I don't know how many of you girls know, but I got a summer job babysitting (BEST. SUMMER. JOB. EVER!). I am working full time (7:45-5:15, Monday-Friday) most weeks, watching two girls ages 9 and 8, awesome ages BTW, cause they aren't "too old" to do a lot of games, but you can still do some more fun slightly more complicated games with them. I am hoping to post about once or twice a week about what we did that day, but this week I am not working cause the girls are in summer school so I will show you my babysitting bag.
So the first day I babysat we decorated some canvas bags. They LOVED doing it and it was a pretty cheap project. Every day sometime in the afternoon we have "chill pill time" which is when the girls will go into there own rooms and just "chill" (read a book, listen to music, take a nap, color, whatever quite calmish thing they want to do). It is a great time for them to get away from each other and just chill for a little cause we go pretty hard all day long, and it is a chance for them to step back and breath for a little bit. They usually end up asleep, don't tell them I know ;) they come out of their rooms yawning and rubbing their eyes, saying "oh, I didn't sleep, I promise!" I don't know why for kids that age sleeping during the day is such a sin, it doesn't make since, oh well. Anyways the girls got to decorate a bag for "chill pill time" and every week I will put new coloring books, new activities, a new book on tape, and new chapter books. They love the idea of having a special bag just for that hour each day.
I made a bag for myself just for holding all my stuff everyday and just an essential babysitting bag. I have even started taking this bag with me to just evening babysitting. It is fun to have a bag that the kids know there is awesome stuff in. In has started to be this really cool Mary Poppins bag for the kids, they never know what I may have decided to through in there that day. So here is what I have in my bag, I think most of this stuff is essential for any babysitter.
Here is my bag, I used plain scotch tape and put it in (not so) straightish lines and put the blue and red stripes on there, it is a little streaky on camera, you cannot tell as much in person and I let the girls help me so it turned out not so perfect.
The first thing I have in the bag is a book that I am reading to the girls, just something we read about a chapter of every time I am there. This is a book Mom used to read to us and I LOVE it, they are really liking it. It is called "The Mysterious Benedict Society" and ya'll should read it, it is one of those books anyone can enjoy. And everyone in my family loves it.
I also keep some sort of prize candy in my bag, the twizzlers are awesome because I can break or cut them into whatever size piece I want. I can give the girls twizzlers for prizes for ANYTHING, I am pretty competitive and I make like everything they do like cleaning, and regular games, and just whatever. It is good to find a candy that the kids like but you don't, cause unless you have self control (I don't :D) then you will end up eating the candy pretty fast. I don't like twizzlers so they are lasting quite a while.
I also have a notebook for writing down random things during the day, what to bring the next day, whose turn it is to clean up dishes, just whatever I need to remember.
I also have some "me" things, chap-stick, gum, lotion, deodorant, and single serve lemonade mix. Just some stuff for that I want to have around during the day.
