I made a magical discovery this week while excavating the wonder that is our home office.
Under piles of files, I found a notebook dating back to 2009, the year we hired our very first baby sitter for our first baby. Within it’s weathered and aged cover were 2 full pages of notes I left the babysitter that first night we parted from our baby, leaving him in the care of, essentially, a total stranger.
Oh, it was even more condescending and ludicrous than I remembered. I read it for you over on my Baby Rabies Blog YouTube channel.
Okay, spill it. Tell me what you left in your notes for the babysitter the first time you left your first baby with one. Bonus points for anyone who also left written instructions to turn out the light and LEAVE the room in order for the baby to fall asleep.
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I told our 1st babysitter that if my son wouldn’t stop screaming (it was kind of his “thing”), she should turn on the music video for Gotye’s “Somebody That I Used to Know”…and then I proceeded to walk her through the steps of finding the video in Comcast’s OnDemand menu.
She’s a freaking teenager, has a smart phone (which I do not), and doesn’t live under a rock…yet I was convinced that she wouldn’t be able to find it unless I showed her where it was.
And yes, it *might* not be the most appropriate video for a young child…but this was all pre-18-months-old (and for holy heaven’s sake, the kid was a ball of colic, acid reflux, dairy allergy, and fructose malabsorption), so we’re pretty ok with the fact that he watched it multiple times a day. I’ll be sure to report any lasting effects…like an overwhelming desire to draw on oneself and/or the wall.
The first time I left my 17 month old it was with my mom. I still left a page of notes. The best part, my then almost 12 month old had the notes almost completely eaten by the time I was out the door. She was destroying all evidence.
4 pages. We left 4 pages for my extremely competent Mother and Father-in-law. Granted there was a tricky medicine routine and extensive (like hour long (what were we thinking?!?!)) bedtime routine but still. Baby #2 came along and we handed him over without much instruction at all. So it just goes to show one can learn from ones’ own mistakes!
So my daughter is only 6 months and I have never left her more than an hour or so. I don’t intend to for awhile either. 🙂
However I thought it was funny and worth mentioning that the first time I ever left my dog I wrote a 4 page letter with detailed instructions. He had a “flexible routine” of when he ate when he pooped and how many times a day. Lol I also mentioned his favorite toys and that it was very important that he was able to sleep in bed with my friend who was caring for him overnight. I asked for pictures to be texted often and obviously left emergency numbers. Oh my, when I think back to this I have no idea how I’ll ever leave my daughter!
On a side note since my daughter’s been around we’ve left my dog twice, no note and one time I almost forgot to pack his food. 🙂
My mother in law raised 7 children and once ran her own in home daycare. So of course upon leaving my first daughter with her as a newborn it was ABSOLUTELY necessary for me to TYPE up detailed schedule for the (maybe) 4-5 hours she would be in her grandmother’s care. Needless to say, the schedule was later found crumpled I n the baby bag. Fast forward to my second daughter. When she gets dropped off it usually goes ,”She ate…..earlier. Feed her….something….whenever. I think I packed a bottle.”
I don’t want to seem overly uptight so I don’t write anything down. Instead I have verbal diarrhea of the mouth and spew instructions for twenty minutes as I walk around the house, because that is so much easier for people to remember right?
lol…i have yet to leave my kids with anyone but family but I just wanted to say that i LOVE, LOVE, LOVE that you have a youtube channel now!
When I leave my baby (my first and only right now) with my mom, the instructions are usually as follows: Feed her dinner. Whatever you want as long she’s had it before. Need anything? No? KTHXBAI! *Yes, I DO realize it’s easier when you leave baby with parents. I have NO IDEA what I would do with a babysitter…*
Soooo….my daughter is 8 and I still leave fairly detailed notes. 😛 Mind you the sitters are normally 12 year old girls who have never babysat before, but still. Thankfully, we just moved across the country and are now 3.5 hours away from my mom so hopefully family will be baby sitting more often. Yay.
I wrote up instructions on how to change a nappy (the entire process-think I had 15 steps) and pinned it above the change table when my sister was coming to look after my firstborn the first time. Lol. Omg. I also had a sleep routine list near the cot and feeding instructions on a bottle.
You crack me up. I once babysat for a family who left detailed notes, including, “Rock baby in rocking chair for approximately 12 minutes.” 12? What happens if I rock for 13…..
I’m pretty sure I did something similar for the first person who looked after my first born.
Incidentally that was my mother. Because clearly she was in need of a full explanation of how to watch a baby.
Seeing as she had three of her own and all.
When my in-laws came to watch our kids for a few days, I wrote out every single snack/meal and the times they were to be administered…and labeled everything clearly (as if they didn’t know what crackers were based on the box), their morning routine, naptime routine, nighttime routine, what channels they were allowed to watch and what shows were OFF limits and which they liked best (they were only allowed to watch two shows…instead of listing those, I just listed out all the no-no shows), prepared CD’s for their listening pleasure, planned all their outfits and even rolled them into bags labeled with each day, told them how often to change diapers, told them to call me before they even considered giving them anything that was not on the food list (even though my kids have no known allergies). Haha. I’m amazed they ever babysat for us again.