Winter break solutions

So once again I thought I could manage the epic three week winter break with no childcare - two kids and me, 24 hours a day, with no plans - and then caved and booked a winter camp late last night instead. Sigh. But also, sigh of relief. The biggest obstacle this year was the fact that Theo is frustratingly just three months shy of five (by mid-Dec) which means he couldn’t take part in any winter camps except the one at his afterschool which doesn’t appeal to me for reasons I’ll get into. And Bobby didn’t want to join him there, and I figured two rambunctious kids were better than one lonely miserable kid, so the original plan was to just keep them both home.

One thing parents and I always marvel at is how little support there is for people with kids under five - right when you need it the most. No public programs, few paid programs. Then magically when your kid turns five the world is your oyster. Seems backwards to me.

Anyway, a quick google last night found me a winter camp that takes kids four and up (huzzah) from 9-3:30 each day, reasonably priced. There’s still a lot of down time - all weekends, plus Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, and NYE and day. I’m cringing at spending more money right now but also relieved I’m not going to lose my goddamned mind. 

I had a brief stint in San Francisco this weekend - just one night - then I leave for Austin on Friday and that’s the last of my band travel until April. I have to say...I’m going to miss it. Even though the kids are so much easier now than they were a year ago, still, getting those little breaks are key. And by January (hopefully) the kitchen will be done, which will make it a lot easier to hang out at home. 

In the middle of all this is Thanksgiving, followed by my ten day trip to Thailand which I am simultaneously looking forward to and dreading. I wish the trip were in February or March instead of in two weeks. But it is what it is. 

Today we have the day off school. I took Theo to the dentist, then we all went to a wreath making party (fun but crazy stressful - based on the amount of whining kids and snapping mothers, I was not alone in this assessment). It’s only 2 pm and it already feels like midnight. I can’t wait for school tomorrow so I can tackle the massive pile of work waiting for me. 

I’m having misgivings about Theo’s afterschool. I can hang with its loose nature (that’s how he was admitted at four, after all), but it’s the bathrooms that scare me. At first I thought the kids used the open public bathrooms - which in this neighborhood are usually full of homeless people taking baths in the sink. They assured me they didn’t use those - not unsupervised, anyway - but used some on the inside of the building. I felt a little better about this...until I saw that even those inside buildings were open to the public and mostly used by the random men that wander off the street to use the basketball courts. I am not ok with my four year old wandering off alone to use a public bathroom with strange men, not one bit. I’m going to talk to them about it tomorrow, but even if they give me the assurance that he’ll only use a bathroom with supervision, how do I know that’s actually going to happen? Am I overreacting? Is it fine? It’s been haunting me ever since I saw that inside bathroom last week and realized it was not for the exclusive use of children. I may have to pull him out of there.