Posts Tagged ‘Childcare’

A recent column in the Washington Post, “With rising child-care cost, many parents are paying to work,” brought to light a parenting issue that many keep to themselves: for some middle-class families, the cost of daycare is more than one of the parent’s salaries.

“I really thought it wouldn’t get much worse than the unpaid college internship. I raced from that gig in my duct-taped car to make it to my paying job as a waitress. I barely scraped by,” writes Post columnist Petula Dvorak. “But 20 years later, I’m horrified to realize that my ramen days were more lucrative than the illogical mess I’ve got going today. Because right now, most weeks, I actually pay to work. And I’m not the only one.”

So why work at all? The Post spells it out.

“‘If you’re leaving the workforce to take care of your kids, that financial calculus may make sense in the immediate year or two,’ said Heather Boushey, a senior economist with the D.C.-based Center for American Progress…. ‘But looking at the long-term economic health of a family, that can be devastating.’ When you step off a work path, you lose seniority, experience, benefits — workforce capital that is difficult to regain once the kids are in school (assuming they go to a free public school, of course).”

Such parents are reluctant to talk about their issue, because they’ll be swiftly (and judgmentally) advised to quit work. But as Amy Graff, a writer for San Francisco Chronicle blog The Mommy Files has it, there are reasons both tangible and intangible: “You might wonder why I worked but our family needed that little bit of money to survive in San Francisco, and I loved my job. Plus, it would have been risky for me to take a break from working at a point when I was young in my career. I had been out of college for only six years.”

Riffing on this, Graff also called daycare centers in San Francisco to see how much they charge to care for infants (prices are higher than for older children). She got back a range of costs, from a low of $1,280 and a shocking high of $1,851 a month. That’s a high of more than $22,000 a year and a vast chunk of family change to drop. Not to mention that many of the centers are difficult or impossible to get into, as San Francisco has a dearth of options for infant daycare and is undergoing a bit of a baby boom. So…good luck with that.

Working at home during naps sounds so easy–until you actually try it. Yes, I too thought my newborn baby might sleep in a basket under my desk, waking up for storytime and hugs before drifting peacefully back to sleep again when I needed to meet a deadline.

Ha, ha, and also, ha. Nothing is as tough on a work schedule as a small child, who, awake or asleep, has you hopping, and it’s tough to get work done when you’re fetching milk, Play-Doh, and the remote control so an episode of Dragon Tales will give you some sweet, sweet relief.

Down in Menlo Park, however, at least one group of enterprising parents has found a solution: Cubes&Crayons brings together rent-able shared office spaces with onsite childcare. Opened in January of 2008, Cubes&Crayons offers a variety of care packages: You can rent a space by the month or by the year, full-time or a specified number of hours a week, bringing infants or children all or part of the time you’re there. You can buy drop-in day passes or half-day passes, with or without childcare; with childcare and a shared office, rates run about $20 an hour, just $5 more than the Bay Area’s going nanny hourly rate. Working 10 hours a week with childcare will run you about $600 a month.

Cubes&Crayons has proved so popular in the South Bay that they’re headed north. The San Francisco office is in its planning stages right now and seeking investors and early adopters. Got a question? Contact Felicity at felicity@cubesand crayons.com.

The Menlo Park location of Cubes&Crayons is located at 1122 Crane Street (at Santa Cruz Avenue), Menlo Park, 650-323-2551, cubesandcrayons.com. The Menlo Park mothership also has a nice blog, with profiles of members and information on other activities going on at the branch, like yoga classes and date nights.

With all the other things you have to do in a day, “nail care” hovers on the to-do list somewhere between “clean out closets” and “plan funeral arrangements.” Who has the time to keep nails spiffy when you’re so busy taking care of the myriad body parts of assorted children?

Now that Mani + Nanny has opened in San Francisco, you may find yourself making the time. The Pacific Heights nail studio’s gig is reasonably priced childcare while Mama or Dad relaxes and gets some nail maintenance. Manicures (regular or French) and pedicures run $8-35, and childcare in the clean, pleasant, well-stocked playroom is just $10 for your first child aged 6 weeks to 6 years and $5 for a second child for the duration of your services. And don’t get all freaky about bringing your infant into a toxin-filled salon: All the lotions and unguents used are paraben-, toleuene-, and formaldehyde-free. So come on in and breathe deeply.

“There are so many things in San Francisco that you can do for your child, but so few that you can do for yourself while your child is cared for,” says Mani + Nanny owner Stacey Isaacs, who left the corporate world to open her own business after giving birth to her 13-month-old son. “It’s so great to see the moms sitting and relaxing with their hands free!”

Amen, Stacey.

Mani + Nanny is located at 1722-1724 Divisadero Street (between Bush and Sutter Streets), San Francisco. Call 415.673.MANI (6264) or visit maniandnanny.com.

A night out looks a lot pricier from this side of the baby divide. Even if you only have one sprout, most babysitter charge upwards of $15 an hour. Add that to the cost of dinner and a movie and date night starts to empty Junior’s college fund.

A better option, for those whose kids have left the pull-up stage: San Francisco Gymnastics’ Parents Night Out, a bi-monthly party for kids age 41/2 and up. Parents drop the tot at 5:30 or 6pm (depending on if it’s a Friday or Saturday) and race off to enjoy themselves, while kids are stuffing their faces with pizza, playing games, navigating obstacle courses around the gym, and watching a movie. According to one savvy mom I know, most kids bring their pajamas and a sleeping bag for the movie portion of the evening, and by the time parents return at 9:30 or 10pm the kids are exhausted, pliable, and ready to fall asleep like a lil angel in the car. The best part? Parents Night Out is just $25 for singleton kids, $20 for each sibling.

Find out more at sanfranciscogymnastics.com.