Mixed Bag: New routines, whining, and preschool vs daycare EP 374

and anything we're thinking of changing up. We're also going to do a brief discussion of whining. Has been a hot topic for us for our Patreon community forums. It happens. I'm not saying my children ever whine, and I'm sure nobody listening to this has children who ever whine, but theoretically it could happen, and if so, we want to share some thoughts about it and ways to deal with it and hopefully come out of it with our own

mental health intact. And then finally, in the question, we're going to do a slightly deeper dive into a question about a childcare and early childhood education and how those things fit together. But first of all, Sarah, you guys are like six weeks into the new school year by the time this is airing, right, you've been doing this for a while.

I feel like we had to practice. But to summarize, the biggest changes have been that we have two different schools, which mean an earlier time to leave the house to drop off the kids. This is not something our nanny generally does for us, because she stays late so we are my husband and I the ones kind of in charge of drop off, and so beginning that process more like seven twenty five versus the seven forty five seven fifty we were used to actually kind of made a difference.

a bit of a later bedtime. So just going through each of those the earlier leaving has been okay in that Actually, I would say the themes that there's been more dividing and conquering than there ever was before. My husband and I realized that actually if we each did one drop off instead of one person being like a bus and doing both, then that means we could leave closer to the more previous typical time of around seven forty five.

And so we've created a schedule where some days I take everyone, some days he takes everyone, and then most of the other days we actually split them up, and this has provided enough variety that it's kind of nice because like then you get the one on one time and some of the car rides with different groups of kids, and then sometimes you're totally off, like I'm totally off on Thursdays and he's totally off on Tuesdays, and I

just feel like we've gotten a nice balance there. So it took some configuring and experimentation, but that's been good. The late night activities has been very much helped by carpools, which are kind of new to us. But I was aggressive in seeking out carpool constituents for soccer in particular because it does go quite late, and we were so lucky to find two other families who live very close by and conveniently. Soccer is three nights per week, so we each now own a night, which means that's two

nights we don't own. Our nanny often helps with us, so I mean selfishly, I actually don't do a lot of soccer driving at all during the week at all. I'm happy to watch games, but super excited not to really be involved in the driving for practices and it's been great. And then finally, my fear was that with kids getting finished with stuff at eight forty five, that we'd be going to bed at like ten thirty because

there'd be this protracted wine down. But we've kind of gotten it, like, Okay, if Josh is picking up from gymnastics, I'm heating up her dinner like while he's driving, so that the second she gets home, I'm placing it in front of her. She knows to just go ahead and

shower and we will just go to bed. And we've gotten to the point where I think there was one night that we did the driving like our nanny had gone and we were all in bed by nine thirty despite an eight forty five pickup, my husband and my so included. So yeah, I feel like that took some practice, but it is working better than I thought. I've talked a lot, but yeah, I thought I would have to alter my morning running routine more than I have, but it's actually been okay.

which is a whole different can of worms. But I do have productive mornings on those days when I am up at five am. So yeah, we've shifted some things to as longtime listeners know, our school district decided to adopt new start times this year in response to plenty of research finding that adolescence just don't do well in early mornings, and so you can have better at ten and then it's better behavior, better graduation rates, all this

stuff if you start high school later. So our high school now starts at eight thirty versus seven thirty, and so that's been a pretty major change because we have two children in high school. To accommodate that. Of course, the middle school moved fifteen minutes earlier, which is causes issues because middle schoolers are adolescents as well, so that's

not a huge win. But the bigger issue is that in order to have the same number of buses running, because we didn't magically get more buses or bus drivers. In the course of this timing change, the middle school bus has actually come quite early in order to get the kids dropped off by about seven forty five seven fifty so they can then start the high school run.

