How Do You Adapt to Snow Delays, Dismissals and Days Off?

Moms Talk is a new feature on Pearl River Patch that is part of an initiative on our Patch sites to reach out to moms and families. We invite you and your circle of friends to help build a community of support for mothers and their families right here in Pearl River.

Moms Talk will also be the place to drop in for a talk about the latest parenting hot topic. Do you know of local moms raising their children in the Tiger Mother's way and is it the best way? How are will our schools' budgets impact our children? What are some good ways to get our children to read?

So get comfortable and feel free to just read or join the conversation. And just to show we aren't going to leave dads out, our own Pearl River Editor Ryan Buncher will start off the conversation this week.

The winter weather is presenting a real challenge for our schools, with some stretches when it seemed like the districts had to made a decision every day whether to have a delayed opening, an early dismissal or cancel entirely. The Pearl River School District has already used four of its five allotted snow days. Some districts have used them all.

This is a challenge for us as parents, too. How do we adapt when school is closed, but work is not? Even more challenging can be early dismissals. You got your child off to school and went to work, but now you find out that school will let out early. Pearl River has been good about making these decisions early, but at least one district was calling parents less than an hour before an early dismissal. What if nobody could get home in time?

So, what do you do about this? How much notice do you need to deal with early dismissals?