I'm about 7.5 weeks pregnant right now, and my friends were telling me I should start looking into day cares now, because the waiting lists are crazy long! Is this true?! This seems soooo early to even think about it!
If so, where did you start searching? Online, local neighborhoods, word of mouth, etc?
wonderful pomelo / 30692 posts
I think it all depends on where you live. Where we live, some places had waiting lists, but lots of them didn't. We started visiting places around 15 weeks (though I only visited the places that didn't have waiting lists). I also started my search on-line - our state has an on-line service so you can look up daycares and see their violations/infractions, so that helped me cross off ones and narrow our list down.
hostess / wonderful watermelon / 39513 posts
We looked at centers about 5 months before LO 1 was born. We looked online, word of mouth and the The National Association for the Education of Young Children website.
We put LO 2 on the wait list a few days after my BFP.
clementine / 912 posts
We started almost immediately after finding out we were pregnant. However, I agree with @Adira that it depends on where you live. Where we live, there are only two daycare centers that I would send LO to. We ended up not getting into either and went with an in-home daycare which we love. No matter what, remember it will all work out (I had to have my husband tell me that over and over when I was stressing about childcare.)
nectarine / 2784 posts
Totally depends on your area. I started looking when I was around 16 weeks and only 1 out of 5 places had any kind of waitlist. I would start by asking friends and coworkers with young children for recommendations, and see if your state has a 211 childcare website or similar.
nectarine / 2433 posts
Where I live daycare is super hard to get into and expensive! I am due in April 2015 and am on waiting lists at 4 places so far. We have a 1 year mat leave so I don't actually need care until April 2016 but at our first choice day care there are 70(!) people ahead of us on the wait list! In our case there has been no choice but to start looking ASAP.
I started by using our City website which identifies all licenced day cares, searched for ones that are closest to my office, take one year olds and were well rated. None of my friends have kids in daycare and a couple of my co-workers use care that is closer to where they live or have wives who stay at home.
honeydew / 7811 posts
I started with personal recommendations. Basically polled every one I knew with kids in my area. I had to put LO (while I was still pregnant) on a waiting list for the daycare run by my work. They called me last month (LO was 17 months!!!) to tell me there was finally an opening.
pear / 1697 posts
I'm about 14 weeks now. Sweetie and I started contacting daycares about 2 weeks ago. The ones that have gotten back to us so far have waitlists between 10 and 18 mos long for infant care. So, we may have actually waited too long to start looking.
nectarine / 2317 posts
I started getting on lists right after my NT scan at 12 weeks. We're on 5 waitlists...I'll worry about visting them and making a decision after the baby is born. None of the day cares were shocked about asking to be put on a list for april 2016 care.
I think we'll look in to more home based care after the baby is born as they tend to be more word of mouth.
eggplant / 11824 posts
I was around 20 weeks pregnant when we started touring daycares; I started doing research some time before then. At that point, we got on the waiting list for our #1 choice daycare and LO was able to get into that daycare at 13 weeks old only because we got on the waiting list early.
Another daycare we were very interested in already had such a long waitlist that they had no idea when LO would be able to get in after she was born.
I started with our state licensing board, as they have an online database that tells you every licensed daycare in your area and any fines/infractions/complaints/etc. they have had.
pomelo / 5258 posts
I started with google and yelp reviews at about 8 months pregnant (5 months before we needed a center). That was plenty of time for a slot at that point. The directors were almost teasing me for looking while pregnant becuse they had so many open spots. Then there was a baby boom or economic shift because all the centers filled up and had long long waiting lists. When we moved from the center we chose I think I could have sold LOs spot for big money to some desperate parent. This time around we're going to start right after first trimester ends.
cherry / 197 posts
For LO #1 I waited until I was about 30 weeks. I started with our state licensing board and contacted from there looking for places that had an opening, and then visited those and made a choice. She was in that daycare until she was 1 and then we switched her.
For LO #2 we want the baby to go to the same daycare as #1, so we told the director when I was 10 weeks and we got the LAST spot for next August.
pineapple / 12793 posts
I got on the list a week or so after my bfp. Even with a year long mat leave I didn't get off the list until a week before I was scheduled to start back at work and had already made other arrangements.
But it's nutty here for day care spots.
wonderful kiwi / 23653 posts
Depends on where you live! I went on tours in August (I'm due in Dec) and signed in September and I had ample of time.
pomegranate / 3577 posts
I should have started looking when E was still an ovarian follicle...
If I were you, I'd track down the word-of-mouth (best way to find in home daycare if that's what you want) and get your baby on some lists if "good" daycares are few and far between in your area. It will save a LOT of anxiety on the other end. (Our problem is that we moved when E was 5 weeks old and my son is STILL on the list for daycare...and he's 16 months old.)
pomegranate / 3658 posts
Got on our first waiting list the day after my first BFP, and stayed on that list after I miscarried. So that's three months before we conceived this baby. I'm now 16 weeks and only last week jumped back into getting on more lists.
grapefruit / 4355 posts
My friend who has a 4 month old had a hard time finding a daycare. They started looking when she was early in her second trimester (thinking they had plenty of time) and found that everywhere seemed to have long wait lists. We're planning on me staying home so I don't have to worry about this but if I was planning to go back to work, I'd already be looking (I'm 6w today).
coconut / 8861 posts
6 weeks old. We seriously didn't look into childcare until after he was born. We found a great in home daycare, so it worked out for us.
coconut / 8854 posts
@cascademom: That's my dream, I would love to find a nice in-home day care, but I don't even know where to begin! We haven't told many people yet, so I can't quite start the word of mouth yet 
coconut / 8861 posts
@MrsBrewer: We found our daycare through Yelp reviews and a local parents network. I would suggest finding some local moms groups on Facebook. For Chicago, there's a thriving community of them on FB. We belong to a neighborhood one as well.
blogger / watermelon / 14218 posts
@MrsBrewer: Oh my goodness, congratulations!!!!!
I think it totally depends on where you live but if I were looking for an in-home daycare in our area, I'd post on my local facebook groups. There are mom and kid specific ones that people have started and people are always posting about openings and "in search of" posts and people are generally really nice and open about their experiences and knowledge!
coconut / 8854 posts
@mrs. wagon: @cascademom: Great suggestions about the FB groups! We haven't announced to anyone yet, so I'm a little hesitant to do anything on Facebook you know?
coconut / 8861 posts
@MrsBrewer: Facebook groups are generally private. It's not even a matter of announcing or not. You can connect with those groups early to get a beat on daycares, etc. I wish I did earlier with my LO's pregnancy.
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