There are so many things for kids that I feel are designed for the Stay at Home Moms—play groups, bouncy places with weekday discounts, mom’s day out, PTA activities, Junior League, I could go on—but Summer Camps really burn me.
90%+ of the super cool, awesome, fun, educational Summer Camps that my daughter brings to my attention are half or partial day camps. That’s great if one of your parents is home for part of the day and can drop them off at 10am and be back to pick them up at 2pm. But, WE WORK, so I again have to tell her “sorry that won’t work”. Then I hear for the millionth time “I wish you didn’t have to work”…don’t even get me started on that one. My reply is usually “I don’t HAVE to, I WANT to work” when I really just want to say “I don’t want to work either, let’s just blow off all the bills so I can drive you back and forth to camps…and by the way, I can’t pay for your college!”
So, we have a few other options—send her to her Elem School all day like Extend-A-Care (how awful) or outdoor camp (in 100+ degrees)—which she doesn’t want to do.
I found a few other camps but the hours are like 9:30-4—now how is a working person supposed to get 8 hours in at work and still drop them off and pick them up on time?? So they have late pick up ($50 extra per week)—late pick up means that she can sit and watch the next group perform—she’s not even supervised, and can’t do anything but sit there—and I have to pay extra for that?! Seriously, I end up spending over $200-300 per week for these camps! I guess that’s nothing compared to these fancy overnight camps that everyone on Facebook brags about—seriously if I had $3,000 to send my kid to camp, I think I could afford that nice vacation we’ve talked about. Maybe that’s not bad if they only go for 1-2 weeks, but I have 12 WEEKS to cover!
I called this week’s camp to ask about late pick up since it’s literally out in the country and pick up is at 4:45. The lady acted like I was crazy. I asked her “don’t any of the other parents work? I mean, how can I get from my work downtown to your location 30 miles away by 4:45pm?” Not to mention that it doesn’t start until 9am each day…again, she acted like no one else had asked for this. So again, daughter sits there and waits for her late Mom to come get her after everyone else.
Sometimes I feel like I’m the only Mom that works full time and has these issues. Maybe it’s because my husband actually works a full schedule too…well I guess he works more like 80 hours a week, but who’s counting?! What if I was a single Mom? Then I guess my kids would have to sit at the Elem school at Extend-A-Care where they already sit for 12 hours a day during the school year? What a fun Summer!!
Sometime, I guess you just can’t win for losing!
