EXCERPTS
When Donalee Jones and Scott Mowbray returned to their home town and began farming near Cartwright, Man., in 2008, the couple assumed that when things got busy, the family that they planned to have one day could easily be looked after by Scott’s parents, who lived on the yard of the Mowbray’s 2,000-acre grain farm.
They didn’t give a second thought to needing other options for child care even after their first two children Abigail and Norah were born in 2010 and 2011.
“The dream was I’d work from home while the kids napped,” says Jones, who works part-time in a home-based office as senior producer for a Winnipeg-based media company. “Or we’d take them on the tractor.”
Today she emphasizes the word “dream” as she talks about the scheduling nightmare that eventually piled up, with her trying to manage farmwork and the demands of her job while also trying to match grandparents’ schedules to children’s care needs.
Fortunately, help was on its way.
The Cartwright and Early District Learning Centre opened its doors in the fall of 2012 providing licensed spaces for 16 pre-schoolers and four infants. They signed up their children for a couple of days a week.