His old contract basically left us 1-2 weeks in May to cover so it was much easier.

AmberTheCat

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #9 on: March 04, 2018, 07:15:37 AM »
Was talking to friends about what their college-age daughters are going to do for 4-5 weeks when they get back from summer mission trips and study abroad trips. 

The girls want to do some short nanny gigs; and are putting out ads/info on the nextdoor neighbor app which is commonly used around here.  I  think there's a lot of college students who would be able to help out a few weeks here and there. Not sure where you'd find them, but keep these kids in mind!

mm1970

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #10 on: March 05, 2018, 11:02:22 AM »
Was talking to friends about what their college-age daughters are going to do for 4-5 weeks when they get back from summer mission trips and study abroad trips. 

The girls want to do some short nanny gigs; and are putting out ads/info on the nextdoor neighbor app which is commonly used around here.  I  think there's a lot of college students who would be able to help out a few weeks here and there. Not sure where you'd find them, but keep these kids in mind!

YES!  We did that one summer - my older son's preschool closed for a month in the summer, and his preschool teacher's daughter worked for us watching him for 3 weeks.

Mongoose

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #11 on: March 07, 2018, 03:28:20 PM »
I work quarter time so we have the kids in day camps one week per month (3 total for the summer). They aren't really full day (9 am - 3 pm) but my hours are flexible so I can make up the difference over the course of the rest of the month. Total of $1020 for both kids.

MayDay

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #12 on: March 07, 2018, 09:11:16 PM »
Get rid of the tv? Can't watch what you don't have...

If I need to get actual work done, I need some screen time. They'll play creatively, but not 8 hours a day. I legit need it as a babysitter.

We had a snow day Mon. Morning chores first. TV 8-11 while H worked from home but had meetings so they had to be quiet. Babysitter took them 11-2 and did crafts and cooking projects. Me home at 2. TV 2-4 because I needed to concentrate on work and not get interrupted with "she hit me" "he took my Lego". Playtime 4-5 as I finished up.

She thing for me is I need to THINK about my work which I can't do if they are screaming in the background or interrupting me every ten minutes. I can get an hour here, and hour there of quiet playing, playing outside, etc. But it is pretty constant interrupting without screens. Which is age appropriate.

2Cent

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #13 on: March 08, 2018, 02:17:45 AM »
Get rid of the tv? Can't watch what you don't have...

If I need to get actual work done, I need some screen time. They'll play creatively, but not 8 hours a day. I legit need it as a babysitter.

We had a snow day Mon. Morning chores first. TV 8-11 while H worked from home but had meetings so they had to be quiet. Babysitter took them 11-2 and did crafts and cooking projects. Me home at 2. TV 2-4 because I needed to concentrate on work and not get interrupted with "she hit me" "he took my Lego". Playtime 4-5 as I finished up.

She thing for me is I need to THINK about my work which I can't do if they are screaming in the background or interrupting me every ten minutes. I can get an hour here, and hour there of quiet playing, playing outside, etc. But it is pretty constant interrupting without screens. Which is age appropriate.
How about reading. I would be under for hours with a good book when I was a kid. I was about 10 when I really got into it though.

MayDay

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #14 on: March 08, 2018, 07:39:53 PM »
Get rid of the tv? Can't watch what you don't have...

If I need to get actual work done, I need some screen time. They'll play creatively, but not 8 hours a day. I legit need it as a babysitter.

We had a snow day Mon. Morning chores first. TV 8-11 while H worked from home but had meetings so they had to be quiet. Babysitter took them 11-2 and did crafts and cooking projects. Me home at 2. TV 2-4 because I needed to concentrate on work and not get interrupted with "she hit me" "he took my Lego". Playtime 4-5 as I finished up.

She thing for me is I need to THINK about my work which I can't do if they are screaming in the background or interrupting me every ten minutes. I can get an hour here, and hour there of quiet playing, playing outside, etc. But it is pretty constant interrupting without screens. Which is age appropriate.
How about reading. I would be under for hours with a good book when I was a kid. I was about 10 when I really got into it though.

For 8 hours though? My kids like to read, but we are talking an hour. Which I think is actually quite a lot at 8 and 10.

2Cent

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #15 on: March 09, 2018, 03:53:25 AM »
Get rid of the tv? Can't watch what you don't have...

If I need to get actual work done, I need some screen time. They'll play creatively, but not 8 hours a day. I legit need it as a babysitter.

We had a snow day Mon. Morning chores first. TV 8-11 while H worked from home but had meetings so they had to be quiet. Babysitter took them 11-2 and did crafts and cooking projects. Me home at 2. TV 2-4 because I needed to concentrate on work and not get interrupted with "she hit me" "he took my Lego". Playtime 4-5 as I finished up.

She thing for me is I need to THINK about my work which I can't do if they are screaming in the background or interrupting me every ten minutes. I can get an hour here, and hour there of quiet playing, playing outside, etc. But it is pretty constant interrupting without screens. Which is age appropriate.
How about reading. I would be under for hours with a good book when I was a kid. I was about 10 when I really got into it though.

For 8 hours though? My kids like to read, but we are talking an hour. Which I think is actually quite a lot at 8 and 10.
You would be surprised how much they can read if they get into the story. If it's a chore it will be hard to do over 20 minutes, but if they like it they can keep going on and on. If they don't like books, comics will do as well. You can probably get a bunch second hand ones for cheap.

Sibley

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #16 on: March 15, 2018, 10:16:11 AM »
Get rid of the tv? Can't watch what you don't have...

If I need to get actual work done, I need some screen time. They'll play creatively, but not 8 hours a day. I legit need it as a babysitter.

