EEK!

A while back, I noted that we were paying our dog walker a larger hourly wage than our child-care provider. Somehow that seemed a little...off. So we've rectified the situation. Not by slashing our oh-so-valued dog walker's wages, and not by giving our hard-working home-based child care provider a raise. No, no, those simple solutions were not for us. Instead, we opted to enroll Tai in the Extraordinarily Expensive Childcare Center (EECC for short....pronounced "EEK!").

We signed up for EECC's waiting list when I was about 4 months pregnant and were told at the time that they might have a spot, come Fall 2007. That seemed a thousand years away. But then time flies when you are raising a baby and suddenly it was June and they were calling to ask if we wanted a half-time spot that starts the week before Labor Day. Part of me wishes they had never called. Let me explain why:

It's fewer hours of care (20 instead of 27).
It's double the hourly rate.
***BUT***
It's on the way to work.
It's a much nicer, bigger playspace.
It's a center, not someone's living room...which is preferable to me in some intangible way.
The "teachers" are the sweetest women ever.
The incoming "cohort" of infants is very diverse, including several mixed-race children.

So, it was a very difficult decision. Mainly because we are unsure whether this place is worth the money. Yes, it's clearly better than our current situation, but does it really warrant twice the money for fewer hours? In the end, we went for it, trying not to burn any bridges behind us in case we have to go crawling back to our home daycare provider at some point.

Tai starts "school" on August 27th. It really does feel like school. The women who work in the infant room are referred to as "teachers". And I think I've even heard the word "curriculum" thrown around. For those of you who received Minh's holiday letter last December (in which he detailed my pregnancy from conception to third trimester gassiness) should note that EECC is indeed the very place he made fun for taking themselves too seriously. And here we are. Brainwashed again.

Once we enrolled and paid the deposit, EECC encouraged us to bring Tai in for visits over the summer so he could get to know the teachers and become familiar with the space. Last week had a chance to play there and sit on the lap of one of the teachers and watch another baby eat her snack. AND...the infant room "teachers" are even coming to our house on the 20th to get to know Tai better and see him in his home environment. Oh crap, that means I have to clean the house. And we should probably hide all the non-organic baby food and dress him in a hemp onesie.

For the record, our plan is to spend ridiculous amounts of money on EECC through pre-school and then enroll Tai in good old-fashioned (and free!) public school for kindergarten. Part of me worries, though, that by the time Tai is 5 The Crunchies will have complete control over my brain and I will be writing a big fat check to the Montessori School without knowing what I am doing. Someone please stop me from doing that. Thanks.