Oh no. That’s devastating on so many fronts. I’m so sorry @frogger.
My SIL was a tenured academic at a small college with financial struggles, and decided to leave before it got to the breaking point. I think she’s really happy about the transition even though it’s not what her 20 or even 30yo self would have imagined. I hope you and your community succeed in saving the college, but if you can’t, I hope your next chapter is equally rich in community, purpose, friendships, and love.
At the risk of sounding smug, I think we might be thriving? Although Little League season may push us back into survival mode 
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For us, both working part-time and having one parent at home for a whole day, every day has been fabulous. I know there are a variety of reasons why it is not possible for everyone, but I think it can be truly miraculous. Not only does it allow us to avoid daycare, which seems to be an enormous source of stress for many working parents, it also allows us to have more time for our young adolescents. Who really still need to be supervised.
Things in our minus column include not having local family support or a robust friend network locally. It does help somewhat that our adolescents have an extra set of parents, with the cuckoo does not!
I don’t want to cancel the surviving versus thriving question of people still have thoughts. But I wonder if I can ask another question? I am wondering if those mudsuits, like the muddy buddy. I think they are called are worthwhile in a dryer climate. We do have some mud in spring like anywhere and today I am watching the cuckoo tumble around a muddy park. Not able to really play with anything and I wonder if it would be useful. @Economista didn’t you have them for your girls? Did you find that you got a lot of use out of them?
I’m glad we have some thrivers representing!
@BiblioFeroz - I have one in the box of hand me downs for you!!! Yes we get lots of use out of them
LOL, perfect!
Important update: it is now actively raining on us, but the cuckoo does not want to go home.
Hell yes for thriving!! 
I think the muddy buddy is brilliant. I had never seen them before the little boy’s preschool, and I immediately showed them to the preschool teachers at my school. Game changer!
I also use them for windsuits a lot this time of year. Or layer with fleece as needed. Even in summer they are often in my backpack because they add a lot of warmth if it is unexpectedly cold or windy without a lot of bulk.
NGL I like my cloudveil suits more. But the muddy buddy is almost the same and still awesome. It is much crinklier and louder which I hope resolves itself.
Yes they are so versatile! We rarely have snow and so I even use it as the top layer for snow days. Also GREAT for the beach/rivers edge etc, any time they’ll be digging and dirty or sandy. If it’s not warm enough to have them in a swimsuit and hose them off after, then a mud suit is life on easy mode.
ugh! I don’t know if I have ever felt like I was thriving in my life, but I think that’s just my personality. We are playing on easy mode too, compared to many–we have one kid, she’s relatively easy (as far a 14 month olds can be), we have family nearby for support. But both spouse and I work jobs that don’t have flexible hours and can’t be WFH. We don’t have friends because we never got around to making them pre-kid, and now we don’t have, like, time to socialize.
One gripe I have is that there are a few nice-looking events geared toward young kids and families, like library storytimes, etc. But they are ALL during the weekday in my area. Anyone else find this? I am craving even the smallest connection with other parents, and that seems like a way in, but we can’t ever do those because we’re at work.
What I’ve heard from multiple sources (school PTAs trying to schedule events, librarians, etc.) is that if they schedule stuff on weekends the working parents are too busy trying to get all the chores done and spend one on one time with their kids or whatever other things just don’t happen during the week, so people tends to not show up at all and it doesn’t make sense to put the effort into setting up the events.
it makes sense. And of course my weekends are packed too, and I have chores, etc. It would just be nice for the option to be there, lol.
Ugh I feel both sides of this. Working parents cannot win 
Agreed!
For real? Wow. I feel like Saturdays are packed with “we gotta find fun shit to do” and Sundays are prep days. Meowlet does all his extracurricular on Sat because there’s nothing else going on.
As a longtime PTA person - yes. We tried to alternate between days and evenings at the elementary school, and evening meetings were dramatically less well attended.
Yes! Can confirm! I am a working mom librarian and all our programs are weekday mornings because that’s when people actually come.
I’m having horrible things happen but my mental health is steady and good so we’re in the solid category. Above surviving, not quite what I’d call “thriving”. But maybe thriving because we can just roll with everything and the bare fridge isnt stressing me.