To be put off using a childminder for this?

[appleharvest]

I am being completely unreasonable and I suppose I'm wondering why.

Shopping around for childcare at the moment for DDs (2 and 5 months.) I need full time places for them both.

I visited a childminder who was telling me about her rule that, when out of the house, all her mindees wore a luminous vest with her childminding company name and phone number on it.

I understand why this is a good idea from a safety perspective but I hated it. It seemed too much like an orphanage or something!

I know I am BU but I hate the thought of DD1 sitting at the dentists or walking through the shopping centre or to a school with a luminous vest on saying she is looked after by someone who isn't her parent.

I get where you're coming from. But I can also recognise why the cm feels the need to do it. I used to be a bit of an 'auntie next door doing it for pin money' kind of childminder (to paraphrase a previous poster); now that I've got 5 children on some days I can see the attractions of having an easy way of spotting which children I'm responsible for when we're doing a school run. I won't be going down the high-vis jacket route, though - like you, I just instinctively don't like it. I don't have any posters up around the house either - as far as I'm concerned, the main appeal of a childminder is that you operate from a normal house and treat your mindees as far as possible like you would your own children.

Sorry lucky but what do you do?

And you were patronising first at risk of sounding twatty.

I'm pretty certain it can't be law as the other c/ms I saw didn't have reflective jackets in their policies.

In any case, it's a shame we can't just chat about stuff on here without people getting defensive or sarky. Surely childcare comes down to personal preferences - there isn't a better than or worse than, it's individuals.

No one said it was the law!!'

Please read the posts.

*iff it's in your policy to wear jackets and you then don't do that them in the event of an accident you could be sued as not adhering to your policy and

Bugger!!

Then you could be sued for not adhering to your policy.

Cming is a private business that parents in essence sign up to.

I read your post, I was replying to someone else

Will you please back off a bit, thebody?

Not sure why needs a vest highlighting this - makes child stand out and not fair to child

I'm a nanny and if we go out I have wristbands that have my telephone no etc but no details of child iyswim

In the end the cm Is her own boss and she can do what she wants. If you or anyone don't like the way she does stuff then don't use Her or leave /find diff chikdcare

Have you looked at a nanny. Often nearing the same cost when two children and much easier as nanny comes to your home and you don't need to wake dress and drop children off somewhere before going to work

When I keep reading school run....is that actually taking those children to school....or taking along other children being minded on the school
Run to drop off other kids?

Sounds absolutely awful. Like some sort of prisoners number. That's my first thought. I would hate it.

It's taking them all on the school run round here.

I looked into a nanny but they aren't very prevalent round here it seems!

I think the childminder with the vests was very good and ordered and professional - maybe that's it, a bit too professional, a bit clinical? I'm sure the DDs would be well cared for but I want somebody who will laugh with them and cuddle them and join in their daft games a bit! Ideally of course!

Vivienne your posts are always so funny

Only1Scoop, for DH he has a full complement of kids, so he has under 5s who aren't at school yet, and over 5s who he has to pick up (and occasionally drop off) - so the younger children will go with him to pick up the older ones. Fairly normal for a CM.

I was being serious.

i know that's why its so funny!

Have I missed something - why would using a nursery mean them being separated? I realise the younger one would be in the baby room and the older one in the bigger room, but I had my two in nursery like that for a while and my daughter loved going to see her little brother upstairs, or playing with him in the playground. It wasn't a problem. Ok they didn't spend the whole day together, but they still felt like they were in the same place.

Can you think of it a bit like the vests being a shortcut, if she had to look out for 4, 5 children at once then she has to be aware of all of them all of the time. Whereas with high vis jackets she can see them immediately, do a mental headcount and have her mind and eyes freed up to relax, laugh, play, etc. With multiple walking children she can't stick them all in a buggy which would be the other safety shortcut. And vests have to be better than multiple reins (like a troop of dogs!)

I don't know, I know that the childminder we used was not very professional or organised but loved the children, but I don't think that the two have to be mutually exclusive. And sometimes not being so professional has downsides - I was never really 100% happy with her car seat arrangements, for example. And when I mentioned it she kind of said, oh, yes, thanks, and then carried on being haphazard. They were always IN car seats, but she'd move them to a higher category than I was happy with, etc.

Stats....thanks I get it now

I wouldn't like it either op.

Personally, I really dislike nurseries for things like this...the separating kids into different rooms, the 'key workers', the double entry doors, high vis vests, passwords...yes they're all for safety, but I just don't like how institutionalised it is.

