Welcome to Viewpoints and I think you'll find many of the members here quite friendly and helpful.

I have three young children and found a few places invaluable for me:

• a church where I and my kids are comfortable
• the public library where I check out not only books but music CDs and books on CD--they often offer story time and other activitiesfor the kids and I often check out a cookbook, for example, before forking over any money
• the local SmartStart office--ours offers a toy library, where we can check out themed boxes of toys/puzzles/games/etc. The SmartStart in our county is free and available to anyone with a child under the age of 5. It is not need-based in our county, and they have many resources for parents, teachers, etc.
• a gym where they have free childcare for up to 2 hours/day
• a digital camera because as you said they do grow up way too fast

Once again, welcome and I hope you'll like it here!