First Week of Daycare

Forgetting that the his teachers were standing right behind me, I said to Soren with my most excited tone of voice, "You survived your first week of daycare!"  They chuckled at my attempt to be positive, but for my brave little boy, it was a big week. 

Monday's drop-off went a little better than I had expected.  Oliver shed a few last-minute tears and Soren didn't even cry.  I blew it though when I walked past Soren's classroom and couldn't resist one little peak.  The window to the classroom door was covered in decorations and I bent down and peered through a narrow, uncovered section of the window and he saw me and burst out crying!  As the assistant teacher tried comforting him, my cover was blown when I heard the lead teacher call out to her, "He saw his mom!" 

The second morning Soren cried as I brought him into his classroom and by the third morning, he would cry as soon as I pulled up in front of the daycare center.  Oliver also grew progressively clingier at drop-off as the week went on.  While his adjustment has been easier than Soren's, I think he can take only so many new things at one time and learning about a class field trip or special music class caused him a lot of fretting.  We can leave notes for the teachers at drop-off and Oliver requested I write his teacher to let her know he was worried about music class.  She reported back that in typical Oliver fashion, he didn't want to participate at first, only watch, and chose to sit on his teacher's lap instead.  Once he had enough time to survey the scene, he eventually joined the other kids and enjoyed the rest of class.

Transitions are hard times of day for the kids, whether it's getting ready for nap time, going to a new activity or seeing other parents arrive to pick of their kids.  Not only is Soren learning to nap in a new place, but without his pacifier, which means his naps have been short or non-existent and he comes home wipes and ready for an early bedtime. 

And for all the tears that have been shed this week, the kids have overall liked their daycare.  Their teachers are full of reports of all the activities they enjoyed and stories of them laughing and playing with the kids and teachers.  Soren one of his teachers unprompted and in a game he learned from his dad and grandpa, ran up to another teacher, tickled her and ran away laughing.   

As for my transition to the new routine of the kids going to daycare, it's gone better than I thought.  I'm actually getting to work earlier than I did with the nanny. I worried about getting them out of the house in time in the morning, but I realized much of my morning routine is still the same.  Even when we had a nanny, most days I had the kids dressed and fed by the time she arrived.  Since daycare provides breakfast, I just feed them a "breakfast snack" while I get ready and then we head out the door for the short drive to daycare.  Our evening routine is more challenging though than it had been since dinners will require more preplanning and prep and that will take time to figure out.  And since Chris will be doing pick-up, he'll have more responsibilities for dinner than he's ever had. 

Our Final Week With Our Nanny

The kids are enrolled in their new daycare and are scheduled to visit next Friday to meet their teachers.  I've thought through our new morning routine and conducted trial runs.  They are technically ready to go.  I am ready to go.  And then I realize that I'm in denial that our nanny only has one week left.  One more week of me being able to dash out the door even if the kids are still in their pajamas because I know our nanny will finish dressing them and getting them ready for the day.  One more week of asking the nanny to do me a favor and run an unexpected errand for me or put dinner in the oven.  One more week of the kids seeing the friends they've gotten to know over the past year and a half and one more week of soaking in the beautiful Portuguese language.  I hope our nanny stays a part of our lives, but I'm in denial that her presence in our everyday lives is coming to an end. 

What I learned about having a nanny, at least a good nanny, is that she doesn't just take care of your children, but your whole family.  Our nanny brought our kids to see me while I was in the hospital and drove me home after I was discharged so Chris wouldn't have to miss yet more work.  She took care of my children when they were sick and was thrown up on, not once, but twice.  The only one childless among her friends, she shows off pictures of my kids and boasted their accomplishments as if they were her own.  Her mom back in Brazil even displays a framed picture of one of Oliver's drawings.  (For the record, I don't have a framed anything of Oliver's.)

Having a nanny means giving up privacy.  Ours knows the dynamics of our family - good and bad - better than anyone else.  She's seen my kids' worst behavior and me in my pajamas.  She knows we're not very organized, we have a sweet tooth for chocolate and cookies and that we wait until the trash can is overflowing before we take it out.  There are no secrets.  But in exchange Chris and I gained someone we trust with her kids as much as each other.  There are few people who love and know your kids as well as you as you do and the more people you have in your life who you trust without question, the better off your whole family is. 

I'm feeling sad and anxious when I think of this upcoming week.  I hope it goes by quickly because I hate drawn-out goodbyes, but not too quickly that I can't see this final week as a week to be enjoyed.

Transitions

We knew the day would eventually come when our nanny would leave our family and move on to bigger and better things.  She's been in school since we met her and has a goal of finishing her business degree.  When you're in a really good routine and so comfortable with someone, it's easy to forget it won't last forever, so it still took us by surprise when she announced her last day would be December 9. 

As much as we loved having a nanny, we decided to enroll our kids in a daycare center.  I surprised myself by how quickly I warmed to the idea.  Considering how we're in the middle of the adoption process, a daycare center is a better childcare option for the time-being over finding a new nanny.  We don't have to worry about the nanny leaving us close to the adoption, which will be a time of huge transition that we don't want to also have the transition of a new daycare provider too.  It had also become overwhelming to think about not only what kind of nanny would be the best fit for our family now, but also who would be the best fit for three kids, one of whom we don't know anything about, such as age or health needs.  The daycare center meets our kids' needs now and we can reevaluate hiring another nanny after we adopt. Meanwhile, we have the flexibility to pull the kids when we go to China and during my maternity leave without worrying about impacting a nanny's livelihood.   

At ages two and four, I feel so much more comfortable with the kids going to a daycare center than when they were younger, just as I felt more at peace with the decision to go back to work after Soren was born than after Oliver was born and I was adjusting to being a first-time mom.  They're at an age where I think they'll adjust to the transition to attending daycare and they'll really enjoy it.  I took the kids with me when I went to check the place out and they loved all the new toys and activities they had available in each classroom.  I know there'll be tons of tears at drop-off in the beginning, but I also trust there'll be a lot they like about their new daycare.