And so Ruth's time was pretty early. She has taken the bus once and it's the same driver in the morning in the afternoon, so she can give him a heads up if she will be taking it in the morning, so he knows to look for her and stop. Mornings we've been driving her, and with driving, we usually don't have to leave till seven thirty seven thirty five, and so she can wake up at seven, which means nobody really needs to be up before seven am in the morning,

which is great. Like I said, I'm off and up before then, but that gives me a little quiet time in the morning. I've been working, I've been running whatever else. So she gets up, the high school boys get up

around seven thirty. They drive together most mornings, and then the little boys start school at nine and nine ten, respectively, although the nine to ten gets dropped off before the nine because the nine ten is the elementary school and they push back on tartis in a way that the preschool does not, so it's it is a clear ranking of the hierarchy of who it matters if you are late, So we definitely drop the elementary school kit off first.

With all this, I did not want my work mornings to start at nine thirty, which is what they would need to start at if I were responsible every morning for getting the little kids to the elementary school in preschool. So we actually have our nanny coming even earlier now, so she comes three mornings a week at seven thirty. I basically say hello, say goodbye to Ruth, say goodbye to the boys who can get themselves out the door, the big boys, and then I go to my office

and I am to be working by seven forty. And it's great, Like I love all I can accomplish. When I have started at seven p forty, I wind up doing the little kid getting ready two of the mornings a week. One morning I tend not to be the one driving, and then one morning I am driving, So I still, you know, I get the mix of all

of it. But three mornings a week, I'm starting early, unless something goes wrong like it did this morning when the high school buses were running late, and Jasper has a free period every fourth day his first hour, so he doesn't get up to drive Sam. So Sam was taking the bus, and then the buses were late, so our nanny wind up driving Sam, and so I was getting the little kids ready this morning. But when things are going as they should, I.

sorts of things. If we're bathing the little boys, like, they wouldn't want to go up before nine, because like they could have had their devices till nine and you know, so it's like by starting at eight thirty at least that can happen before endlessly late amounts of time.

on work. So yeah, it's what's happening now? Love it all? Right, Well, let's take a quick ad break and then we'll be back talking about whining. Well, we are back. We opened with a discussion of new school year routines, what times things are happening, how we have shifted things around. So fortunately, there actually hasn't been that much whining about our new routines. I worried there might be a little bit about the earlier in your room time, but there hasn't been that much,

which has been good. I'm glad to hear it. But you know, whining in general does happen, and we've had some discussions with listeners and you know, peopeople who talk about how it can kind of ruin something that would otherwise be reasonably fun and generally why people whine. And adults do this too, by the way, I mean, there's definitely the sort of complaining tone that adults go into.

It's when you are unhappy about something but don't feel you have the power to change it on your own, so you tend to whine, which is more of a submissive voice to the person that you believe could change it, so it is understandable. It is a very rational way of reacting to a situation. It is, of course, also incredibly annoying. Is also annoying if it is something the person has agreed to, let's say, but in the moment feels like they do not wish to do it and

you are haranguing them to get out the door. I'm sure this never happens in your family, Sarah, Never.

it doesn't mean you should never do anything ever. Again, that said, very few things are fun for the whole family for the whole time. So you can be out at an amusement park, which presumably you were doing for your own edification, like you are there for your children. Except at some point in this amazing day of going to this amusement park, they're gonna be hot, they're gonna be tired, they're gonna be waiting in line for a ride that their sister wanted to go on but was

not in their top three. And that's when the whinning happens. And so you can just get so mad that people are whining about this expensive, time consuming trip to the amusement park that you would not have been doing on your own, or you can sort of say, well, there will be whining today, but it's still going to overall be a good day. We are aiming for a few enjoyable moments.

they would like to do. Obviously, there's not going to be universal consensus and people can't get everything they want, but when you give people some degree of choice, it

can be helpful. I also generally let children who are old enough to stay home by themselves opt out of things if it is not an important family value, as in, yes, if we've decided to go visit relatives, you need to do that, or yes, if we've decided to go to church, let's say you're going to need to do that, but you don't have to go apple picking like that has I think it might be fun, but in general you

don't have to do it, not universally. We had some major whining before a rafting trip because my older two boys had opted out. Desper did not want to go. Sam had a cross country meet so he had a reason. So then Jasper volunteered to go pick him up. You know, okay, clever, yeah, clever. But then that meant I could go on the trip, which is fine. I was happy to go, but then you know, we're on a raft we need four people

to row, and I couldn't have Henry row. Ruth didn't want to go, so she was sort of unhappy about it, but I couldn't not let her go because then we're gonna have to pick somebody up off the street to row for us.

