Kathryn Faulkner, owner and director of Little Britches Daycare in Bellingham, first entered the child care profession while she was expecting her second child.
After some time providing child care for her community, she spent time on other business pursuits and then recently returned to the early learning field once more. Now, she owns and operates her own in-home daycare.
For Kathryn, the best part of running her own child care business is the ability to be creative with the program.
“The state has guidelines on what to pay attention to, what to teach, and things like that – but there’s a lot of choice and flexibility on my part,” she said. “I’m accountable but I get to direct the way things go.”
Fighting through a pandemic
The pandemic brought many challenges for child care providers like Kathryn. Retaining staff, finding funding for programming, and other key elements of the business were all under strain due to COVID-19.
Between spring of 2020 and spring of 2023, Child Care Aware of Washington reported a net loss of nearly 150 providers in Whatcom County. These child care closures represented a net loss of around 1,500 child care slots in the county – a terrible effect of the pandemic on crucial family resources.
Luckily, Kathryn was able to receive a grant from Opportunity Council’s Center for Retention & Expansion of Child Care last year. The impacts of the pandemic were many, but with this federal relief funding allocated by Whatcom County and the City of Bellingham, she was able to retain staff with employee bonuses, secure maintenance support, and add summer enrichment programs for her students.
A multifaceted approach
With the grant, Kathryn was able to develop and enhance her child care program in multiple ways. She gave her employee a substantial bonus, which was huge for supporting some practical needs that had just come up.
“It allowed me to show my appreciation, and she felt special,” Kathryn said of the staff bonus. “That type of thing makes a huge difference to employees.”
Being able to get support with cleaning and maintaining the space gave her more time to get organized and focus on planning for her work with the kids, Kathryn said.
Using the grant funding, Little Britches was also able to bring in a guest teacher to run a summer sports program for the children. The kids thoroughly enjoyed it!
“They loved running, and you could see their gross motor skills improving over time,” Kathryn said.
According to the Washington State Department of Children, Youth and Families (DCYF), Gross motor skills are the ability to move and control large muscles to move the body intentionally in ways like walking, running, jumping and throwing a ball. Gross motor skills are crucial for kids’ physical health as they develop coordination, balance, and posture.
Cultivating growth at Little Britches
Another highlight of the grant process was the food cultivation project made possible by this funding.
“The kids had a phenomenal time gardening,” Kathryn said. “We learned about the whole growth process and photosynthesis, germinating and planting plants, and how to care for them.”
Kathryn said the kids would wait with excitement for their turn to water the plants. And soon, their hard work paid off—in the form of carrots, cucumbers, radishes, pumpkins and more. The results were nutritious and offered a tangible lesson on growing food and sustainability in addition to the many scientific applications.
“Every day we’d go outside to play, we would walk past the pumpkins,” she said. “The kids would marvel at how big they had grown and how it all started with just one seed.”
Little Britches used leftover grant funding to buy seeds for the coming year.
Kathryn is looking forward to working with the kids on another garden so that they can continue to experience the joy and learning opportunities that growing your food brings.
The gift of opportunities
C-RECC, a program of Opportunity Council, works to boost the economy and support children and families by strengthening all aspects of the child care sector across Northwest Washington.
“The grant has given us the gift of opportunities.,” Kathryn said of the C-RECC funding. “Me, my employee, the kids—it’s touched a part of my business in every way.”
To learn more about starting your own in-home family child care program and gain support and guidance along the way, visit our Become a Provider page!
To view current funding opportunities through the Center for Retention & Expansion of Child Care (C-RECC), visit our Funding page.
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