We had a snow day Mon. Morning chores first. TV 8-11 while H worked from home but had meetings so they had to be quiet. Babysitter took them 11-2 and did crafts and cooking projects. Me home at 2. TV 2-4 because I needed to concentrate on work and not get interrupted with "she hit me" "he took my Lego". Playtime 4-5 as I finished up.

She thing for me is I need to THINK about my work which I can't do if they are screaming in the background or interrupting me every ten minutes. I can get an hour here, and hour there of quiet playing, playing outside, etc. But it is pretty constant interrupting without screens. Which is age appropriate.
How about reading. I would be under for hours with a good book when I was a kid. I was about 10 when I really got into it though.

For 8 hours though? My kids like to read, but we are talking an hour. Which I think is actually quite a lot at 8 and 10.
You would be surprised how much they can read if they get into the story. If it's a chore it will be hard to do over 20 minutes, but if they like it they can keep going on and on. If they don't like books, comics will do as well. You can probably get a bunch second hand ones for cheap.

I happily read ALL DAY. Just requires a good book.

PoutineLover

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #17 on: March 15, 2018, 11:23:54 AM »
Get rid of the tv? Can't watch what you don't have...

If I need to get actual work done, I need some screen time. They'll play creatively, but not 8 hours a day. I legit need it as a babysitter.

We had a snow day Mon. Morning chores first. TV 8-11 while H worked from home but had meetings so they had to be quiet. Babysitter took them 11-2 and did crafts and cooking projects. Me home at 2. TV 2-4 because I needed to concentrate on work and not get interrupted with "she hit me" "he took my Lego". Playtime 4-5 as I finished up.

She thing for me is I need to THINK about my work which I can't do if they are screaming in the background or interrupting me every ten minutes. I can get an hour here, and hour there of quiet playing, playing outside, etc. But it is pretty constant interrupting without screens. Which is age appropriate.
How about reading. I would be under for hours with a good book when I was a kid. I was about 10 when I really got into it though.

For 8 hours though? My kids like to read, but we are talking an hour. Which I think is actually quite a lot at 8 and 10.
You would be surprised how much they can read if they get into the story. If it's a chore it will be hard to do over 20 minutes, but if they like it they can keep going on and on. If they don't like books, comics will do as well. You can probably get a bunch second hand ones for cheap.

I happily read ALL DAY. Just requires a good book.
Yup, when I was a kid I couldn't be torn away from my books. I learned to read pretty early and would go through several books a week. I would read at the dinner table and with a flashlight in bed. And while walking to the bus stop (luckily on a quiet street).
No TV in the house.

RelaxedGal

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #18 on: March 20, 2018, 11:01:00 AM »
One of the things important to me about working full time again was providing a good summer experience. I remember going to full time childcare in later elementary and hating it so much.

My first grader is already resenting after school care, because we don't get home 'til 5pm and she misses out on 2 hours of playing with the neighborhood kids.  It's only going downhill from here.  The plan is full time childcare for 7 of the 8 weeks of summer.  Either the place she went to last summer ($315/wk, swim 2x/wk, field trips every other week) or the same group that does her after school care ($290/wk, swim 1x/wk, 2 field trips).  One of those 7 weeks *might* be robotics camp, but it's one of those 9am-3pm "full day" camps, plus at 7 years old she needs outside time to run and play which isn't an option at the place we are eyeing.  The 8th week my parents are visiting so I'll be taking time off. 

Helvegen

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #19 on: March 21, 2018, 09:57:51 AM »
I have a 12 year old and I am not 100% sure. I am planning on quitting my FT job Aug 1st to start very PT apprenticeship training for another related position which will hopefully provide me with a better work-life balance. I don't plan on going back to work until after Labor Day. Her school ends the middle of the third week of June, so I have about 5 weeks of dead space with her before I can take over. Ideally, I'd like to put her in Y camps, but the hours for all of them are so terrible. My only real option is to stick in her in a few B&GC specialty camps again. So, I'll probably do that at least every other week.

I am not looking forward to it though. Summer tourism makes it a real PITA to drive through the town her B&GC is at and will add about 15-30 minutes to our commute time. Is what it is. She can't just rot in the house for five weeks.

I am looking forward to spending some time with her this summer though. Time seems to be flying by and my only will be an adult before I know it.

2Cent

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #20 on: March 22, 2018, 02:38:44 AM »
I am looking forward to spending some time with her this summer though. Time seems to be flying by and my only will be an adult before I know it.
What I see is usually at around 12 the kids change from happy fun loving kids into trying to be cool teens. And mom's usually not cool unfortunately. So enjoy. It may be the last summer with her as a real kid. But don't worry. After a few years of teenage cocooning they usually come back as beautiful adults.

Villanelle

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #21 on: March 22, 2018, 04:00:21 AM »
For the young teens, consider looking at summer camps in your area to see if they have "counselor-in-training" or similar programs.  In college, I worked at a summer day camp every year, and we had a program for 14-16 year olds.  They assisted the counselors or activity specialists.  It's been a while so I forget the details, but I don't believe they got paid, but they did have access to the activities, though much of the time they were working.  They didn't have to commit to the whole camp (I believe it was 9 weeks), but they were required to have a regular schedule and there was a minimum number of days.  And these CITs, as we called them, all hung out together when possible so it was a social thing for them, in addition to getting to ride go carts and horses, swim in the pool, learn some karate, etc. (for the cost of their free labor).

RelaxedGal

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Re: School Age summer care
« Reply #22 on: March 22, 2018, 12:19:30 PM »
Ooh!  Yes, Villanelle is describing exactly what my husband did as a teen.  We were just taking about it a week or two back and he thinks his parents paid the first year, it was free the second, and he got paid the third as his Counselor in Training skills progressed.

 

Wow, a phone plan for fifteen bucks!