Oh help me please ! any such thing as a part time nanny (merseyside) and costs???

[Lulumama]

am having heeeeoooooogee issues with childcare

am a doula, so work is very unpredictable. i also have to turn away work as my child care is so scrappy.

DH out of the equation as works long hours and late nights and evenings.

mum is great, but an hour away and nursing sick mother of her own,
MIL is great but lives abroad half the year
childminder is great, but not keen on weekends and cannot have the DCs Thursday or Friday. finding another ad hoc CM is impossible.
friends are marvellous, but all have their own lives and DCs and cannot guarantee to be around at the drop of a hat !

so, short of only having clients who are being induced!! what can i do?

irony is, if i had better childcare, then i could work more, if i worked more, i could have better child care! chicken and egg scenario

starting to really frustrate me and get me down

DCs are 8 and 2.5, my DD is starting school september 2009, so that will be easier, as school age children much easier to sort, in terms of someone else taking them to school or picking htem up or having them for a few hours of a weekend

what other options are there?

i don;t thikn i can afford a nanny, not even part time, no idea what a nanny costs

DH does not want an au pair, does not want a stranger living in the house, and i feel DD too young for that, especially with a potential language barrier.

whoever solves my problem will be me best friend

does anyone you know have an au pair you can share? or know any students that would be available evening or weekends?

nope, no-one i know has such a thing ! either spouses are around more, or they have family close by who can help

the only student i know has a part time job too, so weekends and evenings are often out of the question

anyhoo, how are you?

looked into babysitting agency, but they need 24 hours notice, which aint gonna happen!

Childcare is a bugger when you don't know when you are going to need it. I would love to go freelance but can't as we need the steady income to cover childcare etc.
I'm not too bad thanks
Busy trying to find a school hours job as I need to spend more time with the kids.

know a couple of young ladies who are nneb training and might be up for helping out
would need to ask
ummm, i think i have your email somewhere and will catch up with you. can't actually remember which "bit" of m/side you are in. luck will have it that you're at an opposite corner from me

good luck job hunting

the alternative is, i train as an antenatal educator ( which costs more money !! earn a steadier income for a while, then when DD is at school, go back to doulaing, and have au pair/ nanny then... when i have an income behind me

am in southport

i keep reading about gumtree as a place to find childcare, is is national ? anyone know?

can you talk to local nurseries to see if you are able to get dd in ad hoc? and does the school have breakfast/afterschool clubs? would that help with things?
just train ds & dd to be runners for you helping you out with your doulaing

have spoken to several nurseries. none can do care like that.

school is less of a problem, as 3 of my neighbours all go to the same school, so DS and eventually DD could go to their friend;s before and after school

there are clubs, but they are fully booked and there is a waiting list

just had a look at gumtree, and have just emailed someone fairly local , so answered my own question !

progress

yes !! have emailed you back. off to bed , thanks for the help x

We have an aupair - my DS's are 3 (nearly 4) and 19m. The language barrier isn't really an issue, as our ap had very good English from the start, which is fantastic after just 7 weeks. It doesn't feel like having a stranger in the house at all. However, ours doesn't do much sole charge (mainly while I nip to the shops / do a nursery run for DS1), so maybe that's why I'm not so worried. I think if you got the right one (there are aussies/canadians or non-English mother tongue school teachers out there), it could work very well for you.

thanks laura. there would be a proportion of sole charge involved, probably more than an au pair would have usually. out of interest, how much is it? if you don;t mind me asking?

We pay our ap £60 per week, which is definitely at the low end of the scale. She's supposed to do 5 hours a day 5 days per week, but does nowhere near that in reality, so I don't feel bad about it. I think if you were going for more hours, or more experience/qualifications (our ap has no relevant experience or qualifications), you'd be paying out a bit more. Then there are the other 'invisible' costs - phone use (not much with cheap rate access numbers), extra food/elec/water (not that noticeable in a larger household), loss of a spare room... But other things like not having to pay a babysitter if we just want to go to the cinema mean that DH and I have been out more often in the past few weeks, than in the past few years

Could you trial the idea - maybe with a summer ap, then you're not tied for ages if it doesn't suit you?

Perhaps a nanny who already has a child would be a good option instead? They might be prepared to be more flexible.

thanks very much

i might look into it, but i don;t think DH would go for it

a nanny would definitely be out of my price range i think

thanks for the info though

have had a reply from the lady on gumtree i emailed! i hope she can drive