Our Story!
Hi!
My name is Frankie. Like many of you, I’m a working Mom and I have three busy boys!
About seven years ago I had this crazy idea I was going to start a daycare. Little did I know what I was in for.
I was on maternity leave with my oldest (who is now seven) and I spent a lot of time touring daycares and interviewing home sitters. I just couldn’t believe I had to leave my precious little guy with someone I didn’t know.
I had to go to work, but I didn’t feel good about going to a “corporate” center. It just seemed so impersonal! They were changing the babies with gloves and the little ones were lined up in highchairs crying! It broke my heart!
Then I looked into home-based care providers and they seemed like a better fit for me, BUT not as secure as a center. After much dedicated searching it was time to return to work and I had not made a decision.
I finally went the home sitter route and at first it worked out great. But then my sitter could only do 3 days a week. And of course my family grew. Over the next 5 years and two more kids I tried many different sitters to make it work. There were days that it was more stressful getting the kids to the sitter than my entire work day!
As much as I loved being a Mom, I also knew that I really enjoyed my career. How could I effectively manage the two? It was such a struggle to make sure I always had coverage for the kids. There had to be a better way.
It occurred to me that my career and taking care of the kids could BOTH be served by opening my own day care center. More and more I began to think of this, despite the size of the challenge and the amount of work I knew it would take to get started.
I never let go of the dream however. It was just put on hold for a while. I knew that if you could combine comforts of home based care and security of center based daycare (with the right staff to carry it out) it was a perfect match for what I was looking for. And if I was looking for it then other Mom’s had to be too!
Fortunately I had loving and supportive family members who shared my dream. And so it was Sharon’s Little Leapers became what it is today. Stop by and visit. I am sure you will be glad you did.
