Mom mom is my hero! She would drop everything to help anyone at a moments notice. And if she couldn't for some reason, she would spend the rest of the day feeling bad and wish that she could have dropped everything to help that person.Lately my mom has been SOOOO nice to watch Anna for us so we could go to the temple, or I could go to JoAnn's (which is a nightmare adventure every time I have gone lately), and little things like that. She is so good with Anna and I love that my mom gets one-on-one time with her. But I feel bad always picking on her. I don't like feeling like I am taking advantage of Grandma if you know what I mean.
Devin and I have talked about possible getting someone else to watch Anna every once and a while, but the big question is....how much do babysitters cost these days???? I was not one of those girls who payed for my college education with babysitting money, so I have no clue how much babysitters charge.
So HELP! What is a reasonable price for a babysitter? I have heard that some girls charge by the hour, some just a flat price, and others by the number of kids. I'm just trying to get a ballpark idea of how this would effect our budge if we decided to get a babysitter for our little princess.
The princess, by the way, has discovered her hands this last week. She loves to just look at them and open and shut her hands. She is also getting really good at picking stuff up.
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Do you have other family members or really good friends? We have never paid for a babysitter because we just ask for favors from all of them.
Of course, we re-pay them by babysitting their kids, too. It works out well.
If you ever want to go to the Jordan River Temple, we will babysit Anna for free.
Look at that cute little Anna sitting in her chair! How she is growing!
Yah i am not up on babysitting costs either. maybe christine knows since jess babysits her sister and brother sometimes.
I've tried to pay about $1.50 per hour per child. Of course it all depends on how old the babysitter is. And if they keep the house clean that is extra points. But I have been told I'm cheap (thanks hubby). So maybe I'm not the best opinion to take.
For one kid I would probably pay$5-6 an hour. Or you could find someone in your ward you could swap babysitting with. We did that when we only had 2 kids. You could do every other weekend. Good Luck that is one of the not so fun things about parenting- finding babysitters. You are lucky to have your mom so close
One million dollars!
(Haha, don't listen to me.)
It depends on the babysitter - how old they are, mostly. Also how long you're planning to be gone. As a young woman, I usually charged well under $5/hour... however, I think most of the other YW were getting paid more, typically. I certainly never made enough to pay my college education!!! If you're only going to be gone for three hours or less, I think $5/hour or a little more is a very reasonable price.
We have never paid someone to babysit because we simply can't afford it. The girls in my mom's ward charge $8/hour. I think it is ridiculous. The most I was ever paid for babysitting was $5/hour for 5 kids.
Like Joe said start going to Jordan River and we would love to watch Anna for you.
Under 16 $5/hr, over 16 and drive to your house-$7.00/hr. Swapping is a good idea-but you will soon come to realize that when you go out at night it is nice to come home to a sleeping baby, instead of having to pick up your kid, wake them up, put them in the car, then drive home and then hope they go back to sleep.(See...you can do things the easy way or the hard way-I pick paying for the sitter when we go out at night insted of swapping-it makes the difference)
This is something I have to post about, because I have a very different view than your average Utahn(type person).
"HOW MUCH IS YOUR KID WORTH?"
Honestly, I think that for a good babysitter you should be paying them $12+. Now that doesn't mean the first hour they are on the job they get that kind of income, but as you establish a relationship with a particular babysitter, and when you feel they are doing a good job...
This, at the same time, would tell your babysitter that you expect perfection in the job. I would think they would want to have you call them again, so they would do everything possible to please you.
Back when Emily was doing babysitting in San Diego, she would get paid $9. And that was over 10 years ago. Yes it's in San Diego, but again, "HOW MUCH IS YOUR KID WORTH?"
However, that doesn't mean this is the first thing you go to, my priority order would be:
1. Grandma,
2. Other close family members,
3. Ward and other friends,
4. Paid babysitter.
I would think that you're in the category of random, inconsistent babysitter needs. So swapping or doing favors in turn for family and fiends would be your best bet. But if you see a more consistent need for sitting, and working out some kind of regular swap or favor exchange with family or friends doesn't work, then I would go with paid babysitting.
Yes we do live in Utah, so there is an overwhelming need to be cheap, but all I can say is, "How much is your kid worth?"
I hope I didn't step on anyone's toes, this is just my male engineer opinion...(my wife would agree with me :-) )
There's my engineering analysis.
:-)
Always nice to get a man's opinion. Thanks Peter.
I was just thinking... taking into consideration the absolute angelic nature of our little Anna, it would be an absolute pleasure to babysit Anna. In fact, you'd think that people would want to pay US to watch her.
But I may be a little biased.
I paid a professional daycare provider $2/hr/child. When I moved to the ward, none of the YW would name a price so decided $1/hr/child. Well you get what you pay for. The kids were safe, but still awake and sugared up and the house was messier than when we left. Now our oldest babysits. And we are still getting what we pay for.
My daughter, Talbie is our professional babysitter and does ALOT of it. It really depends on the family. She doesn't "charge" a certain amount but she gets about $5.00 an hour on average.
Typically the least we ever pay is $20 a night. It could be a little more or a little less depending on how long we are gone... but I always figure on paying at least $20 and go up from there depending on how much I think the babysitter is worth. If they do a good job they get paid more. We are usually gone for about 2-3 hours so usually they get paid about $8/hr.
We have paid about $5/hr when they sitter has to feed and get the kids in bed. I've paid $3/hr for someone a little younger with less experience. That was a couple of hours in the afternoon, so less responsibility. My friends theory is if you pay a little more they will be more willing to come back.
We have always used ward girls we know who are close by their own parents so they can call them if they have an emergency. With infants like yours, we always get older girls around 18 yrs. old. Therefore we feel we have to at least pay them minimum wage or more. As our kids have gotten older, we are getting younger girls but have paid $6 an hour. You just need to ask around and see who is good and then do your own trial and error. Sometimes the jr. high age girls are so much better then high school school girls because they actually will play the kids instead of texting all night long. We seriously had a girl in our ward texting right in front of us as we were saying goodbye. We haven't called her back as you can imagine. But if you pay well, the girls do seem to do a better job and show interest in coming back. It is good to find someone who you can consistently get so your kids feel comfortable when you leave.
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