In times of crisis, any solution that helps us save is welcome. Therefore, many couples with children have decided to dispense with the service of a caregiver to organize a shift system to care for children of their own and others.
The rules are very simple and it is not necessary to spend money. It may be an agreement between two or more couples of friends with children and may vary depending on the occasions that each couple decides. For example, two couples meet with children and decide that once a month each one will stay with their children so that the other can leave.
It's very simple. We take care of your children and you do it with ours once a month. An informal exchange of services. Thus, you can expand the circle by joining new families.
There are several spontaneous associations of fathers and mothers that have emerged. In the United States it has become fashionable and they have gone from informal agreements between friends to create organized networks of caring parents such as Smart Mom's Baby-sitting Co-op or Babysitter Exchange.
What does not convince me too much of this type of association is that it is no longer about well-known people that you fully trust to be in the care of your children but that it transcends the border of friendships to involve other parents that you do not know about any.
Anyway, before allowing them to register in the network of kangaroo parents, references are requested and sometimes their home is visited. They even have to declare if they have weapons at home, pool, animals or smokers.
The idea seems good to put into practice among a group of friends of couples with children, but I would not do it with unknown people. Thus we save the money of a caretaker and from time to time we can enjoy a couple outing, which always feels like and is necessary. How do you see it?
