Sometimes a compromise can be made, depending, of course, on the reasons someone is reluctant to have a third. Lynn Smith, a mother of three from Houston, Texas, had mentioned to her husband routinely that she wanted a third. His response was always that he was worried about paying for college for three, plus everything else that comes along with raising a child.

"Then one night, he told me that if we waited a year so we could pay off our credit card debt, he was in," Smith says. "I was estactic, and agreed. One year would fly by."

What do they say about the best laid plans? Two weeks later, Smith and her husband found out that sometimes things happen when they want to happen. "I found out about two weeks later that I was pregnant," she says. "We did pay off the credit card debt; I just did it while my waistline grew."

Nine months later a little girl joined the Smith family. "I like to joke with my daughter that she wasn't an accident – she was just early!"