to do. But you got to choose your battles. I am certainly not above bribery, you know, like, Okay, we're doing this, and I know we'll be getting home close to time, let's say on Sunday night, when you would have to put your screens way, so maybe you get them for an extra thirty minutes, or we do a

wah wah stop on the way home. Definitely, we stop at Starbucks after church every week, which is not a great broad because my kids seem to get Starbucks a lot, but there was a period of time in my life where we were not even allowed to go to any commercial establishment on Sunday. So this seems like a big give on my part. Not in my family, my family of origin. But yeah, it's yeah, you know, you bribe where you can.

I'm probably quoting this wrong because I didn't look it up before I did these notes, but was that you don't have to go down there, so that if your kids are in a negative emotional state, you don't actually have to match them. You are allowed to enjoy yourself even if the people around you do not seem to be actively enjoying themselves and are letting you know about that. That your emotional state is within your purview and you do not have to give that over to someone else.

thing because it's fun. Pretty soon you're going to be on the other side of it, and if it's something that is generally fun, you probably will be happy that you did it. So you know, in this particular rafting trip, we did tell the kids in the morning, like, Okay, we're going to be on the other side of this in a couple hours, Like eventually it's going to be Saturday night and we will have been on the rafting trip,

or we will have not. But most of the time people go on the rafting trip because it's fun, right, Like that's why people raft down rivers. It's not because they're trying to get from point A to point B, which there are much quicker ways to get from point A to point B in Jones that people think it's a fun activity, and it was. It was a lot of fun, even though it rained on us, even though it was kind of chilly, it was like sixty five degrees and rainy, and yet we still had a good time.

And I could, you know, say that at the end of lie like I'm not saying we have to do this again tomorrow, but we did enjoy ourselves and like we were like proud of our family for rowing that four miles down the river and getting off the river at the right spot even with the rapids and all that.

So you know, I'm not saying you have to say I told you so afterwards or anything like that, but you might narrate that things are generally fun, are like, oh, look, we're enjoying ourselves that Oh yeah, we weren't sure we wanted to do this, but oh look how good it was, or yes, this might not be your favorite ride in the universe, but in three minutes it will be over, because all rides are over within three minutes, and then

you can go about your life. Love it, love it all. Right, Well, we're going to take one more quick ad break and then we will be back with a little bit of a longer Q and a thinking about childcare and early education options and how these fit together. Well, we are back. We have been talking our new school year routines, about the mornings and the evenings. We did a bit of a deep dive into whining, and now we have a question, Sarah, did you want to read this or you want me to?

She loves her current daycare and they seem to have a good preschool program, but with her going to the local public school for kindergarten, are there pros of going to the public school preschool program at three or four? How do we make this decision? Are there things we should consider? From your experience, there seem to be so many options, but not a lot of information about why

we would choose one over another. Also curious if there were some things you did to prepare them when they do start preschool that ease the transition, as her daycare is all she knows.

eighteen months, they were doing early childhood education curricula. They were working on holding a pencil. Eventually, by the time they were about three or so, they were learning you know, letters and numbers and colors and days of the week and months of the year or whatever else you're supposed to be doing. They were practicing making letters. By the time they could hold a pencil, they were doing early

math curriculum. They were working on early literacy. Once they were you know, three and four years old, so it was preschool. The only difference was you could drop them off at eight and pick them up after five, right like, which a lot of preschools do not offer that that are only preschools. So high quality daycare is preschool with wrap around care. Now, the reason this matters is because I feel like in our cultural conversation daycare is often

