I'm pregnant!

[sierra]

I am pregnant with my second child, due in July. I have already lost my biggest client because of it. The dayhome they found to take the children when I'm off ( only for a month) does not hold spots and was a great fit for them. No hard feeelings, I would make the same decision for my own family.

Have any of you had similar experiances? How did you fair running your dayhome after your new arrival? My family thinks I'm nuts to only take a month off after baby but I think its just too risky to close for an extend period of time. Any thoughts?

[playfelt]

Congratulations. Sounds like we have a lot of babies being born this year on this forum.

I started my daycare when my second one was 4 months, older one 18 months and my last two kids were born into the daycare so for all intents and purposes 3 of my 4 kids were babies in the daycare. With my third I had him on a Wed, home on Sat and back to daycare on Monday. All of my kids were age 2 and up at that time though. With my fourth I had a week off because one of my daycare moms gave it to me for my "gift". She had arranged with her boss to take a week off work of vacation whenever I went into the hospital and she took all of the daycare kids for the week. She enjoyed getting paid to take a week of vacation but swore she would never ever do it again, lol.

If this were your first or you had issues with your first then I see cause for concern. But when you already have kids of your own in the house you already have to do certain things so the daycare isn't really as much in the way as people would think. Yes you will be tired but you can't nap when baby does because your older child wants to play or needs fed or whatever. With them having the daycare friends to play with it actually allows you more time to sit with your feet up than if you took time off since your child will be entertained by someone else.

Use the money you make from daycare to order in a few more times or purchase more ready made things or treat yourself to those exotic fruits you are craving or to hire a cleaning service for a few weeks. Make it work for you and not against you.

Parents should be very understanding that programming will go by the wayside for awhile and trips to the park will be less depending on timeframe baby is born and how quickly you heal - pulling a wagon of kids after a C-section for instance will take longer to be a good idea.

Yes you run the risk of families leaving if they find alternate care and even those that say they will come back may change their minds once they have spent a month or so at the new daycare. Be prepared to simply start over anyways and budget accordingly since if you do it will be harder with just a one month old to sign on new families than if your baby was older.

Unfortunately is almost comes down to taking no time or taking 2-3 months and starting over.

[loulou]

Congrats!

I'm pregnant. I have always had a young lady that comes in once a week to help with field-trips. Now she covers any of my appointments as well. I will close for 2 weeks and then she will be here full-time until I get the hang of things again. It's great because the kids love her and I really trust her!

[Momof4]

I have friends who have closed their daycares for a few weeks to take a short maternity leave and sometimes they have lost clients and sometimes it works out great that people plan a vacation or a family member for backup so they can keep their caregiver. You just never know. But I wanted to say congratulations and best of luck!

[sophgag604]

i had my baby two weeks ago. I closed for a week and opened back last week. But i have my mother in law (whos retired) and my sister who is on mat leave helping me. until i can do on myself again.

[Inspired by Reggio]

Congratulations on your newest pending addition to your family!

It does suck that the downside of this job and being self employed is that taking time off work for 'any reason' has the risk that clients will seek service elsewhere and than not return

While I get that clients need to do what works for them and that is cool ... for me personally anyone who was not supportive/appreciative of my services enough to return to care after a maternity leave or medical leave or whatever is not someone I really want to honor with my service anyway ~ so look at it as a positive thing that someone more deserving of your energy is waiting to join your crew!

[sierra]

Thank you all ladies! I am hoping to get help from a few family members and not close for the 4 weeks I have set aside. Actually my worst fear is having baby blues like I did with my first. Best to take life as it comes All your posts are very much appropriated!

[mom-in-alberta]

Congrats!!
My youngest was "born" into the daycare. I went into it fully expecting that I could possibly lose every family I had. My action plan was to take the month off. She was due the first week. That (in theory) would give me a week off, baby comes, and then three weeks off. Little bugger was late, so I ended up having a 2 week old instead of a 3 1/2 week old, but what can you do.
Luckily, I only lost one family. And that was because I was no longer offering transport to school. They were in, then out, then in, then out, then in again. Two days before I re-opened, I called and they had changed their mind again. Lesson learned, should have charged a deposit or holding fee. But, as I said, I was prepared for the possibility.
I had a very well thought out plan when it came to "what will we do, if... (baby comes early, or I need a c-section, etc). I think that helped the parents feel better.

[mlle.coccinelle]

Congrats!!!!!!
I'm pregnant as well, due at the end of may! i've told every family... there is only one family not sure about that they will do yet! I even found a new family that will be in my care for 3 months then I will take my 1 month off then he will come back!
I hope you will find a wonderful family like I had the ''chance to do''

[sierra]

wow lots of babies are due! congrats to you all!. Well since posting this thread I have had 5 interviews! All are fine with my needing time to recover and they have family or vacations planned