Travis is busting his hump for us... What a trooper!

Wow. I have to say I MISS MY HUSBAND. He has been working very hard for months now. He is trying to work as much as he can so we can pay off as much debt as possible before the baby comes. The problem is that after the baby comes, he probably won't be able to quit working the overtime completely. He should be able to cut back significantly, but it would be a little rough if he stopped it all together. Thing is, we should be able to pay off at least one credit card and we will have our taxes paid by June, but then we will have diapers and daycare and hospital bills to take care of. We're just trading out our old debt for baby debt.

I will do whatever I can in my power to cut back on the amount of overtime Travis has to work after the baby comes. I want him to be here to get to know our little man. If he continued to work the hours he's working now, he would be home after Lil Wodie went to sleep and he would only get one whole day a week, at the most, to spend with the baby. It's depressing and I won't stand for it. Besides, it would be nice to have a little help raising this kid, ya know?

I am really looking forward to the first week after the baby is born because Travis is taking off from work. We'd love to do more, but we can't afford it. Unfortunately, Travis does not have any sort of paid leave, so we will have to save up for that one week of bliss as it is. We are HOPING that his boss will be a gem and pay him for that week, but it's not something we can rely on.

We are currently juggling our credit card debt to hopefully make payments a little easier and maybe even a little lighter. It may help us in the long run (less chance for late payment fees and the possibility of less interest paid over time).

Did I mention that we found the daycare provider we want to use? She is a stay-at-home mom (that I will call J) who used to watch four kids before the hurricane, but was forced to downsize to just one child when her and her family had to temporarily move into an apartment. Their lease is up at the end of this month, so we plan to go visit her new house and meet the woman in the flesh. Over the phone, she sounds extremely pleasant. We know the mother of the one child she still watches and she loves this babysitter. Plus, her son is turning out to be a great kid.

J has two kids of her own; a two year old and a five year old who is starting Kindergarden this fall. She only keeps one infant at a time, so we were fortunate to catch her before anyone else found her. I feel so great about this situation and I am yet to meet J in person. Another awesome aspect of this daycare provider is that English is her first language. Many of the teachers at the daycares we were looking at had Spanish as their first language. Don't get me wrong, I would love if my child grew up learning Spanish. Thing is, I still want him to learn English. Which will be hard if his teacher barely speaks a word of it herself.

We are not sure how long we will leave him in an at-home daycare. I know there will be other children there, but I like the idea of him being exposed to other children in his age group. Socialization with kids will help him grow, not to mention it will help build his immune system! (Although I'm not exactly looking forward to all those runny noses.)

I feel so much more comfortable about having the baby now. I feel like my biggest worry has already been solved (move over daycare worries, move in sleep deprivation worries). Unless of course we get to J's house and it is a nightmare. Cross your fingers for us!!