To ask how families with non teaching parents manage DCs during school holidays?

[Sheitgeist]

Just that, really.
I am an out of work primary teacher in an area where there are rarely any vacancies. If they do crop up, there can be in excess of 100 applicants. I'd gladly be a TA, but it seems impossible to get that job too!

I'm looking outside of education now, but if I get a basic admin - or indeed any other job - I'll likely get around 5 weeks holiday. DH gets 6. Our two school age children (still at primary) get 13!
If I put them in a holiday club it will cost around £250 per week; childminder (if I can find one for school age children) would be a bit over £300. More than I'm likely to be paid!

We have parents or inlaws to help out. I'm feeling pretty unemployable now. What do other working parents do?

One thing I do is buy more childcare vouchers than I need each month (I buy them for after school club and just get about £20 more than I need) then when holidays start I have some spare vouchers in my account, plus am not having to pay for after school club so can cover some time in holiday club out of the vouchers without having to dip into my wages. This means I'm saving on tax and of course I would never save that money in cash so it keeps I safe for me!

So glad mine are older now. Summer holidays used to be a nightmare trying to get cover and hating being stuck in an office on a sunny day while teacher friends were taking their kids to the park etc. Dont have any answers.Just do the best you can and long for the day when they grow up!

So me and DH both do compressed hours 3 long days a week (dont really see DCs those days) but still end up doing another 1/2 day a week somewhere to try and get all work covered.
This leaves 2 days when we are both working. Have a nanny 1 day a week (11-12 hour day) and GPs/annual leave cover the other day. This is throughout the year.
No club would cover the hours we work on the days we are working. We know we are lucky really although completely miss some days with DCs.

manic I have put my DC into the school I teach in for exactly that reason. I'm hoping as they get older I'll have more possibility of being able to slip off for an hour here or there to see the nativity etc...

My colleague did the same and is able to see the teachers for parents evening meetings during school break times

Oh I know, I'm not serious. If it was what I wanted I would have done a conversion like DH rather than a pgce. I imagine the industry as a whole isn't family friendly but DH is in a very senior position which obv helps. His pay and hours were crap when he was working as a solicitor.

We get 10 weeks holiday between me and DH. Two weeks holiday together in the summer. We take opposite leave the rest of the time, a little help from grandparents (ageing, more difficult), holiday club for the youngest and can leave the eldest for half days and ring home regularly!
Not easy. An ongoing headache tbh before you count strike days, snow days, inset days etc to cover as well. Given my time again, I would choose my profession more carefully.

Lucy - that is very creative. It's a bit like interest free credit. You pay the same overall but it's much less painful!

I work at home some of the time but never the same days. There is no pattern to it and we could not have had a toddler wandering around due to the endless audios I need to attend. So, we paid for an 8-6 childminder. Every Sunday we would sit down and argue/agree who would do the drop offs and pick ups. If anything changed and I was doing a pick up and something changed it would be up to me to make alternative arrangements.

Now the boys are older it's much much easier. We did push the boundaries
I think with regard to leaving them alone but they have always been taught to run to our neighbour or scream the place down should something untoward happen.

I agree with a pp - it has enabled us to afford private education and have nice hols. I don't regret a bit of it tbh.

My DC are older but when they were little , DH and I never had holidays at the same time.
I work 3 days so in my working weeks he'd cover the 3 days or I'd take leave.
I did Saturdays as overtime for time in lieu (I wouldn't get time+half unless I was F/T , but it made better sense for us to get time than pay)

No nearby family here either

Hillingdon - I think that might have been me. We have been able to send our DC to private school because of the progress I made in my career.

We prefer to take our holiday as a family, and are fortunate that we can pay for childcare to make this happen. DH and I will be off at the same time for around 4 weeks of our annual leave (a week at Easter, 2 weeks in the summer and a week at Christmas). The other week will be staggered (covering sports day/concert/ill children).

This week we are child-free (DD is at PGL and DS is on the school ski trip). We've been able to go out together, which is lovely.

I am self employed. I work from home- I have done this for 14 years. I can work as much or as little as I like. During term time I work 40, sometimes 50 hours a week (with commensurate earnings) then when kids are on holidays I work less, perhaps 10 or 15 hours a week depending on how much my kids need me.
I save during the richer months to see me through the leaner weeks when I don't earn so much.

I'm reading this thread with great interest- my elder DC is in Reception and I haven't yet worked out how the hell I'm going to cover the summer. Lots of ideas here...

