Why Finding Summer Camps, Childcare, and Activities for Young Kids Is So Hard (And What Actually Works)
My coffee’s gone cold on the kitchen table, and my 4-year-old is scribbling purple dinosaurs on the back of a local nature camp flyer. “Can I pet the ponies?” she asks, holding up the crumpled paper. I click over to the camp’s registration page for the third time that week, scan the fine print, and sigh. Ages 5 and up. Full waitlist. Same story as the other 12 options I’ve looked at this week.
I went back to in-office work three days a week last fall, so I can’t just pull her along with me all summer like I did when I worked remotely during the pandemic. Our regular in-home daycare doesn’t do full summer programming—they close for the whole month of July, and only have space for 3 school-aged kids over the other six weeks of break, all claimed back in February by families with older kids. I had no idea you had to start planning summer childcare for toddlers before the last snow even melted.
I called my sister, who has a 6-year-old, to vent, and she laughed and said she put her son on a camp waitlist before Halloween. I thought she was exaggerating until I started digging into why this is such a mess for parents of kids under 5. Most day camps are built for kids entering kindergarten or older. They require kids to be fully potty trained, able to follow large group directions, and keep up on hikes or group games. That makes sense for camp directors, who are trying to keep costs down and activities running smoothly, but it leaves a huge gap for kids like mine, who turn 4 this spring and aren’t starting kindergarten until next fall.
Licensing rules don’t help, either. Any group program for kids under 5 has to keep a 1:5 staff-to-kid ratio, compared to 1:8 or 1:10 for older kids. That means programs have to hire more staff, charge much higher prices, or just cut the younger age group out entirely. The only full-time option I found within 20 minutes of my house was a private preschool camp that cost $420 a week. That’s more than our monthly car payment. We can’t swing that.
I posted a quick vent in our local neighborhood parent group, expecting a few pity replies, and ended up with dozens of messages from other parents in the exact same spot. One mom, who’s an adjunct professor at the local community college, suggested I post a childcare ad on the university’s student job board. She said early childhood majors are almost always looking for flexible part-time work over summer, and they charge way less than agency nannies.
I posted the ad, noting I was open to sharing care with other families to cut costs, and got 11 responses in 24 hours. Most of the applicants were undergrads studying early childhood who just wanted extra cash before the next semester started, and were fine with a rate that was half what I’d seen on nanny websites. We ended up teaming up with two other families who have 3- and 4-year-olds, all with the same three-day-a-week in-office schedule. We split the hourly cost three ways, so it ends up being $120 a week total for me, which is way more manageable than any full camp.
Once childcare was sorted, I stopped stressing about finding structured full-week activities for my kid. I’d been conditioned to think summer had to be full of fancy camps with planned activities, but I started looking for low-cost, one-off options that fit our patchwork schedule. The public library has a free weekly story time that ends with 45 minutes of outdoor play and water games in the courtyard. The local hardware store does a $5 “little builders” workshop every Saturday morning for 3- to 5-year-olds, where they build little birdhouses or planter boxes to take home. Our city rec center has a drop-in open play for toddlers every Tuesday and Thursday morning for $3 a kid. None of these are full-day, but they give my kid a chance to play with other kids, break up the week, and don’t break the bank. I also worked out a deal with our current preschool: they don’t do formal summer camp, but they let current families drop in two days a week for $40 a day, which covers my other work days.
What I’ve learned through this whole messy process is that the “perfect” summer plan for young kids rarely exists, especially if you’re a working parent on a budget. You don’t have to start planning a year in advance to make it work, though. A few small, concrete shifts make all the difference: check college student job boards instead of only using expensive nanny agencies. Team up with other parents of young kids to split the cost of a caregiver—most of you have the same work schedule anyway. Don’t sleep on low-cost drop-in activities from local libraries, rec centers, and small businesses instead of paying for full-week branded camps. And always ask your current childcare provider if they offer informal drop-ins even if they don’t advertise a summer camp—most are willing to work with current families for extra cash if they have extra space.
This summer’s plan isn’t perfect. I have a recurring calendar reminder to swap days with one of the other moms every other week when she has an early meeting, which means I leave work two hours early and catch up on emails after my kid goes to bed. Last week, the college student texted to say she’s extending her trip home by three days, so my mom is driving an hour to stay with us that week, and I’m taking three half-days. Some days, I’m sure they’ll eat more Goldfish and popsicles than vegetables, and spend more time watching Bluey than doing nature activities. But it works, for this year. I already put a reminder in my phone to start looking next year in January, after the holidays. I know the spots fill up fast, and this gap isn’t going anywhere. For now, though, patched together is good enough.
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