Curiosity - Parents go with another daycare

I have a curiousity issue. Help !!

Last September I corresponded via email with a lady that was looking for daycare for her son for one or two days a week.

It ended up being that we set up an interview and then she cancelled because her mom offered to watch the son when needed instead.

After a month or so I switched bus stops where i would take my brood and I would see her there but not know that she was the one I had corresponded via email with.

One day she asked me whether I was indeed the same person she had emailed with and that is how we realized it

Since then I have talked to her at the bus stop many times about school and our own kids and I have talked and befriended her mom who comes certain mornings to look after the young son and put the older kids on the bus.

Anywho....this morning she mentionned that her youngest son who by now is around 15 months is starting daycare today.

I was kind of taken back because we have been seeing each other and she has seen me out and about with the daycare many times a week and yet she didn't even ask me if I had any openings.

True...my ad currently says that I am not accepting anyone until September so maybe she looked it up and based it on that but the other part of me wonders if she has seen me out with the kids and not been impressed and that is why she didn't even approach me this time now that we know each other. I don't think my daycare has ever been totally out of control or in any kind of dangerous situation or given her any reason to think it was not a good place.

I think I am an above average daycare. I am sure I am not the VERY best because there are some really impressive people who go all out every day with activities, themes and planning etc but I am a happy and good daycare and I have a loose structure we follow. I feel that I do quite a bit with the kids and we try to make a happy and fun/safe day.

Anywho...now I am curious to ask her but thinking it might not be polite. It is not that I am looking for anyone right now but yet I feel slighted. :rolleyes: It is crazy. I feel like asking her who she chose and how come she never even asked me but I also don't want to put her in an awkward situation or cause any weirdness when I see her from now on

I would just let it go. Like you said,

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but I also don't want to put her in an awkward situation or cause any weirdness when I see her from now on

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Yeah I think you're right. I am glad I controlled my initial impulse to ask. I just smiled when she told me and wished her and her son luck with the new daycare.

It is crazy to feel rejected when I didn't even officially interview or ever show my daycare.

However....the more I think about it - the more relaxed I am about it. I can imagine it would have made a very bad bus stop run if she had come and interviewed and then didn't like it or if she joined the daycare and then things had gone sour. :p

Just think of it this way: They don't know what they're missing!

I had a lady cancel an interview with me, and left a message stating "I have found a better and cheaper daycare than you". I was pissed at first, but glad I didn't waste my time with her. Apparently money is more important than your own flesh and blood. Good for you!

Just remember that people have all kinds of reasons for choosing a daycare (hours, location, price, someone they need has a child in the daycare, etc. etc.). It is probably not that she didn't want you...it's just that something else worked well for her for some other reason. As a new daycare provider I have gotten used to not being chosen...my first five interviews ended up with the parents going elsewhere. However, after that I have now filled all my spaces and am turning people away. I think we need to not take it personally. Sometimes it's just not a good fit.

I probably would just let it go. Keep telling yourself it is because you listed a Sept opening and then it doesn't have to eat at you. On the other hand if you really wanted to find out you could do it in a round about way. Just say you have a curious question to ask her. Mention this forum and then something about how we have been chatting about what parents look for in a daycare and what makes them choose one situation over another. Since she just went through the choosing part does she have any words of wisdom she could share.

I sympathize with you! I tend to over-analyze and take things very personally, also. :P
I would not worry about it, though. She may have thought the same thing, about it being awkward around the neighborhood and at the bus stop if things didn't work out. More than likely, she just thought you were full. Maybe the new daycare is close to her work? Or to some other important place, like gramma and grampas? There are a million maybes!! :)
Either way; oh well!

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Originally Posted by mom-in-alberta

I sympathize with you! I tend to over-analyze and take things very personally, also. :P
I would not worry about it, though. She may have thought the same thing, about it being awkward around the neighborhood and at the bus stop if things didn't work out. More than likely, she just thought you were full. Maybe the new daycare is close to her work? Or to some other important place, like gramma and grampas? There are a million maybes!! :)
Either way; oh well!

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Thanks. I am crazy that way. I always tend to blame myself or take things personally. I try to do the whole thing of being like a duck and letting water slide off my back but sometimes it does not work.

It's not as if I was still hoping for her child to come or expecting him to nor am I even interested in adding anyone to the daycare right now and yet some part of me feels hurt or wonders why she didn't at least ask and whether I was just not good enough.

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Originally Posted by Play and Learn

Just think of it this way: They don't know what they're missing!

I had a lady cancel an interview with me, and left a message stating "I have found a better and cheaper daycare than you". I was pissed at first, but glad I didn't waste my time with her. Apparently money is more important than your own flesh and blood. Good for you!

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OUCH! That's just mean and oh so unnecessary. How would she even know this other dc is better when she didn't even come to the interview?

By the word "better" she means better for her not the child. Better in the sense of closer to her, better hours, cheaper rates, more perks, recommended by a friend whose child goes there. Lots of possible reasons. The mom isn't comparing the setting of each daycare just the extraneous things.