"I was churning out quantity and not quality and totally wearing myself out, which was ridiculous!"

Aug 02, 2021

I have been a registered Childminder since 2002.

I began Childminding after my divorce in 2000.

I wanted to have an occupation where I could work from home and be there for my two daughters and support them through their school life.

Throughout my career I have given 100% and so far achieved 3 Outstanding Ofsted Grades.

Unfortunately I feel that because I have given so much to my job and the families I care for, I have missed out on the main reason for starting this childminding journey......... my family.

For years I thought that my vision was to provide a setting which emulates a school nursery. I would be obsessed with the EYFS Development Guidance, taking multiple daily observations and obsessively completing tracking charts.

I used a variety of online platforms to observe our children and found the whole process to be so time consuming and a complete chore. I felt that because I had constantly done so many observations, I needed to keep up that pace.

In actual fact, I was churning out quantity and not quality and totally wearing myself out, which was ridiculous!

My home had turned into a Nursery school with brightly coloured, in your face displays on EVERY available wall.

I filled my setting with brightly coloured plastic resources as I thought they would be more robust, last longer and encourage interest.

I thought it would be 'better' and more 'professional' to follow themes throughout the year to mirror Nursery.

I realised that our children weren't interested in MY monthly chosen themes. I also noticed that because our resources were so robust, there wasn't any respect or value shown.

Resources were thrown, kicked and behaviour took a negative turn due to lack of interest.

Nobody looked or paid attention to my wall displays (which, may I add took hours to complete). The whole in your face setting made me feel stressed, down and sapped every ounce of energy and time I had.

Over the past few years I had noticed that our children of all ages were becoming consumed with electronic devices and loosing the idea of play, social and emotional skills.

My Grandson arrived in November 2019 which also changed my life.

In April 2020 Covid19 hit the Universe.

As my Grandchild who was living with me was very young and hadn't had his immunisations, I decided to close our setting.

Over the years of childminding I hadn't had one day off, so you can imagine what impact mentally this virus had on me.

I had financial concerns and felt absolutely and utterly lost and worried for my future and home.

I started to deliver pizza at a local restaurant. Although this helped me financially, it totally knocked my confidence. I never thought at 46 with a successful career, I would be in this position.

After the worry of the Covid19 virus and watching endless episodes of Alaska The Last Frontier, I decided to build a Log Cabin to Child-mind from within my garden. My partner John, my Daughter and myself built our new setting.

Not only did we build the Cabin, I decided to change my setting name from Joanne's Outstanding Childcare to Homestead Childcare. Our new name follows our ethos of a homely provision incorporating and appreciating the outdoors.

Homestead Childcare:

We did open again in July to Key Worker children.

Still affected by the virus and uncertainty of my business I found The Hygge Accreditation online.

This Accreditation seemed to encompass, not only the Curiosity values, but also lots of guidance and support on mental well-being and managing my work/life balance.

This seemed perfect as I REALLY needed to learn that it was A ok not to work myself to breaking point, and to have quality time for me and my family.

I have thoroughly enjoyed listening to the clips and often go through them when I need a Hygge fix.

As mentioned in the course, our profession isn't easy and is still demanding on occasion.

I think though if we can take just a few ideas and pockets of inspiration, it will make our lives more positive and filled with hope, peace, kindness and love.

Thank you xx

Joanne