I chose a cm because I wanted a home from home environment. My cm has a 1 year old (her dc), 3 year old, 4 year old (ds2) and 3 x 6 year olds (one is ds1, one her dc)...not always all at the same time, but occasionally they are all there.

They all eat meals around the same table, they all roll around together on the living room floor, the 6 year olds 'help' to care for the 1 year old. The cm does what any family does with dc - takes them places appropriate/safe enough for the dc she happens to have with her that day.

So on a day where she only has my two (her dc sometimes go to their grandparents for a weekend) she'll do more adventurous things - take them into town to see a kids attraction at a museum, or take them to the beach for the day, or go swimming. Things she wouldn't consider (or be able to in the case of swimming) if she had all 6. When she has all 6 they'll go to the local, very open park, where they can run but no danger of getting lost in crowds.

She has the 1 year old in a buggy, 3 year old on a wrist strap and the other four pair up and hold hands just next to her if she's out with them all. High vis vests would put me off tbh as it seems too much...like business. I'm not stupid, I know it is her business, her livelihood. But the atmosphere is completely family-like. It's hard to put into words exactly why, but it really would put me off.

When the dc had been going to her for about ten months, a friend of mine asked ds2 if he liked his childminder. Both the dc turned and gave her a blank stare, and ds1 asked 'Who? We don't have a childminder' and gave her a look. Ds2 then asked what a childminder was. To them, they just go to Julie's house to play, which is the way I like them to see it.

I get what you mean op.

If you wanted a nanny then if you advertised you would get some choice evwn if not many in area atm

Apple - and there it is. THAT's why you're iffy about her. At the end of the day, even though I'm a bit about the vests, I wouldn't have cared if my CM used them because she was perfect for my boys. She did laugh with them and cuddle them. In that case the vests would have felt like a safety feature, rather than clinical and business like.

She was new, and hadn't even had an Ofsted Inspection that I could go by, it was all instinct.

In fact, as luck would have it, on her first Ofsted inspection DS2 fell ill, rapidly (had been absolutely fine before, honestly!) . I was stuck on a train into London, had been for over an hour already, and so DH (in London already) had to make his way to a different train station to try to get to her place as quickly as possible (he made it to her before my train even moved...). Fortunately for her the Ofsted inspector complemented on her relationship with DS2, as he was quite clearly very happy being held by her and comforted by her, even though he was ill - and she ended up with a brilliant report even though she couldn't do any of her planned activities.

apple

Will do and backing off.

Was just trying to point out the reality of being a cm, Running a business looking after other people's children and having my own child badly injured in an fatal accident on a school trip and as such In the middle if a huge court case so pretty relevant really to health and safety.

Hope you find the child care best for you and sorry if my posts were ott. Bit of a raw subject.

I think it just depends on what you want for your kids. Personally I prefer my DD to be playing and learning on the two days she's at nursery, to me that's preferable kid to going around the shops with other kids and a CM to do chores or to pick other kids up from school. But she's in the home setting 5 days a week with me the rest of the time so she can do out and about daily stuff like that with me, for free . I do get why people prefer CM to nurseries but lets not paint a CM's house as a roaming playground and nurseries as a one room prison. Our nursery is in a converted house with 4 rooms to use plus a garden, they start from 12 months so no baby room, they only take 26 children so staff ratio is brilliant and they are not just penned into one room all day as another poster implied nurseries do.

I want somebody who will laugh with them and cuddle them and join in their daft games a bit!

Exactly that. I saw a few CM's before I found ours, and the main theme seemed to be what they'd teach them. That they stuck the the Early Years Foundation Scheme (or whatever it's called) rigidly, cooked only 100% natural, healthy, organic food, did structured activities.

It was so clinical (albeit very professional). CM that we chose is a 'normal' woman. She's fantastic with the kids and has the patience of a Saint. She chases them and tickles them and has tea parties. She 'parent's' my children the same way I do. She takes them on fab outings and arranges fun arty activities. But she also lets them have a go on the I Pad sometimes . She makes lovely meals for them, but also has the occasional cba day (usually where they've been out doing something fun) and takes them for a McDonalds for tea.

You know it would bias me in favour of that cm. She is saying that, in public, anyone will be able to hold her accountable for her care of her mindees. She will always spot them quickly in a crowd and has nothing to hide in her behaviour with the dc. This would inspire trust in me.
To me a good cm beats a nursery every time.