As you are planning ahead, make a note that a lot of good camps do their registration as early as January so you need to work out your camp plan early.

This is OP. These were very helpful. Thanks! I hadn’t considered that I would also need to pay for activities with a sitter. I was thinking pool but hadn’t thought past that. Thanks!

One thing to keep in mind if you decide to go with a college sitter, they may need to go back to school several weeks before your child does. That would leave you with a few weeks at the end of the summer with no coverage.

There are a lot of good options, some are even great, that are not Cavella, Bretton Woods and the other uber expensive camps. Those look great and are something I might think about for DS when he gets closer to middle school. Right now, he just needs a place to run and play and swim. There are a lot of those that are far less expensive.

This week he is at a camp that ended up with only 4 kids but has a great indoor play area, Ninja Course, and they go out to a splash pad. He says it is his favorite camp ever because he can do what he wants and he is running all day. We prefer that camps with a bit more structure (games, nature walk, swimming, arts and crafts, playground) but they are deemed less fun then the total free time camp. Mind you, if we had him stay home he would tell us he is bored and want us to play with him and there is nothing to do and his toys are not interesting and the list is long. But send him to a camp with a massive play structure, a lunch, and a few other kids and he is, literally, a happy camper.

He enjoys the other camps, he is always excited to tell us what he did and to go the next day.

I've priced it out before and it seemed like camp was cheaper than an sitter for one kid and about the same as camp for two kids. Mine did a mix of less expensive camps with a couple more expensive thrown in there. The sitter in many ways would be easier on me -- no drop off/pick up, packing lunches, figuring out camp registration in January. But, when I suggested it to my kids they said "no way", they love their camps. It does take trial and error to find the right camps for your kids and, for us, that meant sending them to different places which is a logistical PITA but they were generally happy. I did make DD go to one camp that she didn't love for a couple weeks for several years because 1) it was inexpensive, 2) it was DS's favorite so he spent most of the summer there and 3) I picked weeks where the weekly theme/activities aligned with her interests.

To make camp logistics easier you can sign up for the whole summer in one place, although that's a bit risky that they won't like it. Talk with parents of your child's friends and try to align at least a couple weeks with a friend. When we were first trying to figure it out, I'd sign up for 2 weeks max at a new camp. That gave us a good sense if the kids liked it but wasn't too long if it was a dud.

My mom stayed at home when I was a kid and I still went to camp all day. And even if I stayed at home now I'd send them to camp. My kids come home from camp exhausted but that doesn't mean they didn't have fun. They would be bored without camp.

If you are considering doing a babysitter instead, keep in mind that then you also have to pay for activities for them.

We are in DC and looked for someone to watch two 4 year olds over the summer. At $23/hour (before taxes), we were getting rejected by college kids. We found someone at $25/hour, and for a full day this was going to run each family more than a middle of the road (price-wise) camp. Add to that the hassle and the cost of setting up payroll. We ultimately pulled the plug and went with a camp.

Anonymous wrote:Here is an idea. Have a parent actually involved in the kid’s life.

Who wants every day of the summer waking up to go to a scheduled camp? That sucks.

We are a two working parent family. Either we drop an income, which is not acceptable, or our child goes to camp. He picks the camps and enjoys himself. WE pick him up and he has a smile on his face. If I try and pick him up early, he is annoyed because there is still camp.

I had a SAHM Mom and did not go to day camp. I always wanted to go to camp because of the cool things my friends at camp were doing. My 2-3 weeks of over night camps are my best memories of summer. Heck, there are SAHM I know who send their kids to camp because their kids want to go to camp.

So kindly keep your ill informed opinion to yourself. There are people who don't have a choice and there are kids who enjoy camp and there are families who meet both requirements.

Anonymous wrote:Here is an idea. Have a parent actually involved in the kid’s life.

Who wants every day of the summer waking up to go to a scheduled camp? That sucks.

Here's an idea, give your kid a chance by sending them to camp. With an asshole parent like you, I can't image the miserable kids you raise.

Here is an idea. Have a parent actually involved in the kid’s life.

Who wants every day of the summer waking up to go to a scheduled camp? That sucks.

It depends on the camp. We are in the Herndon/Reston area and most of the camps that we send our child to are $250 a week and are very good. The Reston Association, Fairfax County Park and Rec, YMCA Reston, and others have a pretty large variety, are reasonably priced, well managed (The Y is the weakest of the three examples), and have a good number of kids attending.

There are some that are far more expensive but those are the top range camps.

Anonymous wrote:You'd be hiring a summer babysitter, not a nanny share. Someone like a college student home for the summer or a graduated senior headed to college in the fall.

That person would probably want at least $15/hour for one kid, so $600/week, which isn't any cheaper than camps. Add in more kids, and you're going to increase the hourly rate--say you find two kids, close in age, and the sitter will take $20/hour, that's still $400/week for you in base salary,. You can find camps for at or near that price, especially if you look at stuff run by the county.

At age six, you'd need kids close in age who enjoyed playing together and got along well, so if your kid has a friend whose parents wanted to do it at the same times that you did, that might work. You'd also need to agree on what kinds of activities the kids could do--any classes? Going to the pool? Can the sitter drive them anywhere? Plus factor in the cost of those activities.

I've looked at the costs and agree with this poster. The only advantage of doing it this way is that it might be more enjoyable for your child (my kids get tired of camp and want to have more downtime) and you don't have to worry about transportation back and forth to camp. One big disadvantage of doing it this way is that if it doesn't work out for some reason with the nanny, then it might be hard to switch gears mid-summer, as camps can fill up early.

You'd be hiring a summer babysitter, not a nanny share. Someone like a college student home for the summer or a graduated senior headed to college in the fall.

That person would probably want at least $15/hour for one kid, so $600/week, which isn't any cheaper than camps. Add in more kids, and you're going to increase the hourly rate--say you find two kids, close in age, and the sitter will take $20/hour, that's still $400/week for you in base salary,. You can find camps for at or near that price, especially if you look at stuff run by the county.

At age six, you'd need kids close in age who enjoyed playing together and got along well, so if your kid has a friend whose parents wanted to do it at the same times that you did, that might work. You'd also need to agree on what kinds of activities the kids could do--any classes? Going to the pool? Can the sitter drive them anywhere? Plus factor in the cost of those activities.

It might be hard to get a nanny share at that age just for the summer.

I’m starting to budget for next year. Goodness gracious, summer camps are expensive! Did anyone price out doing a nanny share instead? I would need to do payroll, taxes, etc. Would that be any less expensive? This is for a 6 year old and we live in Arlington.