When child goes to pre-school ...

[HappyAsIAm]

This is my first post, even though I have been a lurker for some time!

I am a part time working mum to a 3 year old, and our lovely live out nanny looks after him on the 3 days a week that I work. He will start at pre-school very soon, doing a couple of sessions a week, one of which falls on our nanny's days. Gradually, I would expect that he will work up to 4 or so sessions a week, all of which will fall on nanny's days.

The pre-school is a 15 minute drive away from our home. Each session is 3 1/4 hours long. Nanny works a 30 hour week for us, and does lo's ironing every week, and tidies up toys etc after him. Occasionally, she cooks a batch of meals from scratch and freezes them in portions (I do the same), so there is no need to cook him a hot meal every day. The lunmchtime meal is something cold, like a sandwich, so no cooking there either. I do all the washing, shopping etc, and we have a cleaner who comes every week and does the whole house.

Would it be reasonable to ask our nanny to do any other tasks, or not? She has been with us for 7 months (previous nanny is on maternity leave, and we don't know whether she is coming back), and she is very experienced. We really value her and how she cares for our son. I don't know whether it would be reasonable to ask her to do anything else, or whether she is already doing the norm.

Honest responses welcome! Many thanks.

Once back from doing the pre-school run, the time can go fairly quickly... so would be a perfect time to do the ironing, the dishes and general tidying. Could you add Washing onto the duties - surprised it isn't part of it already. Generally I'd say everyone just mucks in with doing washloads, if the machine is empty and there is a full load to do, just put it on.

Pre-schools often like having parent helpers, so nanny could do that on occasion, as your contribution towards the pre-school.

It depends what tasks you're thinking of?!

Generally speaking a nanny will do all tasks to do with the children. This can include; washing, ironing, sewing, changing beds, tidying playroom, sorting out toys/clothes, organising a party/playdate, shopping etc.

It's not really within the scope of a nanny to do any household chores that are not related to the child. So your washing/ironing, cleaning, changing your bed etc. would not normally be done by a nanny. Although a nanny/housekeeper probably would do this and your nanny may be willing to take on these tasks.

I'm in London and it seems to be the 'done-thing' here that when this happens and the child/children are at school, the nanny will take on another child part-time (nanny-share) rather than doing any extra household chores. It is worth remembering that nannies are nannies because they love working with children and so she may be unhappy to be doing domestic chores for half the day and prefer to find another job that is solely childcare.

Thanks for the replies.

nannynick - good idea about the washing. I will suggest that too, and we cuiold, as you say, share it between us and just put a load on when it needs doing. My son is potty training at the moment, so some days there is an abundance of things to wash! And once my son is settled at pre-school, it would be great if she could help out there once in a while.

ohnoshedittant - we live only just out of London (7 miles or so out, well within the M25), and I am reluctant to do a nanny share as I have seen friends who have tried nanny shares be unhappy with them, for a multitude of reasons. I would strongly prefer not to do a nanny share, and don't mind paying the going rate (which I am sure I already am) for a nanny to only care for my child.

Am I right in thinking then that the likelihood is that to keep our nanny when my son goes to pre-school, she should only be doing the chores she is doing already (plus washing, if it needs doing)? Its not that I want to put upon her - I wouldn't want to offend her by asking if she would do something that nannies would consider inappropriate. Its just that, over time, she will have a lot of time on her hands, which I had hoped could be used to help out. I hadn't really thought too much about exactly what could be done to help out. As I said, we have a weekly cleaner who does all of the cleaning and mine and my husband's ironing. I suppose if we ever had another baby, that would solve the issue!

By the time nanny settles DS into nursery and travels home and leaves enough time to return to nursery 5min before collection, this time will be easily filled by doing your sons washing, ironing, tidying, sorting, batch cooking (which will take the pressure off of you) - all while your son is out of the house, where before she would have to do these tasks while he entertained himself. She can now focus on doing fun activities while he is at home.
Does nanny like to bake? You could ask her if she would mind making a cake or batch of cookies/muffins weekly, especially lovely if she does this towards the end of the week for the weekends visitors/trips.

