Hi there! My name is Lea, and I am the Owner and Operator of Lea’s Littles, LLC.

I run this Family Child Care Home out of beautiful Breckenridge, Colorado. Thanks for coming to check out what I have going on here. Whether you are a local parent interested in finding child care for your little one, an early childhood educator looking for ideas in an infant or toddler classroom, someone considering taking the leap of faith into the world of family child care or whatever reason you’ve found yourself in my little corner of the internet, I’m glad you’re here.

how did I end up here? Quick back story

Life has thrown some curveballs over the last few years. Let me take you down the winding road that led to where I am today.

I was born and raised in Holland, MI and attended Central Michigan University, where I graduated with a Bachelor of Applied Arts in Recreation Parks and Leisure Services Administration from the College of Education and Human Services. Fire Up Chips!

I moved west to finish up my degree with an internship in the Town of Breckenridge Recreation Department in Summer 2011 where I developed a strong sense of community. From there, I realized my passion for community events. I spent several years working a myriad of events jobs in Summit County, where I produced events across the spectrum: from 50 participants in a strider bike race to internationally renowned festivals that saw 30,000 visitors over a weekend, including the International Snow Sculpture Championships and the Frisco Colorado BBQ Challenge and everything in between. You might even find me on an event stage some weekends, I still love the scene.

While I was building my resume, I had to hustle to make ends meet. When starting out in the events industry, a lot of the work is part time or seasonal and I found myself in search of a full time job. I got a job at one of the local early learning centers and spent two years full time in the toddler room while also juggling my events jobs and waiting tables. I loved being in the classroom, I loved the sense of wonder that children brought into my life, and I loved working in a setting inspired by the Reggio Emilia Approach to Early Childhood Education. However, I did have this awesome degree that I wanted to use, so I decided to follow that path in an events career.

Flash forward to Spring 2020 and the universe had other plans for the events industry. I decided to roll with the changes.

The sense of community that bloomed when I first moved to Breckenridge led me back to the world of Early Childhood Education. Things were different for me in this new phase of life though, I had a husband, a mortgage, and a baby on the way. Like many communities across America, there is a huge demand for child care here in Summit County. I decided that the best way for me to serve this community would be to increase the capacity of care and open up my home to other families in need of infant and toddler care.

What now?

That’s how I found myself opening a small business during a global pandemic. I know that the need for child care is not going away any time soon. During the application process, I searched the internet high and low for others that were on this journey of family home child care, specifically infant and toddler licenses, and found that there were not many people sharing their experience with the world. I wanted to shed some light on these important processes. I know that most towns in the USA are in need of few more family child care homes, so I hope a couple others would like to learn from my experience.

I am here to tell you all the silly details that actually are not so silly and all of the little things that often get swept under the rug by experienced providers but new providers might want to have a heads up about. Trust me, there is a lot to learn and I so appreciate you coming along for the ride with me and learning from my lived challenges.

Thanks for visiting my website. You can learn more about my philosophy to early childhood education, details about my business and enrollment in the Admissions tab. Resources and insight about the world of Family Child Care can be found in the Blog tab. Please do not hesitate to reach out to me directly by going to the Work With Me tab. See my legal statements about affiliate links and other noteworthy information in the Privacy Policy and Terms and Conditions at the bottom of the page.