Daughters expectations for babysitting

[grandmacant]

Hi,
My only daughter and her husband have 2 children, 6 and 4. She asked me a few months ago if over the summer I could/would like to babysit while she and her husband work. I agreed. We live in Cumbria, she lives in London, but decided we would do the first and last week of the holidays. I believe the other 2 weeks will be a juggle (they are away on holiday for the middle two), but son-in-law works from home on Mondays and Fridays, my daughter works from home Tuesdays and Thursdays, so I believe they plan to drop the kids at club in the morning, a friend will pick them up and have them until early afternoon then the work from home parent will juggle work and kids for a couple of hours.
I was under the impression that my husband and I's two weeks would be calm and at our discretion as to what we do with the kids, I'd planned museums, picnics etc.
My daughter messaged me today saying the kids are booked in at a tennis club 9-12 each morning for both the weeks we are down, and we won't have to have them on the Wednesdays as their godparents will pick them up from tennis and take them to theirs to play with their older children.
Now I'm driving 6+ hours to spend afternoons with the grandkids, probably too tired to go out and do anything. I don't enjoy living to a schedule, thats why I retired early!! I told my daughter I wasn't much happy and she said, if the issue is the being up and ready to go early, she/her husband will drop them off before they start work but they would need help for the Wednesday morning. I told her the issue is I'm coming down to spend time with my grandkids and rather than spending time with them I'll be doing club runs and dealing with tired kids in the afternoon. She has replied saying if I am unhappy we can not bother coming down, but the kids want to do the clubs and it will be better for them. I'm not disagreeing the kids doing clubs is great, but why on the weeks I'll be looking after them? Why not consult me??

Are you sure your daughter hasn't done it with good intentions, so you didn't have to entertain them all day long?

Either way it's a mis-communication and you can sill have fun with the children. As a pervious poster said just be sure to take food when you pick them up as they will be hungry!

She's using you for free childcare. I doubt it has occurred to her that there's a difference between you going to them and fitting in with their schedule (i.e. free childcare) and you going to them to spend your time with your grandchildren.

At 6&4 they will be fine to do things in the afternoon after their club, and it will be easier on you and your husband as kids of that age all day for a week will be a lot. You and your husband will also be able to spend some time together in London together.

Same. My rather sedate 80s childhood seems feral in comparison to the micro management today’s very small children have. Me and my nan are very close to this day and it’s absolutely because of those summer holidays together.

Your daughter’s explanation sounded very reasonable and thoughtful of both you and the children. She also sounds as though she’s a bit worried about your reaction and feeling under some pressure to keep everyone happy. I hope you can reassure her that you completely get where she’s coming from and you’re looking forward to a lovely visit with them.

I completely agree ... She should have consulted you first, because you could have had days out with them and done all sorts, and had great fun with them. Now you're just stuck in and stuck with having them in the afternoons where you can't do a lot really. I'd be really pissed off if it was me ... Even if she HAS done it to 'help' you, it's more of a hinderance really, as you can't even do what you want on those days as you're stuck in waiting til 1pm waiting for the grandkids.

You can either tell her now to cancel this tennis club - as you just want to do what you want with them over the fortnight, or just suck it up and when it's all finished (after the holiday) just tell her that next time, you'd rather have them all the time ... and next time don't book anything for them. Personally I'd tell her now.

I expect when describing how hard you are working and your kids are at summer camps having a Simply Marvellous Time you also have a head tilt and a tinkly laugh op. Enjoy.
I think how Ive described summer hols was how it was for most of us in the 70/80s. Summer activity clubs didnt exist. Either one parent worked and the other stayed at home with the kids in the holidays. Or kids hung out at their grandparents or neighbours houses. Or left at home on their own.

It wasnt all sunshine and rainbows (6 weeks is a long time) it was often pretty boring as well - by september I cant have been the only one itching for school again.
Just in case you are wondering how rich my parents were (to enable this cushy thinking and dreaming) my dad was a milkman, mum was a cleaner.

I think I’d just say, that will be great, but they’ll have to skip a couple of days when I’ve planned chessington etc.

Tennis camps are often only 4 days a week- have you checked it's every day?

She's probably realised that having them all day five days a week would be full on for anyone. It sounds like a nice compromise to me. They will probably be bouncing and raring to do something else for a couple of hours in the afternoon once they've had a bite to eat.

Short tennis.

They play games a lot and usually entertain the kids pretty well, it's certainly not just tennis. Often not much actual tennis for the little ones.

