We are not Disney people (we did take our kids once when they were 6 and 11) and they liked it but it was not their favorite and they never asked to go back. Luckily SIL’s parents love WDW and live in Florida. We love doing things with GD, but we are letting the other grands be the “disney grandparents”.
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My kids had many more days that needed coverage once in K than they ever did when I was paying for daycare. They went to after school care at their school, but it was only open on school days. That meant they needed care on school holidays, the day after Thanksgiving, Christmas break, all the weird holidays, teacher conferences…I was lucky I often had friends who could take them. They started school in Sept 2001. I don’t think they went to school for all 5 days until 6 weeks into the school year. Sept 11 thru everything into days off for them and required work for me. At the time my mother was still working full time, so she couldn’t cover.
I would have loved to have grandparents willing to take them. Drop in daycare, if available, was very expensive.
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Ooops! D will not begin full day Kindergarten. GD will! 
GD does remind me a lot of D at the same age.
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I live about 20 minutes from Disneyland. I like Disney but hate crowds. I went 2 years ago with my son, his wife and their (at the time almost 3 year old and 14 month old). I was there with them about 14 hours and it was SO exhausting! They are going again next month but with the other grandparents. I will meet them the next day at Goofy’s Kitchen.
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My sister just retired from her job as a kindergarten instructional assistant to watch newborn GS #4 (and after-school for his 4, 6 & 8 yo brothers).
She’s only 56 and has tons of energy, so I expect it will go well. For now, she’s going to S & DIL’s house, but plans to have a day care for teachers’ kids at her house starting in the fall and the new grandbaby would come to the house then. She’d then have school holidays and summers off so she can go to travel team games and the lake.
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Who would watch the kids during the summer and school holidays?
Isn’t that what grandparent are for??
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I had an acquaintance who only provided daycare for teachers’ children, too. Good idea, really, if you don’t depend on that income.
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@oldfort The teachers are off during school and summer holidays.
@VABluebird, she is taking her pension now and wants to bank it for her retirement nest egg later, but hopes the home day care will replace her pay from the school system. Her school system pays what is barely minimum wage in my HCOL area, but she’s in a low COL state so it goes further. She’s extraordinarily creative and resourceful, so I know she’ll do a great job at making it work.
OTOH, she paid into SS and will get that, and also gets retiree medical effective immediately (no premiums). Her max service for the pension is 27 years; she had 25 and was able to buy into the last two years of pension for $1800. Quite the good deal! It’s better than the pension/benefits contract the teachers have.
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@countingdown, she may earn more running her own business with deductions than she did as an employee. She just needs to be sure she has insurance and disability and all those things. Good luck to her!
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I love little kids! 3 year old GD had a dentist appointment yesterday morning, and it was my day to babysit. I met D & GD at the dentist’s office, and GD was really excited. She held up a piece of paper and very excitedly told me, “Look at my bone teeth!” She had pictures of her X-rays, and she was so proud.
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5 YO GD1 gave me a picture she drew of Grandpa and Nana and wrote on top “I love you Nana and Grandpa Love XXXX”. I told DH that she flattered him with more hair on top, and Grandpa asked “where is my mustache?” So she colored a mustache in along with facial hair on both sides of his face. Grandpa sometimes goes several days until he has to shave for appearances somewhere - and he tells me sometimes after he shaves “well I am not scratchy anymore”.
Aren’t the grandkids grand 
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I am here babysitting DGD, who seems to be giving up her afternoon nap, and she isn’t even 2-years-old yet. Groan! Her older brother did the same at this age. They wake up at ridiculous times like 5:50am, ready to start their day, and they go to bed at 7 or 8. They just are not sleepers…
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Both of my kids were sleepers and nappers. GD also needs a lot of sleep.
I heard intelligent people require less sleep.
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My S will say that is true, thank you very much. 
He used to be up and ready to go by 5 a.m. at the latest, and he resisted naps at an early age. I would run errands several times a day just to get him to nod off for a little bit here & there. He has trouble sleeping at night as an adult - his circadian rhythm is out of step with most folks.
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I had a sleeper (D) and an insomniac newborn (S). Neither of my kids were big nappers, though.
GD takes after her mom except at least for now she will take a nice long mid day nap. D is worried that if she has another baby she will not get so lucky 
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It is much easier psychologically and otherwise to have the ‘easy’ baby be the second one - as the parents are dealing with baby plus one.
DD1 - was fine for naps and ‘short night’ during 6 weeks maternity leave. At seven months, I learned to keep her up at night until 11 pm so she would sleep until 5 am (she was at day care and did sleep morning and afternoon ‘naps’). DD2 was born 25 months later - at two months she slept from 8 pm to 6 am w/o waking up. I lost my ‘baby weight’ in 1 month with DD1, and it took 2 months with DD2. DD1 was born the year DH and I turned 38, and DD2 the year we turned 40.
DD1 (29, so she has ‘young energy’) is mom of 4 - youngest is now 7 months and the oldest is 5 1/2. The children have needed to adjust to mom/dad schedule as DD1/SIL work FT away from home, the older two are in elementary school (K4 and K) with the younger two at daycare. Mom/dad get up at 4 am M - F - lunches for all 6 are part of morning preparations. Dad has to work out and then works 7 - 3 (he is in Army and needs to do conditioning if not doing drill time before work). Mom drops off daycare children first, and then at school (they have some time in before school care) and then reports to work by 7:30 am. Dad picks up older two right after school - gets them home with snack and school papers/any homework, and does chores. Mom picks up younger two before 5 pm (usually has to work over some with her nursing management job - otherwise can get them a bit earlier), gets dinner ready, family dinner, and then family time until bedtime. Sometimes a load of laundry (room conveniently on 2nd floor near bedrooms - but laundry doesn’t have noise to where it keeps anyone awake). Very handy to have laundry near all the bedrooms - helps them keep clothes ‘together’. Baby feeding during the night, so mom is a bit sleep deprived (mom is still breast feeding a little, but too active to pump much, so mostly baby is bottle fed which is fine - baby is very healthy) - not unusual on many school nights for mom to be asleep in the rocking recliner after dinner. SIL has gotten pretty good at doing a lot of house stuff, including laundry, kitchen clean up and loading/running the dishwasher.
Sure. But it’s not really a choice 
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Dang, I had 3 babies and NONE of them were “easy”. We must have been bypassed on that perk!!!
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I’m suffering GD-withdrawal. Snow that was predicted for Sunday turned out to be rain then sleet then a lot of ice. What little road treatment was done (it’s not very common in the south) was washed away before the hard freeze. The few trucks with snow plows can’t break through the ice.
We’ve cancelled babysitting twice and are not sure we can safely pick up the girls until the middle of next week. H may try to drive to their house Monday afternoon with more milk and eggs since one car has AWD. I’ll bake cookies for him to take and will send some new books, too. I need to remember this the next time I feel burned out on frequent babysitting.
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