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Back in philly we could always get grandmother or one of the boys aunts to watch the kids. but now we dont have that luxury. Has anyone been through it where they didnt know anyone and had to be with the kids 24-7 when you arent at work or the kids at school.
Ask other parents who they use, The afterschool/DayCare staff, program staff, RedCross?? run a babysitting ed program you can check with them, A call to the HS could find someone, have them be a 'helper' few times when you are there to check there interaction with the kids.
Back in philly we could always get grandmother or one of the boys aunts to watch the kids. but now we dont have that luxury. Has anyone been through it where they didnt know anyone and had to be with the kids 24-7 when you arent at work or the kids at school.
Always had to be with the kids 24/7. We never had the luxury of grandparents or other relatives nearby. We always asked the neighbors and coworkers who they used. Mostly it would be either coworkers teens or neighborhood teens. Also, there was a drop-in evening day care in our area. By state law (Texas) they could not keep kids more than 4 hours. We used it several times when things came up at the last minute and we couldn't find a sitter. It was a nice place and my friends kids loved it. My kids hated it though. They much preferred a baby sitter at the house.
Our children's favorite babysitters have been boy/girl scouts. Try contacting one of those troops/dens - now is a good time to find the girls as it's 'cookie season'.
ITA with above: neighbors, churches, local colleges, local YMCA babysitting class. We've been relatively lucky where we are now in that our subdivision lists babysitters in the neighborhood directory, so it was just a matter of calling them. A neighborhood when we lived in Alpharetta, GA (ATL burb) had a babysitting co-op, where you could earn points by watching other kids, and then cash them in for free sitting. Other than that, yes, we've been with the kids 24/7 with no romantic get-aways, unless willing to fly in a relative. It's hard, but you just deal.
Oh, yeah, as others mentioned, church. I completely forgot about there. We used to do a baby sitting swaps with other families. It can can be expensive, so we would just take turns keeping each others kids. One family we traded with a lot had 4 kids. We only had two. So for every hour we kept their kids, they kept ours two. Worked out well and saved us a bunch of money. Unfortunately, not long after we started, they got transferred.
We relied on drop off day care, day care by the hour. I forget the name of it, there were several franchises, I think some were called Kidspace, try googling that in your area.
They were a Godsend, I do't know what we would have done without it. They were open 7am--10pm, 7 days/week. You could leave your child by the hour, staffed by licensed workers. My kids always enjoyed going, they thought it was a big treat. They provided hot meals for an extra charge, or you could pack a lunch. It was a Godsend for us if we had job interviews, doctor appointments, etc. Many times you have a committment for just a few hours and can't find a babysitter on short notice.
Also, look in the yellow pages under Day Care or Child Care to see if there's any places that provide care on an hourly basis.
I live literally with my family at the moment and they can't often watch my daughter because they all work full-time and have other commitments. I've found all of my daycare providers/babysitters thus far through CL.
If you are on CL, make sure you look very carefully at the spelling, punctuation, and format of the ad. Why would you trust your child to someone who can't be bothered to write a good ad for their business? Our current daycare provider we found through CL. She only has a HS diploma and I don't think has ever been to college. She still wrote a great ad and, lo and behold, she is a fantastic provider.
I didn't originally think of this as a way to find childcare, but my daughter will be starting kindergarten in the fall, so I browsed the website of the school district she would be attending. I found that they actually had a list of local daycares, after-school programs, preschools, and summer camps. It was a godsend, because now I know what we are going to do with our daughter while we look for work/go to interviews and take care of some administrative things. Plus she absolutely loves any kind of school like activity and she would be thrilled to death go. I'm planning on enrolling her part-time in a full day summer camp program as soon as registration opens up. So maybe also your school district might have some suggestions.
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