seen as bad. So, like, literally, there was this viral tweet a few months ago. I don't know, I was off Twitter for a while and then I got back on, and then I was sad that I got on because I see's still like this. But some young childless dude had seen like a daycare near his house, and I guess some kid on the playground looks playground looks sad, and so he thought he tweeted out daycare should be banned, okay,

and some people were like liking this or whatever. I mean, it's just so stupid, right, So it's like daycare is bad, where's preschool? Like preschool is good? Like maybe a kid cries on the playground there, but well, it's pre school learning. It's learning, Like if they fall on the preschool playground, it's fine. I don't know, so I struggled to get my head around this, because again, remember, high quality, center

based daycare is preschool with wrap around care. But as far as I can tell, the issue is that working moms use something that is called daycare, and working moms are bad, and airgo daycare is bad, but stay at home moms use preschool, and stay at home moms are good, and therefore preschool is good. And this is literally the depth of the reasoning in this conversation.

But then if you actually think about, like, well, why does that make them feel better? It's exactly what you said, because daycare is bad because it's for the parents. They're caring for the kid while you get to do your own stuff, versus preschool for the child, it's only for their Enrichmond, who cares what mom is doing? And this is like what we've talked about so many times, which is like we can't too, and maybe it can be

for both of us. Maybe there could be a best of both worlds in here where my kid is actually getting engaged and taught and learning, and I'm getting to go to work, build my business, do whatever I want.

it'd be different. But anyway, so off the soapbox. Now to our listener, if your kid is happy at daycare, there is zero reason to switch, Okay, like zero. You are not missing something by not sending her to something that is specifically labeled as a preschool. She is getting all of that at her daycare, which you've pointed out has a preschool program, so there is nothing different that they are going to do, Like you're gonna learn the

same months of the year. They don't learn different ones at preschool, Like you're gonna learn the same numbers, You're gonna certain the same fine motor grip so you can hold a pencil, Like this is all the same stuff that they are going to learn. So you do not have to switch, because again daycare is preschool with wrap

around care. Now, in this listener scenario, the reasons that she could switch partly if it is a public preschool option, it might be free, Like I presume it is free as a public school option, so she would have to run the numbers on that.

the morning and then come again in the afternoon. Like it doesn't there's not that many people who would want to do that. So probably you and your partner would be covering one of those, right, Like you would either bring your child to preschool at nine o'clock and need to flex your work hours to start after that, or else one of you would need to end by three o'clock or whatever the time is for daycare, if you had help in the morning in order to get the

same wrap around care. Now again, possibly if it is a public preschool option that maybe you have enlightened legislators in your area who have created wrap around care for the preschool, in which case great, then maybe you could approximate the hours you're getting in the daycare. And if you wanted to switch in order to have that same social group of kids who would be going to that elementary school over the next few years, then that might

make sense. But you need to make sure that you're getting the hours that you need to to work, and a preschool might not automatically do that. They'd get you somewhat of the way there, but they wouldn't get you all of the way there, and so if you don't have a whole lot of flexibility, you would need to figure that out.

He'll be turning five in a few months, so you know, that's sort of the ramp up that we did with it. But obviously three hours, five mornings a week is not going to cover your work hours, so you'd need other care beyond that if you're going to use that option. All right, love the week. Well, so mine is opening the window. I have one window in my office that has this roll screen thing. It's kind of cool, like you open the window and the screen automatically appears, but

you don't see the screen. When you're just looking out the window, it's like in the well of the sill, so you push it up and then there's a screen. And so it's nice because I can open it. At this time of year September October, usually during the day the weather is quite nice. Autumn breeze here, the trees here, the birds makes me feel like I'm bringing the outside in. So that's a benefit. And I don't do it obviously in July because it's too hot, and I don't do

it in January because it's too cold. But there are some months of the year where it makes sense to do so I need to remind myself to do it well.

of total hours offered. Which daycare attends to have the advantage on that one. But anyway, a lot of different topics. As always, we love to hear from you guys. If you have ideas for future episodes, things you'd like to us to talk about, questions you might have, let us know. You can always reach me at lo Ura at Laura vandercam dot com. We will be back next week with more on making work and life fit together.