Going Back to Work

[peaseblossom55]

Hi
I am new to this board.  I figured I would ask my question here.  I am going back to work in early April.  My MIL has generously offered to watch her two days a week.  The problem is what to do the other 3 days a week.  Since she was a preemie I am hoping to avoid daycare until she is at least a year old, I am worried about germs and her getting really sick at daycare.  

So I am looking into a nanny for the other 3 days.  has anyone else done this? Did you use any website like care.com to find help? Any advice/tips?

[supertrooper1]

Welcome!

IMO, I don't think waiting until your daughter is 1 will make a difference. Daycares and schools are germ pools and kids are going to get sick no matter what age.

[twinmomma]

Welcome!
We had a part time nanny and family care for the first three years with our girls. When they were infants, it was awesome to not have to worry about packing them up and getting them out of the house in the morning. But then it honestly became more trouble than it was worth after awhile, trying to coordinate everyone's schedules and make sure we always had coverage when someone needed a day off. We weren't paying our family, so obviously if they needed a day off for something, they got it and we couldn't really complain. So my big advice is to make sure you have a solid plan B in place before you dive in. It'll help save you some headaches.

We found our part time nanny on Care.com. It worked fine since it was the same couple days a week - so always M/W/F for example, with family on Tuesday/Thursday. Part time people were very open to that, since it was constantly shifting week to week.

[xctsclrx]

Welcome!! I don't have any nanny advice but wanted to say hi.

How are her lungs? My DS didn't get sick at daycare his first year. Between one and two though I felt like we were never going to get well. More mobile equals more germs.

That being said I completely understand you wanting to keep your DD safe and healthy since she was a preemie. Good Luck!

[rere26]

Do you know the area well? Any family and friends close? We got our nanny through word of mouth. She was the aunt of a friend. My mom watched on Mondays and the nanny Tuesday -Thursday. My kids loved her, but we did preschool before K for the socialization.

[peaseblossom55]

Feb 27, 2017 14:03:23 GMT -5 xctsclrx said:

Welcome!! I don't have any nanny advice but wanted to say hi.

How are her lungs? My DS didn't get sick at daycare his first year. Between one and two though I felt like we were never going to get well. More mobile equals more germs.

That being said I completely understand you wanting to keep your DD safe and healthy since she was a preemie. Good Luck!

Hi
Her lungs are good luckily. I was hoping to keep her home for some one on one time before introducing her to so many germs.

[peaseblossom55]

Feb 27, 2017 14:16:33 GMT -5 rere26 said:

Do you know the area well? Any family and friends close? We got our nanny through word of mouth. She was the aunt of a friend. My mom watched on Mondays and the nanny Tuesday -Thursday. My kids loved her, but we did preschool before K for the socialization.

I just got a recommendation for a sitter from a friend so we will see if that works out. We will see.

[peaseblossom55]

Feb 27, 2017 13:36:08 GMT -5 supertrooper1 said:

Welcome!

IMO, I don't think waiting until your daughter is 1 will make a difference. Daycares and schools are germ pools and kids are going to get sick no matter what age.

Yes she will get sick either way when she goes into daycare. We were hoping to delay the day care situation at least until she is one. It was recommending by our pedi and nicu too. If we could anyway.

[Widget123]

Welcome to the board

[sudokufan]

Welcome! Does your town or area have any local Facebook groups you could join? Ours is really useful for these kinds of things. I wish I'd known about ours when I was researching centers.

[mustardseed2007]

seconding what sudokufan said, we even have a local facebook group for sitters and nannies.

Welcome to the board!

Congratulations on your baby girl! I had a preemie who came home on a breathing monitor so I just wanted to commiserate. For us, we handled it by having DH and I both take maternity/paternity leave back to back so we stayed home just a little bit longer before we sent her to daycare so she at least was off it for a month before she came home. I looked hard for a nanny share but wasn't able to put it together and by the time DD came we didn't have family who could help.

DS had already stayed home with family for his first year though and it worked out pretty well until my mom had a health scare and was very suddenly out of commission. My sister filled in until we could get him into a daycare.

My mom's sudden health issue was something I did not expect and did not really plan for so I really lucked out that my sister helped. You can't plan for everything but you might just start kind of scanning the day care scene just so you know what things are like in your area, particularly if you think full time or part time DC is something you may want in the future. Depending on your area you might need to get on a waitlist now for a spot in 1 year.

[liziz]

I found my nanny/babysitter (somewhere in between since DD went to her house, but was the only kid) by asking around. I asked my friend if she knew anyone at her church that might be interested, and she pointed me to her mom - I've known them all since I was a teenager, and it was a great situation. So use your social network!

[helenahhandbasket]

Welcome!

I have two friends that used care.com to find their nannies.

Good luck !

[callmeKD]

Feb 27, 2017 16:32:44 GMT -5 sudokufan said:

Welcome! Does your town or area have any local Facebook groups you could join? Ours is really useful for these kinds of things. I wish I'd known about ours when I was researching centers.

Yes to this! The local FB mom's groups that I'm are always posting about nannies looking for extra hours etc.

Glad to see you here! How is baby girl?