I'm very lucky that my parents and inlaws help me out in the holidays. My sister is a TA so has all holidays off. My son is often lucky enough to be asked along on her family holidays too. My nephew is the same age and they are company for each other. So win win for both of us. So by using all my holiday and my husbands, plus my fab family, we just about manage. I do realise how lucky I am. School holidays were a big factor in deciding to have only the one child.

lol at lots of you saying oh just use all your annual leave on the school holidays. No good if everyone else wants the same thing in your place of work and the holiday isnt granted. chtistmas holidays nope. not in my place of work or in any retail job ive been in, busiest time of year so no ones allowed holidays in December.

oh just get a nanny or aupair. yeah if your not on minimum wage and you have a spare room.

I am lucky in a way, dp works nights and I work in the day so we can work round it. dp is going to stay awake to look after the 7 and 4 year old till I come home then I will take over. if he falls asleep my 12 year old is there for back up, she can always wake him if needed.

we are also a family who has no extended family. my mum has refused to help us in any way, shape or form even though she is local so we do it all ourselves.

blackheart what point are you trying to make?

I don't really understand your post. Surely what you're saying is "xyz works for us", and other posters are saying "abc works for us".

That's it really isn't it, everyone works it out to suit themselves and their circumstances.

Why the snark?

OP, Google 'ordinary parental leave' - the rules are changing as of 5th April, I think, it's a route by which you can take additional unpaid leave as a parent. one link here

Yes why the lol blackheart?

Of course it's crappy if you can't take leave over Aug, but it's not unusually jammy to be able to take some of your leave allowance over Christmas and summer. Your regime sounds tough but there's no need to laugh at people who do it differently. Or should I lol at you for being lucky enough to have DP working nights and a 12 year old for backup?

We have 5 weeks each, we spread them out over the hols and my dmum will do about 23 individual days through the year - which suits my mum as she loves to have ds but doesn't want to commit to a regular childcare arrangement so she gets to choose days throughout the hols and we work around that. We will need 3 days holiday club this year, if we had more time off together we would add another 5 days holiday club

To be fair to Blackheart, I think she was saying that most people in her position would be really stuck and that it's only by virtue of her DP's job that she isn't. There must be lots of couples where both are in that position. What do you do then?

Well you do something else!

I could snarky lol because she has a DP to help out and I don't, but what would be the point in that?

Doing something else isn't that simple.

At any rate, both my parents were teachers and never went to my sports days, plays or similar events.

I never resented it. It was just how it was.

I think you're being a wee but disingenuous there, fourteen. I'm the first to admit that it's easy for women like you and I (professional, holding higher degrees and PG qualifications) to say 'why not do something else.' The sentiment is right, of course, but the reality isn't quite as easy. Being a single parent can't be easy either of course and I take my hat off to you but I'm sure you'll agree that life skills and opportunities are far more limited for single parents without a profession, many of whom are working for NMW or on zero hours contracts.

DH and I both work PT so only have 3 days a week to worry about, we also have generous leave allowances. Mum comes to stay with us for half terms to look after the kids, we use holiday clubs (although hard to find ones that actually cover full working day) stagger annual leave (although last year I took odd days of annual leave in the summer holidays but was so busy at work I ended up working weekends unpaid to get all my work done ), and do some swaps with other parents. Trouble is I have 3 kids so not everyone wants to take them can't blame them. I'm still panicking this year though since DH has just gone full time which means we now have an additional 9 days to cover.

We both work full time, but I work compressed hours over 4 days. I'm off on Friday, Saturday and Sunday and DH is off on Thursday and Sunday so it's only 3 days a week childcare we need.

We pay for a cm but spread the cost out over a year. Our term time childcare (3 days afterschool, 2 dc's) is £240 a month but Dh and I both get childcare vouchers and put in £350 a month. So the cost is the same every month and we build up an excess of vouchers which covers school holidays too (3 days of all day care is £190 for two so August alone costs about £800).

We have structured our lives and finances so that I am able to be there for the children whenever it is needed. I work in a very flexible, very part time job and also have a small self-employed business that I can run from home. We deliberately set up the business to supplement the family income (most of which comes from DPs full time salary) while having the opportunity to look after the children ourselves. While this has meant a sacrifice in career terms for me, it also allows us to make significant savings in other parts of our lives as I can do things that we would have to pay for if both DP and I were out full time. And I would much rather that I was looking after DCs myself than paying someone else to do it. I know not everyone is in a position to do this, or would have the desire to put children above employment, but for DP and I it was a priority and we have worked hard to ensure that it is possible.

I think blackheart was lol-ing at the casual way so many MNers say "get an au pair" or "take unpaid leave" or the like. As if it's the simplest thing in the world.

Of course it's not that simple if you work in a minimum wage job and are struggling to keep your head above water let alone pay and house an au pair. Or take unpaid leave - even if that were allowed.

Fourteen's "do something else" is a case in point.its as if someone in a low paid job will say "oh! I've been slogging away for all these years. If only fourteen had come along earlier with that helpful suggestion, I could've been a consultant surgeon all along!" So bloody patronising.