Big sigh of relief!

Along with the sadness of the passing of my great-grandmother, the Sedberry house was blessed with a wonderful piece of news this past week. Our child care issue has been resolved! As many of you know, we have been struggling with the decision as to who will watch our upcoming bundle of joy. Our initial idea was for our very good friend Jess to watch him or her. She is a stay at home mom right now and has 2 wonderful little boys that we love to pieces. They are very well behaved and blossom in the learning environment that she provides. Unfortunately, that didn’t work out. Thankfully she and I were able to talk and discover that the timing wouldn’t be right fairly early on so we had time to keep looking. I had called around to a lot of centers but with the high costs, low curriculum and long wait lists, it was not looking too promising.

Then, one day about a month ago, I was at our friends Amy and Bobs playing with their little guy Grant. We got to talking (Amy and I, not Grant and I, ha-ha) and she mentioned her next door neighbor that was planning to watch Grant before she changed jobs. It was like a cartoon – I saw the light bulb turn on above my head! If Amy wasn’t going to need her, maybe she would have an opening. Now normally I would not be open to the idea of an in-home child care provider that I do not know. BUT….I do know Amy and Bob and know that they are very protective over Grant. If they felt comfortable with him being at her house, this was something I had to check out. The bonus is that she is their neighbor so they not only knew her in the child-care capacity but had seen her interact with her own children since they have lived at their house. Jeff and I met with her and her husband the very next week and were very impressed with what we saw. Her kids are adorable, had manners and played well together. Her husband was also at home and was interacting with the kids and was very supportive of her decision to watch other people’s kids in their home. She was very comforting to me and my “new mom” questions and concerns. All went well with the meeting but the catch was that she had a very good friend that was also expecting that may want the opening. We left the meeting with our fingers crossed that everything would work out. We put all of our eggs in one basket by not reserving a spot at one of the centers in case she would not be available. She called this week and her friend has moved out of town, thereby opening up the spot for our little one!

I cannot even find the words to express how much of a relief that call was! I am very proud of myself that I have not been freaking out about the possibility that she would call and not have an opening. That is HUGE for me. I have taken the approach that everything happens for a reason.