[somebabiesmom]

I highly recommend hiring a nanny tor keep kids from getting sick. My kids were in DC first and had a runny nose or worse 99% of the time; but as soon as we switched to a nanny, they were healthy 95% of the time. Long term, there's no escaping it (like PPs said), but you can definitely put it off until she's stronger.

Care.com worked for us once to find a nanny, but after she left, we couldn't find anyone. All but one applicant flaked on us before we even got to the final interview. Even after we jacked our price from $10 to $15/hour.

Last thing: we didn't pay under the table. We calculated taxes, filed W-2s and all that. If you have just a PT sitter coming, I would be very surprised if you got in any trouble for paying her under the table. Sitters are generally exempt - although you should check with your state.

[judyblume14]

Hi peaseblossom55! We found our in-home day care through word of mouth, so I'd recommend that route for a nanny as well. I have also found my local Moms Facebook group to be invaluable!

[traveltheworld]

DS went to daycare as a baby and got really sick, then developed multiple serious allergies - like he was not allergic to anything for the first year when he staid home with my mom, then 6 weeks of continuing sickness at DC later, he developed multiple life-threatening allergies. I know there is no scientific link to the two, but I couldn't mentally get over that fact. So with DD, we went with a full time nanny. It just gave me peace of mind.

That said, I loved DS's daycare and DD will be going there in a few months.

[k3am]

DD spent her entire first year at daycare sick. It seems we'll do the same with DS.

If I had a child who was immune compromised, I'd consider a nanny or nanny share.

DD is 4 and honestly, I don't remember the last time she was sick. Even with all the illness that's run through DS, DH and I, she gets.. nothing. Immune system of steel.

[librarychica]

We enjoyed having a nanny for infant ages. It worked well for us on the erm front and on the scheduling front. We found her through friends and we have found other nannies/babysitters from time to time on Care.com. The threshold for hours needed to pay taxes is really low, though, so be cautious of that. We had someone FT so it was a nonissue -- taxes were going to be paid. If you have a dependent care flex account it balances the taxes out pretty well, or at least it did for us.

Good luck and welcome!

[sdlaura]

Welcome! You may want to look into licensed in home daycares. There's usually a state website that provides contact info, and some do part time schedules. We used one when both of my kids were infants and will go that route again with the baby I'm expecting now. Neither kid got sick that often, even though my son was born with some health issues. I'll also throw out that no pediatrician ever recommends sending babies to group care in my experience - whenever one gets sick it's always 'yep, normal for a kid in daycare.'

I looked seriously into hiring a nanny this time, but ultimately couldn't get past the cost and logistical issues. I think if the perfect reliable and trustworthy person fell into my lap I would still consider it, but the in home daycare we plan to use costs about $15k per year, while we'd probably pay $45k per year for a nanny when we included taxes. Plus the leg work of finding the right person who I trust to be all alone with my child, and the logistics of managing an employee and paying taxes were too much for me when I weighed all the pros and cons. I also know a lot of nanny share fails since so much depends on the other family.

Unfortunately deciding what to do for infant childcare is never any fun and every choice has drawbacks. It is way easier at 18 months/2 years when the licensing requirements change. Good luck finding a solution that works for you!

[lc102310]

Hi,

Obviously you have to do what you feel the most comfortable with, but when I put my daughter into daycare, she did not get the colds, I did!
But having her in daycare gave her a great immune system, she is four now and knock on wood, gets a cold here and there, but that's it. 

We have a similar setup where she is in daycare 3 days a week and the 2 grandmothers take the other 2 days.  I love that she spends time with her grandparents, but there is always that chance that they cannot watch her one of their days.  Sick, doctors appts. etc.....daycare is there no matter what, unless we have a blizzard. 

Good Luck with whatever you choose. 

L

[mommyatty]

We used care.com for finding a summer nanny. It was pretty tough. But the person we found was really excellent so worth the trouble. The biggest problem was having anyone actually respond to me when I contacted them.

I had grandparent care. I still do to some extent. Prepare yourself that your relationship with your parents will change. It takes some serious open communication and mutual respect for it to work. It may be free in terms of money, but nothing in life is really free. With that being said, I love the relationship my kids have with my MIL.

[peaseblossom55]

Feb 27, 2017 22:39:08 GMT -5 callmeKD said:

Feb 27, 2017 16:32:44 GMT -5 sudokufan said:

Welcome! Does your town or area have any local Facebook groups you could join? Ours is really useful for these kinds of things. I wish I'd known about ours when I was researching centers.

Yes to this! The local FB mom's groups that I'm are always posting about nannies looking for extra hours etc.

Glad to see you here! How is baby girl?

She is well. I asked on two local FB groups and got no response...

[k3am]

peaseblossom55, try signing up for nextdoor.com and asking there. Someone is always posting about a nanny position in my neighborhood..

[mama2a]

I don't know if this is a regional thing but it is really hard to find part time infant care at a daycare center where I live. In-home providers seem to be more likely to take part-time infants, but most didn't have part-time openings since that is so popular. I thought I'd mention it to keep in mind as you search. Secondly, I agree with k3am to try NextDoor if your neighborhood is active on it. My neighborhood is and I agree--everyday there is always someone offering up their services as a nanny or someone looking for a nanny share.