To ask, if you have primary age dc

[Zara2008]

What sort of hours do you work, and does your dh (if you have one), do his share of the childcare?

I work part time but I do 100% of the childcare.

I have one year 3, I'm on my own no shared custody or other support. Work full time but choose my hours to some extent so a bit of flex from employer. A bit of paid childcare.

My house is an absolute bomb site, domestic goddess I am not. But, noone here to judge.

I work 30 hours, DH 40.

He does most drop offs, I do a few pick ups and we have after school care also.

DH does all cooking and meal planning, usually the shopping is a joint venture.

I do the laundry and we both fold and put away.

We both clean the kitchen regularly

We have a cleaner once a week who does the bathrooms, floors and dusting.

I have a day off which I use for catching up on bits and my hobbies.

Sorry, two children 4&9

He shares bed times too.

I have a 6 year old and a 2 year old, DH is full time and I work four days. We share drop offs and pick ups 50/50 but I still find it incredibly stressful.

I'm actually reducing my hours soon, I'm going down to three days but both DC will be in school/nursery 9-3 so I'll have a chance to catch up on housework/laundry etc. I can't bloody wait.

Dh does 8-4 I do 9-5. I finish at 3 on a Friday to do a pick up. Childminder does the other 4 days. I do all drop offs. We are each only a 10 min commute which makes life so much easier, I do drop offs and pick ups because dh only has a work van which cannot be used outside of work however, in the hour he is home before me he hoovers, hangs out a wash and starts dinner.

(although only on one of my days off, the other one the 2 year old will be with me! )

We both work 8:00-4:30

We share everything, but dh does 90% of cooking and I do most laundry related tasks.

Yes he does his share of parenting (I refuse to call it childcare!)

He works from home so he drops dc to school and depending on the day (meetings etc) either I collect or he does. They go to Afterschool until 5.

Both work FT 9-5.30/6. DH does mornings - up, dressed, breakfast, drop, I do evenings - pick up/sort out dinner. We have an excellent childminder who covers most school hols and inset days. We also have a cleaner 4 hrs pw. Easier now they're both in KS2. Requires a lot of organisation and routine.

I work 9.30-2.30 x 5 days. No lunch break in order to maximise my work hours. I do all drop offs and pick ups. On top of that I do additional hours on a flexible wfh basis. Sometimes in the evening if my son has a hobby to go to. Sometimes after bedtime. Sometimes at weekends. If my son is sick I wfh on those days too. My husband does fuck all, he pisses off to work at 8am and swans home about 7pm. He earns way more money but I carry the full burden of juggling childcare.

@JackieCollinshasnoauthority

When I say I do 100% of the childcare I mean I do all school/wrap around drop offs pick ups, get them ready in the morning, do all extra curricular activities. Dh works very long and unpredictable hours, he is often away for several nights for work at short notice, and will often have to do weekends too. So although yes he does do childcare when he's not working, 100% of the responsibility falls to me.

That sounds difficult but surely he is doing his 'share'. Or do you want him to reduce his working time?

I think work/life balance is really important and if he doesn't have much time to spend with family then what is he doing it for? Rhetorical question obviously.

Both FT, both WFH but work opposite shifts so he drops off and I pick up. I do lions share of the housework though annoyingly

DH works FT from home. I WOH, 30 hours over 3 days. We have one DC at primary, one at preschool. On the days I work I leave at 7am so DH sorts breakfast, gets DC ready and does drop off. We are very lucky that GP's live locally and pick the DC up on the 3 days I work and have them for a couple of hours until I'm back at about 5.45pm. I start dinner and do lunches for the next day, DH is usually finished work by 6pm. We always do bath and bedtime together unless one of us is out for the evening.

On my days off I do drop off and pick up. DH still helps with getting kids breakfast and getting them ready in the mornings. On weekends it's basically 50/50. DH does most of the cooking (because he enjoys it and I don't) and will usually take eldest to their swimming lesson. I tend to do all the school/nursery admin.

I'm TTO so we don't have to worry about holiday childcare but DH tries to take his AL in the school holidays anyway.

@Zara2008 but on the days that he is home why is he not helping out in the morning? What does he do? Can he have 1-2 days a week that the schedule allows for him to be home to make dinner or do a drop off etc?

I work at my children's school as a TA, so I don't need childcare and the school holidays aren't an issue. Obviously the pay is low, but the hours are convenient. If I was doing a different job, my husband would step up with the childcare. However, we are dependent on his income and I also prefer to be able to work part time.

I do everything, year one child and 2 year old. WFH 16 hours a week spread over 4 days. No childcare it's a nightmare, but I can't afford it yet. DH works long hours. I am resentful.

Yes so I'm not complaining about how much dh does.

I've been considering increasing my hours because although we are comfortable off, it would be nice to have a bit more money and I feel a bit guilty about not earning as much. But I really feel the pressure of having to be available for all childcare due the the unpredictable nature of dhs job so part time has always suited us.

I'm interested to see what the balance is like for others.

DC1 is at primary school and DC2 is 1 year old.
I work 3 days and week and DH works 4. On days we both work, DC1 goes to after school club and DC2 goes to nursery, and we share drop offs and pick ups. On the other days, whoever isn't working looks after DC2 and does the school run.

Apart from the fact that DH works one more day than me, so I obviously do the childcare on that day, it's a pretty even split, although I do more childcare and he does more housework.

I do the "mental load" organising stuff. He does the jobs I hate!

Don't know what we'll do when DC2 starts preschool, might change our working pattern - I want to work 4 days but maybe with one or two early finishes. I expect DH would quite like to stick to 4 days or maybe do 4.5. Neither of us want to work full time really if we can help it!

This week I am working 72 hours and my DP is working more than that. We work shifts and are very lucky that we are not at work at the same time and one of us is always home so we don’t need childcare. It’s exhausting and we don’t see each other much but we make it work.

😱

Sorry to jump on the post but I have a question for families with both parents working, what do you do in the school holidays?

Christmas is fine as our offices close between Christmas and New Year so we can cover it by taking just a couple of days of annual leave each.

The rest of the holidays will be a mixture of annual leave, holiday clubs and hopefully a bit of help from family (although they're not very close so depends if it works out with logistics).

@EmpressSuiko this is another reason I stay part time. Much easier to find childcare for 2-3 days a week than for 5.

I use a mixture of holiday clubs, grandparents for a day here and there. I get a decent annual leave entitlement and can take flexi time or buy annual leave.

We take annual leave to cover school holidays and also unpaid parental leave which you can ask for legally. Or we use the odd school club/grandparent
www.gov.uk/parental-leave

I get snide remarks from my fil about what do I do all day on my days off.

I don't think he appreciates what it's like juggling everything when dhs job doesn't afford any kind of flexibility.