I am a grandparent who does childcare duties albeit locally so not with a drive like you have and I completely get where you are coming from. Is the tennis club every day? I would imagine the kids would probably prefer days out like legoland and chessington. Had you spoken to your daughter about the days out planned? Can they not just do one of the weeks with tennis club?

I would not do Chessington etc for just an afternoon. They cost a fortune to get into and the kids will be exhausted after playing tennis or games all morning.

This would be best if you were doing term time minding as well, school pick ups etc. you'd have probably done your farm, zoo, museum trips at weekends.
I can see your point. You wanted to do the nice, grandparenty things and she should have given you the option to plan the week together.

Glad you have spoken to your daughter and as my son in law works from home I can understand why having the kids in the house in the morning could be an issue. Save the big days out for when the kids are older. Mine are the same age as yours and the younger one struggles with full days out. Maybe a park or swimming or just a bus or train ride in the afternoons. That is what we have planned with ours.

I love the Brockwell Park - you could look at using the Lido but it has a nice playground.

Various ways you can get there.

A 4 year old won't get anything from a tennis club and even a 6 year old would be questionable - odd choice

You can absolutely start children playing tennis at that age! They're not playing serious games or anything, they're just learning to whack a ball around with a bat. My friend's kid started at that age and he still plays every week now at 14.

OP, I think your daughter probably just thought she would be doing you a favour and letting you have some free time while you're in London, but I can see why you're disappointed. I think you should probably have both had a discussion at an earlier stage about what you'd do with the kids while you were there.

Chessington and Legoland would be awful for those ages in the summer holidays. Hour plus long queues in the sun with whiny fidgety children.

I'm local to your daughter. I would suggest picnics in Kew gardens, they have a great children's garden with slides, an enormous sandpit and an area to paddle. Stag lodge stables have pony rides in Richmond park for their ages.
The wetlands centre in Barnes is lovely to walk around and there is a great playground for children.
There is an adventure playground in marble hill park just over the river in Twickenham, you'll need to book a session in advance.
There is the Rose theatre in Kingston, Richmond theatre and the Polka theatre in Wimbledon.

I'm not sure why people think that tennis club for those ages would be a bad idea. All of mine have done tennis from three. At that age it is a lots of ball skills and playing fun games.

Wow - if I had a 6 and 4 year old (and willing grandparents in Cumbria), I know where my kids would be spending the holidays!

Cumbria with grandparents is an idyllic way to spend the holidays but the daughter’s right - 6 and 4 is really too young to spend all that time away from their parents when they don’t know how you’ll cope with them. You could maybe ask next year once you know the kids a bit better.

More seriously, I think your plans are a bit ambitious. My teenager was at Chessington for a full day last week and managed to get on 4 rides (1-2 hour queues per ride and its not even state school holidays).
If you are used to Cumbria days out - and I have lived there with young kids - then London is a completely different ball game. My kids soon worked out that going north to stay with grandma meant they lost a few bragging rights (Legoland, Chessington, London Zoo), but got to do a lot more with fewer crowds.
I also know that the drive down from Cumbria is a nightmare depending on where you live (we used to reckon on at least 8 hours), so to do it twice in the summer holidays is a massive favour.

@grandmacant seems to have vanished. Not even showing up on a search as being here on her own thread.

How odd.

Sorry- changing my post- she is showing.

@grandmacant Do you hang out on Gransnet? You might get more replies there from women your own age.

My mum used to take mine to a bus stop and they would get on the first bus that came along to see where it would bring them, so simple but my kids absolutely loved the excitement of it and still talk about it today (they are late teens now).

How lovely! 😃

Thank you all, a phone call and all is sorted, the kids want to go to tennis (I don't doubt the benefits of this, they already do tennis in term time too), even though I wish I had full days if they will be happy with tennis that's ok.
I think initially I was upset as I often feel my daughter and her husband doubt our abilities, we are only 64 and 66 and I feel she acts like we are 80 sometimes!! On the last visit we had an issue of one of her friends older children coming over to help me babysit in the evening!! I don't need a 15 year olds help!! So I think I felt like this was her calling me incompetent again.
She explained her logic, we agreed In October we will have Monday, Friday full days and she will sort something for the middle 3 mornings.
All is well, no bad blood or fallings out and I've been sent a copy of the kids summer bucket lists they wrote and well they have very humble wishes with top of the list being going out on bikes, picnics (with teddy bears), a trip to Hamley's and swimming!! Perhaps I overestimated how much the kids would want to do. I raised my daughter in Cumbria and often felt she missed out as although growing up in the lakes was beautiful, theme parks and even good zoos felt a world away.