the daycare hunt

Its rough folks, I’ll tell you, it’s rough.

It all started when I got this pesky little thing called a new job.  You see, my husband and I worked for the same company until the beginning of this year.  Our office was approximately a 30 minute drive from our house (on a good day).  Because it was so far – we elected to have our kids in daycare near our office instead of near our home.  For many reasons, but the largest being that if they needed us for any reason, we’d be close.  Since I started the new job, Tim has been solely responsible for dropping the kids off and picking them up each day (at two different locations….).  And, its been working, but this is where it gets complicated.

You see, baseball season begins for Tim at the end of March.  This is the same baseball season that I’ve talked about  where I become a single mom.  Well, the difference this year, is that at rush hour after work is through, it can take anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour and a half to get to the area where Tim works, and where the kids are in daycare.  So, I knew that I’d never make it to both places to pick up the kids each day before they close, nor did I want to spend my entire evening driving to and from that area with two kids in tow.  So, I was forced to start the daycare hunt closer to my work and our home.

I began searching back in December, almost as soon as I was offered my new position.  I preferred to have Kate in an in home daycare like she was currently in, and I wanted to find a preschool for Cooper.  I didn’t really think it could be that difficult to find something that would work for each of them.  I didn’t care if they were in the same place, as we were used to them being in different locations.  My main focus was getting them the best care possible, with a secondary focus to not spend more than I make on that care.

I probably called 20+ places, visited 6-10 of them, and finally  found a place for both kids!  And bonus!  It’s the closest place to my house!  The cherry on top?    BOTH kids are going to go there.  I’m telling you, I struck gold here ladies and gentlemen.  Cooper starts this week in fact, and Katy will start either in April or after her first birthday, basically as soon as they can fit her in.  I’m very fortunate to have Stephanie and my mom who will be able to watch Kate until she starts there.

But honestly, that search was painful.  We are picky, yes, but we should be, right?  I mean these are our babies!  We want the best for them!  I visited some places that I wouldn’t send my least favorite person to for care. 

There was a place that literally didn’t have enough standing room for 3 adults due to the toys all over the floor.  When I asked if the toys everywhere was normal, the answer I got was “yes, this is actually a pretty good day.”  I was shocked to say the very least.  Did this place really think I was going to let my baby learn how to crawl in a place where she could hurt herself on the hundreds of toys covering the floor??? 

I toured another place where the kids ate lunch at tables in their classroom, and since they were just finishing up, I got to see what that led to….   I’d never seen such a food mess in all my life.  I think there was more food on the floor than could have possibly been consumed. 

Another place I visited had babies eating table food (some at 6 months) and guess what part of their table food was….. COLE SLAW.  Seriously, feeding a 6 month old cole slaw?  Maybe I’m weird, but that seems a bit insane to me. 

Like I said, I found a good place to send my kids.  I am lucky.  I do not envy anyone who has to start this process.  We were so fortunate until now that we didn’t have any of these problems.  When Cooper was born we had care lined up, we did switch him when he was 6 months old, but after that, we’ve had the best daycare situation.  I feel confident that this new daycare is going to be equally good for both of my kids.  Please folks, if I can give you one bit of advice….  Don’t settle for something that you don’t think is good enough.  If you search long and hard enough, I think you’ll find some place you’ll feel good about.  At least I think we did in the long run.

Have you had problems finding daycare for your kids?  What was your hunt like?  Did you get lucky right off the bat???