Day care waitlists

Yes!!! Definitely. I put my unborn unnamed child on wait lists. Takes about a year to hear back.

It would be best to wait until you know where in the city you’ll be moving too. You would want to find a daycare or dayhome within your community ideally. Once you know that, then it would be good to start reaching out to them to find out their availability

Thank you ❤️ we've been researching for maybe 6 months. We have a friend in (i think) North West Calgary who we will stay with for a short time but i think we'll end up settling in Cochrane but work in the city.

Cross fingers we'll both find jobs otherwise it'll just be a holiday for a few months eeek!

I imagine we will probably have to pay for a private childminder until we reach the end of a waitlist for day care 😬

Like Meg said, it depends and there is a lot of great dayhomes with availability if that's the route you want to go with (we love your dayhome).

But if you want some specific daycare centers, some can have some very long lines (I put my daughter's name on a list when a few months pregnant and never heard back. She's now almost 2. Many prioritize children who have siblings already in the program).

If you have some top choice daycare centers or even dayhomes in areas you are seriously considering, you could go on a waitlist (they often cost money to join the waitlist but you can always decline if you are offered a spot you no longer want)