To wonder who you agree with re childcare

[Grestin]

dh doesn’t want to consider a childminder, he thinks there may be problems with reliability and also the mix of ages may be a problem.

I think it might be good to at least look.

Wondering what others would do when you just don’t agree.

It's good for you both to feel comfortable

Baby under 1 year, childminder I felt - when mine was over 2 we moved him to nursery, but could have done it younger. Mine was with 2 older boys at the minder and they doted on him, they are still friends now.

Once he went to nursery he made friends both older younger and the same age

All depends on what you both like the idea of

I did find when it came to toilet training etc it was easier with nursery rather than someone in their home

We've had nice experiences with both settings. He's just left nursery back to a different minder recently due to being too old for nursery.

Bear in mind with a minder they may get a bit bored once walking and more social, but it's a while until that happens. Mine liked the group interactions

I agree with your husband, reliability is an issue but also safeguarding. In a nursery there are many pairs of eyes on the children. Especially with a very young child I worry about the lone working nature of childminders. Also childminders are not qualified to the same level as nursery staff. They have to attend a short introductory course as opposed to a full and relevant childcare qualification.

I've used the same childminder since DD was 9 months old. She's 6 now.

Best decision I ever made. They're ofsted registered to.

She absolutely loves it, is like one of the family, their own children invite her over for sleepovers sometimes so I get weekend freebies 😂.

They go on days out to places, gets fed really well and does loads of activities.

Never had a problem with sickness. They take the usual 4 week holidays (don't charge for this) and I plan around it as I get plenty of notice.

They've never once not been able to have her due to sickness (except that spell in covid where they had to close).

I love them.

Thanks all, it’s hard to make a decision.

i think recruitment and retention at the nursery is an issue because it’s a bit off the beaten track. So there are quite a few staff changes which isn’t ideal. Just considering options.

The reason could be that it's 2023.

I used a childminder initially, but after a number of months I took my son out and put him in a nursery and never looked back!

I found my childminder so unreliable, my holidays were never my own as I had to hold them to cover her time off, constant phone calls at work to say he was sick and needed picking up and when I collected him there was absolutely nothing wrong with him, and the final straw came when I was at her door to drop him off one morning and she said she was sick and needed the day off. She was up and dressed, and her son was up and dressed ready for school, and never at any point did it occur to her to lift the phone and tell me? Never again! The nursery was a breath of fresh air!

It's not so much that as that childminders want to take that usually in the school holidays because they usually have school age children.

If you have under 5s, you generally want to use your leave during term time

Thanks. I have to admit I didn’t really consider a childminder for first dc. Mostly because I just didn’t feel 100% comfortable with leaving a non verbal child alone with someone I didn’t really know. It’s obviously not to say that I think anything bad would have happened but you just can’t know, and I know some like the different ages but I think it can make life difficult eg managing different naps and so on.

I am just a bit worried about the nursery due to staffing turbulence. I’m sure it will be fine though.

There is a lot of talk at that age about what's best for children. It's kind of part of the fun about the baby years. The main thing is whatever you choose you want to feel like they care about your child.

If you expect him to do 50% of the emergency childcare when his experience is that childminders are unreliable, you will get friction in your relationship - he will be thinking he told you so and you insisted so it should be your problem. If you think he expects you to do all emergency childcare then perhaps that isnt a problem for you?

Is he actively looking at childcare options or just vetoing your carefully researched suggestions?

@Ohtobetwentytwo - I have got some reservations about the nursery we have her down for although she probably will end up going there.

We do tend to split emergency childcare depending on who is around and what’s on. I am only going back for two days a week (was three days before) and rightly or wrongly since I am only in for half a week there is definitely little tolerance to me having to be off for any reason. So for example if dc is sick Monday morning and I am off Monday and Tuesday and they are my working days that means I’m off for the whole week while if I was full time it would only be half the week. (Im doing my one handed posting again so I hope that makes sense!)

To be fair to the nursery they’ve never sent home for silly reasons as far as I can see but of course it will happen and would at any setting and I recognise that.

@Grestin I definitely think that if you're only working two days a week, your DH should do most of the sick days that fall on those days because you will be picking up most of the sick days by default on your non working days

Child minders are better in the long term when you need to consider wrap around child care and not all schools offer after school clubs. I’d rather my child was with a childminder than a noisy nursery all day.

