This is a guide to creating and maintaining a successful family child care arrangement. As care begins, you may still have questions and concerns. For example, how do you and your child establish a strong relationship with this new person in your lives? And what about all those business aspects that could cause some problems?

The goal of this packet is to generate ideas of how to build and maintain a strong partnership. Research indicates that stability of care is best for children, so it's important to respect and value this person who's spending important hours with your child.

By choosing care with a relative, you are creating the possibility for extending and enriching the family ties you and your child may already have. As you probably know, choosing a relative to care for your child can offer many advantages.

This guide explores the advantages and advises how to avoid the possible disadvantages. Includes worksheets, checklists and loads of tips.

For many working parents, the Mary Poppins mystique is difficult to dispel. When some parents need child care, in-home care is their first and most obvious choice. But in-home child care is only one type of available care and not always the best choice for some families.

The goal of this publication, produced by 4C, is to assist you in deciding if in-home child care is best for your family. It will carefully examine all aspects of locating and evaluating an in-home caregiver. We have also included sample forms that may be helpful to you.

A basic approach when considering in-home care should include a comparison to other types of child care. For that reason, the first section will look briefly at the three basic types of child care, and the advantages and disadvantages of each.

School-age children need adult support, encouragement, and limit setting to help them feel safe and secure. As a parent you want to provide your child with the tools to make sound decisions. We hope this booklet will help you find the information and resources you need to make informed choices. The Self-Care Readiness segment suggests guidelines to help you assess your child's ability for self-care and gives tips for preparing your child and your home for this important step. The School-Age Resources segment provides a list of community resources concerning a variety of school-age related issues.

You can play a key role in your child's inclusion in a program. As parents, you have many roles; mother, father, therapist, employee, advocate, coach and teacher. When talking with providers, your role is critical in educating and advocating for your child. Here are some tips to keep in mind as you talk with providers about your child.

It's a fact! Not all mothers are employed outside of the home. Some women, without the influence of economic factors, choose to take care of their own children, remaining "stay at home" moms indefinitely.

At 4C, we've found that moms who don't need child care still want some occasional socialization for both themselves and their young children. In addition, they sometimes want to connect with other mothers of young children, to formalize some regular babysitting arrangements.

This booklet offers information on informal groups, especially ideas for getting one started in your area. Although probably not comprehensive, 4C has developed a listing of some of these groups that exist in our community. We suspect this listing is not complete and hope you'll help us add to it when you learn of more, or better yet, start your own group.