Taking Care of Grandkids

[HappyOutsourced]

I was wondering how many of you are spending your early retirement babysitting the grandchildren. Are you enjoying it or do you feel you're a little too handy now?

 

[SJ1_]

I was wondering how many of you are spending your early retirement babysitting the grandchildren. Are you enjoying it or do you feel you're a little too handy now?

Just once in a while for us. Jobs, school etc take up a lot of their time

 

[Walt34]

DW does that occasionally for grandnieces which she enjoys immensely despite the two-hour drive. It is not a regular thing though, calling her is "Plan C" for the nephew so it happens about three, maybe four, times a year.

 

[WhoDaresWins]

I would love to have grandchildren to babysit, at least every once in awhile! Alas, I have a thirty year old unmarried son so no grandkids on the horizon.

My friends who are grandmothers invite me on trips to the park, zoo, playgrounds so as to enjoy their grandchildren with them.

 

[haha]

I do it regularly but not often enough, from my POV. My granddaughter is a delight. Her parents are well off, so they realize that giving her to me is a favor to me, and usually more of an emergency plan for them than a week to week go-to.

She is five and I would rather hear her opinions about things than those of most adults.

Ha

 

[Bestwifeever]

I was wondering how many of you are spending your early retirement babysitting the grandchildren. Are you enjoying it or do you feel you're a little too handy now?

I am doing it right now for the 2 year old big sister whose newborn baby sister will be home from the hospital tomorrow. Joyous but exhausting. They do have a nanny during the workweek plus the other grandparents so we are not called upon for everyday childcare. I figure we will be able to demand payback in a few years.

 

[Moemg]

My daughter lives a distance from me so I only get to do it when we are together. I adore my grandsons but would not like a daily babysitting job.

 

[youbet]

I was wondering how many of you are spending your early retirement babysitting the grandchildren. Are you enjoying it or do you feel you're a little too handy now?

DW and I are babysitting right now!

DS forget to let us know that his DW (our DIL) is traveling on business a couple of days this week, the nanny has class tonight, and the youngest grandson has soccer. So, we're here with the two oldest (11 and 12) while dad and the youngest are at soccer and nanny is at class.

We don't get called on for any regular babysitting but do get these kind of "urgent-help-I forgot" calls from time to time. And if we're free (we have such a busy social life you know) we get a kick out of popping over for a few hours. It's about a half hour drive.

 

[PatSea32]

We have established with our daughter that we will babysit the three grand kids when her day to day paid babysitter arrangements are not available, if it does not conflict with our own schedule. We will not babysit on a regular schedule. We probably average babysitting once per week for 2 hours. The arrangement seems to work for all of us.

 

[kaneohe]

Well, this isn't ER anymore after so many yrs, but we get up at 3:30AM every Monday to get to the airport to fly 350mi, take a 1.5 hr bus ride involving 2 transfers, then babysit during the wk; every Friday at 5:30PM we reverse the process to do a touch-and-go wkend catching up w/ the mail and the lawn, then repeat.

We think we're exploiting the parents since we get to see our 9 mo. old (&first) grandkid......the princess and the tyrant simultaneously......more than they do.....during the wk anyway. It is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity that won't last forever so I'm sure we will greet w/ mixed feelings her admission to daycare. Until then, we will enjoy being exploited.....

 

[SteveNU]

Our daughter became a single mom with a deadbeat husband this spring and she was paying almost $1200 a month for daycare. So when I retired in July I started watching our granddaughter on Mondays. It's a one hour drive to her house but it saves her almost $400 a month and it gives me a chance to be with her and help her around the house too! Funny thing is she lives just a few miles from where I was working before I retired so I still get to make that drive but it's only once a week now

 

[frayne]

DW and I do it every chance we get and love every minute with the two grandkids ages 5 and 7.