My parents always had my nephews, one day a week when they were young and their parents worked, until they started preschool neither went to nursery or childcare before that - they had help from the otherside of their family too. That arrangement seemed to work for them. My parents retired very early in their mid 50’s which is why this was possible.
When I had my eldest, I asked if my parents would like to have him one day a week too. There was a lot of umming and ahhing and they couldn’t/wouldn’t commit to a particular day (despite me asking as I needed to
commit to his days with nursery and pay a deposit) so I put him in nursery for all my working days instead - I thought they just didn’t want the hassle/commitment.
When I had my second, my Mum had a big heart to heart and said how upset she was I hadn’t asked her to have my first (I had) and asked if they could have my second one day a week. So for the last 15 months they have my second. It’s great because it’s a huge saving but:-
They seem to massively resent it, talk about how hard work it is and when they get a “day off.”
They leave my youngest with me (I WFH) whilst they take my oldest to school which means I can’t actually log in until 9.30 - which then means I need to log off later and then they resent that I’m “late” coming to collect them because I have to tag the hour I’ve logged in later on the end of my day.
They frequently have holidays and need to change the days because of other commitments (I find it really frustrating they can’t make appointments etc in the other 6 days of the week).
They don’t really do anything simulating with my youngest, I encourage them to take him to play groups etc but they prefer their own space and I know he’s sat in front of the TV. They also let him nap for ages - I cap his naps - so we have a really crap evening that day where he won’t go down.
My youngest loves nursery and we can afford it - I just know my Mum will act all offended but really I think she likes to be “seen” to be doing something - she says a few of her friends have their grandchildren. So my hesitation is just that I know she’ll be offended.
My parents are great for adhoc childcare. I think they full days and the commitment of it week in week out is their issue.