We Don't Really Sit On the Baby

I used to baby sit quite a bit. She Who Must Be Kept's former best friend had a child that was a good ten years younger than me. I also knew a few people here and there with little kids, and some of my younger cousins.

I ran into a LOT of problems while I was baby sitting. In one instance, I was supposed to have a baby less than a month old for one night. I had him for three days. In one instance, I was supposed to watch one child for a few hours. I had two kids over night.

I decided I needed to write a guide for parents AND sitters on how to make this go as smoothly as possible. (And yes, all of this has been an issue for me at some point in time.)

1. If your kid can't be left home; don't do it. If you have a child who is going to scream for three hours because you left them home, you really shouldn't leave them with a baby sitter. What do you think we're going to do about it? It's really stressful for us, and you are not paying us enough to get our eardrums burst. I make this first and foremost because I think parents forget that.
That isn't to say we don't expect and anticipate a little anxiety from the kid. A good baby sitter is prepared for that. A good prep is; "It's sad when Mommy leaves. But, WE get to play together this afternoon! I'm so excited. Want to help me color a picture for Mommy? She'll be so happy when she comes home!"

2. Leave clear rules for the baby sitter. I don't mean something like; don't play with matches. If you, for instance, don't want your child to watch the television while you're gone, say that very clearly. In front of the kid, if at all possible. It's really frustrating for a sitter when the kid is telling us one thing and throwing a tantrum and we don't want to call to interrupt your girls' night out to ask if they can go play at Billy's or whatever.
Some rules to leave; television/computer/video game rules and regulations
BEDTIMES (and make sure this is nonnegotiable)
If/when friends may come over, if/when they may go to a friends
Snack rules

3. Your baby sitter is not your maid. Your baby sitter is not your maid. Your baby sitter is not your maid. Your baby sitter? NOT YOUR MAID. That being said, no baby sitter is going to balk about picking up the toys they got out (or helping the kid do such), putting the supper dishes in the dishwasher, or putting the towels from bathtime in the laundry.
Also, if there's some big Goldfish Holocaust and all the crumbs are in the rug, we will want to know where the vacuum is to pick that up. It did happen on our watch, after all.
But we're not going to run a load of whites, wash the windows, scrub the pots and pans, do your dusting... That's just not going to happen, okay?

4. Be home when you say you're going to be home. Or if you're going to be late, give me a call. If I didn't drive myself over there, then I need to let my ride know, and that's really why I hate if you're late. If your kid is asleep and I'm sitting around making money watching reruns of Viva la Bam, then I don't care if you're not coming right home. I *care* because my ride is waiting to come get me. Of course, if you then decide to take my home, whatever.

5. If your kid is a notorious brat, and yes there are a couple, then could you let me know that? I don't expect you to come right out and say; "He can be a real pain in the ass sometimes." But I WOULD like to know; "We're having some trouble with tantrums right now. I'm so sorry about it. This is how we're dealing with it...." and leave me a detailed step by step plan. Do you use time outs? Where do you do that? Do you take away toys? What? Don't leave me just staring at your kid have a nuclear meltdown on the kitchen floor because I won't give him a cookie!

6. If you can't get your kid to bed, what makes you think I can? I'm the baby sitter, not Super Nanny! I'll do the best I can, but listen, don't be surprised if you come home and he's still awake sobbing and not in bed and I'm sitting around tearing out my hair because I don't know what to do.

7. I really need you to be ready to pay me at the end of the agreed upon session. I make my prices clear right out (two dollars per hour per kid, and this is dirt cheap. I've heard up to five dollars an hour). So it's not going to be some big shock to you that it costs what it does.
I don't take credit, either. I don't have a credit card scanner in my purse, all right? If you don't carry cash, stop at the machine beforehand. If you're a little bit short once in awhile, that's cool, I don't mind, really. But if you show up every night like; "Can I pay you next time?" No. There won't be a next time.

Living On The Edge (Er... Loveseat)

I'm twenty years old and I still live with my mother.

I don't have a job, and to be frank, I never have. My whole life I've been going to school and doing little volunteer jobs here and there. Oh, and babysitting. Lord, have I done a lot of babysitting in my time. (Two dollars per hour per kid, and I come an hour early for free! Wanna hire me?)

I really, really hate it.

It isn't that I hate my mother. Far from it, I love the woman. But I have no space. I sleep on the loveseat downstairs in the living room while she sleeps across the room on the big couch. This has been the arrangement since I was seventeen years old. At the time, it didn't seem like such a bad deal. I mean, I was going to be moving out soon.

But the stars in my eyes went out when the market kept crashing, and there just were no jobs. You'd have to beg, borrow, or steal a position even at the Taco Hell down the street from me. And trust me, this is not the Taco Hell that's GOOD in my town, this is the one that you only go to at one o clock in the morning when you're too drunk or too high to remember that you probably shouldn't go there.

They run out of lettuce on a regular basis.

So now I'm living on the couch, and the grand total of four square feet around it is all mine, containing my computer desk and chair, along with a couple crates and boxes of books and school papers that I'm saving.

What I'm really finding interesting is that--most of my friends are in the same predicament I am. Not the sleeping on a loveseat bit, but the living with their parents bit. The simple fact is that no one can afford to live on their own right now.

I remember it wasn't always this way. I remember a lot of kids moving out right after they finished high school. They got an apartment with a couple friends, started up at the local community college, and when they weren't studying or flipping burgers, they were partying. It was what we were all living for in middle school.

And no, nope. There's just no way it can happen. Even if you could scare up the rent, you wouldn't be able to go to school and work at the same time. Not unless you developed some kind of cloning machine, and even then you probably would be less worried about money because somebody would buy it from you. Or you'd be a mad scientist and you'd already be living in your mother's basement.

I digress.

It is just plain AWKWARD to live with our parents at this point. We're legally and, for the most part, emotionally adults. And yet we're still living under the rules of our parents (which is fair. We reside in their homes). I've seen some kids paying rent and still having to do a multitude of chores, still argue about tattoos and piercings and going out late.

It's the point where it's hard for our parents to consider us adults because we're not acting like adults, and it's hard for us to act like adults, because we're not being treated like adults. Now, I will say that you can still act like an adult while being treated like a child, and that'll get you far, blah blah blah, but there is a limit.

I know that even if I did have a job right now, I'd still be living at home. And you know what? It sucks.