With the recent recession, everyone is looking to save money, right? Well, my husband and I figured a long time ago that the traditional 8 to 5 jobs weren’t going to work for us, so we avoid paying for child care by working split shifts.
My husband works from 4 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., and I work from 5 to 9 p.m., and 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. on weekends, when my husband is home, and can watch our child. We spend time together on my days off, and on weekend nights.
Here’s how we have made this venture successful:
1) Communicate through notes. What have you done, what do you need me to do, good job on this, what were you thinking with that, thank you, thank you, thank you, you rock! The you rock! is very important, because we like to be positive and supportive.
2) Don’t discuss upsetting things when people first wake up or when they are hungry. Tempers tend to flare, and then we are fighting about stupid stuff, like why Jack stayed with the bad guys on Lost.
3) Spend time together as a family, but also value private time. Spend time by yourself often. It’s OK not to do everything together; sometimes you just need a break.
4) Split the chores. For example, I wash the dishes, and do the laundry (with our son’s help) in the morning, and then my husband does those chores in the evening. We share the homeschooling duties, and the major chores.
And we don’t pay child care, saving about $200 a month, because one of us is always available to watch our child ….. Woo hoo!!!!
Finally, some industries that support untraditional shifts are retail and driving jobs. For example, I work in customer service, and my husband works as a courier and dispatcher for a courier company. Companies that offer untraditional shifts include Home Depot, Lowe’s, McDonald’s, Wal-Mart, Office Depot, Michael’s, and Office Max.
If you are paying more than you’d like for child care, you might want to give slit shifts a try. Thanks for reading, and have a happy day!
Tags: children, free child care, frugal, not paying for child care, split shift, split shift parenting