We put our son in nursery. Immediately hated it and moved him to a childminder within a few months. I did meet 5 before finding 'the one' :)

Of the 5 years we had our childminder across both of our children, she had a grand total of 3 days sick.

The best thing about a childminder was that they went out and about almost daily. To the local park, to groups, to the farm, to the allotment.

Anyway, you could start with a nursery and always change to a childminder!

I understand where he's coming from. I never entertained the idea of a Childminder and preferred a Nursery. It worked out well for me.

I mean us. It worked out well for us as a family.

@Lifeisapeach we’d only need a max of two days in before / after school care though and not for very long. I’m actually not sure at all any childminders do pick up or drop offs from the school they’d go to although I haven’t looked into it. Unless they lived in the village I doubt they would, it’s off the beaten track a bit.

I thought I'd love childminders but it was a nightmare. Nursery provided more accountability, variety in stimulation and consistency in care for us.

Oh that’s really interesting @regularmumnotacoolmum

It was some posts on here that had me wondering, and a friend of mine said the childminder set up worked really well for her.

I've always used childminders

• considerable cheaper - 30%
• friendly home environment
• very reliable
• more flexible on types of contract

I didn't like nursery as they seemed to have a constant revolving door of bored looking young people who worked there - not a lot of consistency of care givers - nurseries are much bigger so found the administration side of it very impersonal.. not a lot of outdoor time. Hit and miss with food

My twins are with an amazing childminder who has a staff member as well so it's like a mini nursery and they get out to loads of activities at the local library, put on language lessons, forest school lessons, visits to places like the fire station train station etc - things that a large nursery simply couldn't do whereas a childminder with 4 kids can

Food is actually one of the things that leans me towards nursery - I do love not having to cook anything on nursery days!

The reason is more likely to be that they need two wages coming in. Just like we did in 1973. 🙄

It does really depend on the nursery.

The only teenager at the one we use is one who is studying, the rest are all older, experienced and some have been there for years. DS started there at 3 months, he'll be 1 in a few weeks and still has the same keyworker.

They have plenty of access to outdoor spaces, the baby room has its own outdoor space. They also take them outside to things such as feeding ducks at the nearby park.

In nursery, they have people come in and do classes such as baby yoga and baby signing. To celebrate their 'outstanding' Ofsted result, they had a mini petting zoo come to the nursery grounds for the children to enjoy.

I'm happy to pay through the nose for it, it's truly excellent.

I've had this convo many times recently. I'm a cm and have a really good relationship with the families I work with. I understand d it's so difficult for parents to choose a cm sometimes especially if the cm is a stranger. I will say tho, if you find the right one it can be amazing. I have a parent who has recently moved over from a nursery and she's been so complimentary about what a different experience they've had compared to how they were treated at the nursery. The child is so much happier and has a great bond already. I understand it can be a very difficult decision to make but if you meet a few and see how you feel and whether there's someone you click with.

FWIW I have the immune system of an ox and I'm never off sick tho I do take holidays well planned out in advance.

My son started as part time nursery, part time childminder largely as a result of the concerns your DH had about childminders.
It quickly became apparent he preferred the childminder- more homely environment, more flexibility for his routine. He ate and slept better at the childminder. We interviewed several nurseries and childminders before choosing.
We find our childminder very reliable because if they don’t work, they don’t get paid! Yes, we take our holidays when they take theirs, but as part of the interview process you can identify when they take them and if it suits you.
With the shortage of places you need to get organised whichever you choose!

There are def some excellent childminders around but they won’t be as flexible as a nursery. For our nursery we had two “set” days but could add and swap around within reason- few CMs would be able to accommodate this and as pp said they have set holidays. Depending on when these are that could be problematic.

Illness is a concern- you could always get a call at 8am saying they are ill. Very unlikely with a nursery as they move staff around to make sure their ratios are ok

CMs are cheaper though.

personally I wouldn’t have an issue with mixed ages. During the school day they will all be younger than school age, obviously. Some CMs I know take the kids on all kinds of adventures. Not all do.

There are excellent CMs and excellent nurseries. And not so good versions of both too.