Thanks tarlia for the suggestion. That sounds a great idea - my son loves to cook and would really enjoy joining in. And we all (nanny included!) enjoy eating!

Talk to your nanny about what she is willing to do.

My nanny cooks lunch for the DC / hoovers and cleans downstairs / irons my husbands shirts whilst the DTs are at nusery.

I have a cleaner who comes once a week and just does upstairs.

Frankly, for most it would be uneconomic to hire a nanny to only do "nursery duties". In our household they need to chip in generally.

It should be remembered that while your son is at Pre-School your nanny still has to be available to pick him up if he is ill or in an emergency and so is still on duty. I have always used these times to sort toys and clean child's room, do their washing and ironing and prepare food any time left is used to plan play and activities.
Although I am not precious about what I do I would not appreciate being used as a glorified dogsbody because my employer was scared she wasn't getting her moneysworth

If the nanny already batch cooks for DS could she do a few family meals for the freezer? Agree washing for DS should not be a problem - what about changing his bed linen?

Sunshinenanny, Asking for opinions as to whether it would be reasonable to ask our nanny to do other tasks is hopefully a long way away from her "being used as a glorified dogsbody". I hope I haven't come across differently - as I said, we think our nanny is lovely, and we really value her.

PDR, I will suggest changing his bedlinen. I am sure that wouldn't be a problem. Thanks very much.

I will be able to put a short list of other tasks that are related to childcare together, I'm sure. Thanks for all the suggestions - I don't want to take advantage of our nanny in any way, but I do want to feel that we are getting the help from our nanny that is reasonable to expect given that we are paying a good salary. If nanny is doing everything that any parent would expect, then fair enough, that's fine. But I think there are a few other things that I could suggest that she takes on, so I'll see what she says.

Cheers.

I think your nanny actually does a fairly light amount of nursery duties and it wouldn't be unreasonable to ask her to do a little more on the understanding that those things may slide if your DS is ill or preschool is closed. Changing bedlinen has definitely been on my list of jobs in the past, as has putting washing on, batch cooking and sorting through/mending clothes that land in the ironing pile.

You might ask nanny if there's anything she wouldn't mind doing for you - many nannies are flexible when asked but resent being told they're taking on a whole load more duties.

Happy just though also would she either do the grocery shop for you or wait in and put away an online delivery?

SFAP - thanks for the suggestion in how to approach this. That sounds the way to go. I have no idea why I couldn't come up with that myself, but sometimes you try so hard not to do the wrong thing, you can't see what the right thing is, if you know what I mean.

PDR - that sound be great. make life easier for me and hopefully not a very time consuming task for her either.

All sounds great!

I'm just thinking that assuming nanny is happy with you and you want to retain FT childcare she may be amenable to taking on additional things to secure her job in the slightly longer run (assuming your nanny in ML doesn't come back too). Changing jobs is no fun and some nannies are happy to stay on with slightly altered duties to put off having to find another job! It's worth remembering on both sides that being flexible now and laying the foundations well could lead you to keep the nanny once your DS is at FT school rather than making her redundant and I'm sure she realises that if she flatly refuses to do anything extra you're going to resent paying childcare you're not using and that's her job gone.

The key is to find what she's happy with and you think is worthwhile.

Thanks SFAP. Really appreciate your advice. I would love to retain our nanny and understand the long term ideal.

i think that anything to do with your son eg: helping with his washing, tidying his toys/room, preparing his dinner before pick up, planning an activity for when hes home is all fine, but if im honest to expect her to (as in other posts) iron your stuff, do your things - well she should also charge for cleaning lol, to be honest anyother stuff is for you to do and not her.
anything relating to ur little one though is fully acceptable, (hpe that dosnt offend)

Seems there is quite a difference in opinion as to what is reasonable to expect. And I'm only trying to be reasonable here (hence asking the question. Can I ask whether the responses have all come from nannies? Or from parents who employ nannies?