u/ActualEmu1251

My son just turned 3 and we are leaving our current daycare/preschool at the end of May to attend a more formal preschool facility. For many reasons we are leaving, this being the final straw. It is small and one class, so my son spends half day at preschool and the other half in the house.

Today his daycare texted and said my son threw up once outside while playing and was upset for like 15 minutes. They told me to pick him up. I was in the office 45 min away and my husband is out of town. I asked if he was sick and they said no, but still wanted him picked up because they didn't want him to be upset the rest of the day.

When I got there, 2 teachers were with the preschool kids reading in the separate classroom. The other teacher was with the babies (under 2) in a playroom in the house. And my son was sitting alone in the living room watching TV. Apparently he was watching TV for an hour before I got there. He is at the office with me and totally normal, no sickness.

It's not that I don't leave my son in a room unattended, but I don't think a preschool should be doing that. I was also just pissed about the whole situation. He is only there two more weeks, so do I stick it out because I paid for it or just pull him out and have my parents watch him? Should I say something to the owner about the situation? The owner only said to me "he's in the living room" when I got there and didn't even say bye to my son when everyone else did.

My son turned 3 last month and for the past few months watching TV has turned into a rare privilege because of the way it impacts his behavior. When he was younger, we were pretty casual about TV and watched things like Ms. Rachel, Bluey, dinosaur shows, Elmo, etc. and he would go play on his own after about 20 minutes of watching it. We quickly learned that high stimulus shows were terrible and avoided them. We have a tablet that we have used probably 5x total on plane rides or long car trips.

Now that my son is 3 years old, anything more than 15 minutes of Bluey or maybe a Disney classic movie on the weekend turns him into a total tantrum monster. At this age he can be so glued to the TV. I had another baby 5 months ago, so he definitely watched too much TV for about 2 weeks between the holidays and postpartum. One time I grabbed the tablet to take on a long road trip and he was so fixated on wanting to play it at home while it was charging. I ended up throwing the tablet in the closet and it's never coming back out. We have even experimented with how much TV he watches and his behavior, it was consistent.

Anyways, has anyone else experienced this big shift in behavior driven by screen time around 3 years old? Thankfully he will only ask for a minute about watching something and when I tell him no he will just go play.

This year we decided to spend what would have been vacation money on a used small camper. We have a 3 year old and a 5 month old. We live in a small town that is over 50% public lands surrounding us. This past weekend we had what felt like a whole forest to ourselves with a small creek. Our son caught his first fish, we played games, hiked several miles, watched our dogs swim, and enjoyed some nice wine by the campfire.

This is basically our vacation for the next 5 years with two small kids..... Both in daycare. I don't know how others afford to travel internationally with their families, but I try not to be jealous. Our kids are probably happier in a creek anyways.

Other working moms camping as their family vacations?