There’s been some buzz around the blogosphere on daycare. I don’t really care to enter the fray, but it has gotten me thinking about ways that single income families save money so that Mom can stay home with the babies if she feels compelled to do so. I know that most working moms believe that their families can’t make it on one income—and some truly can’t. But I feel certain that in many cases, maybe even most cases, if one has enough want-to, when you really crunch the numbers, costs can be cut enough for women to be stay-at-home moms.
It will mean swimming upstream from the culture. It will require sacrifice. It will be hard. Some days you may wonder what kind of crazy idea this was, and you might long for the times when you could spend hours at your job without the demands of your needy children. But my guess is that you’ll find that the sacrifices are outweighed by the joy of staying home and mothering those sweet little ones. Anyway, in most cases, where there’s a will there’s a way. And even if it’s not an option now, it’s a goal worth pursuing for the future. You can do it!
I’m going to write a little series on single income families and ways to cut costs that will help families live on one income, even one small income. And hopefully it will also give those of us who already stay home ideas on how to be more frugal than we already are.
This isn’t a slam against people who must use daycare. I know that there are unavoidable situations where moms must work and their babies must go to daycare, and my heart goes out to parents and children in that position. In some areas of life, we all have to make choices sometimes that are less than ideal, and we do the best we can with the circumstances life throws at us. But I’d love to encourage working moms who want to stay home but don’t think they can, to reevaluate whether or not the career and daycare life is really unavoidable.
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3 comments:
Hi! I found you by way of Meredith (Like Merchant Ships) and look forward to reading your series on 1 income families. :) If you have the links (or titles) to all your posts on the subject, I'd like to know them so I can find them all. I just switched to the beta blogger, and that lets you put everything in a category; so that all you have to do is click on "1 family income" and it pulls up all the posts. Thanks for sharing! :) We switched to 1 income soon after marrying while preparing for the child rearing times. :) I am SO glad we did it then even though a lot of people thought it was really odd. I can imagine it's harder for women who have been used to the job and income.
Wow, thanks for the kind words! I had sort of let the series slide, but between Crystal's Frugal Fridays and your comment, I'm inspired to finish it. I didn't know about beta...Not being able to categorize has been a frustration, so I see a change in my blogging future. Thanks again! You've been so encouraging and helpful. :)
I came from Meredith too. Just a reminder to not forget about the stay at home Dads. We wanted a stay at home parent but knew from the time we met that that would be my husband--he has a high school diploma and I have a PhD. We have to do some unexpected work on our house that I've been complaining about the cost (it's required by the state so no choice here) and a few folks said something about him getting a part time job. We wouldn't even consider it! I'd rather be a bit more frugal than send him to work (and most of the money would be eaten by day care or by exhaustion if he had to work nights or weekends). People forget that SAHM/Ds actually do a lot of work and aren't just laying around all day long thus having tons of energy come evening. LOL
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