There’s a lot of great wisdom in here I’ve had to read and re-read a few times over. It is reassuring that I feel like I’ve at least got the core aspects down: love, love and more love 
Regardless, I won’t stop striving to be the best parent for my family and spouse! I really appreciate all of the wisdom and lessons from my fellow parents - thank you! 
@YnJvd24 I used to go to a special library about parenting, here in my local area. One time I read about the concept of “good enough” parenting, and that kids thrive as long as it is “good enough.” You may not relate to this, but as a counterbalance it might be helpful.
Kids have a drive to be who they are, and to be independent. Of course some have challenges that get in the way. Learning challenges, medical or psychiatric problems, poverty and nutrtion.
But in general, we parents can facilitate but some of it is also staying out of the way
I am sure your kid(s) are going to do fine and they will be lucky to have you.
So funny. I answered odd looks and questions about Montessori for years. I went in the 70’s before it was cool. Had a great experience but my sister hated it and was pulled out. It seems to have gone into revival mode in the 1990’s. Though some purists say there are real Mo tessori’s and ones with just the name.
I am new to this forum as well, and honestly am thankful I did not find it when my kids were in preschool! Neither my husband nor I went to boarding school, we both had a combination of Catholic and public schools. He was a horrible student, but very smart and even though he graduated with. 1.9 in HS, now has his PHD and is a college professor. A few of my family members went to ivys, years ago and my grandpa and an uncle went to a Military boarding school. But I honestly had no clue that this world existed. My daughter is a junior, and recently had a friend go to an elite school. Knowing her family was not one that could pay for boarding school, we started looking in to the option. We learned that some have massive endowments and financial aid so set about selecting a few and entered into the application process pretty blindly. Along the way she decided her chances were better if she applied as a repeat Junior. My kid has extremely high ACT and SAT scores on her first go with no fancy prep course, she is in the gifted program, takes 3 AP classes, has a few school clubs, but is extremely talented in the arts. She is a public school kid. We needed financial aid, and lots of it, she only applied to 3 schools, all of which are in the top 5 on most lists. And she was accepted to one of those with financial aid. So I would say the answer is no, you do not need to start planning in preschool. This was all driven by my child, my other child has no interest in boarding school. If I had known her chances, and how crazy obsessed people get, I probably would have discouraged her from applying .
My in-laws were educators and insisted on Montessori preschool for the grandkids as they believed the Montessori method instilled a love of learning in children. I don’t know whether the method cultivates a love of learning, but kids are naturally curious and the Montessori classroom fosters that curiosity. Where I lived in the late 90s, Montessori preschool was quite popular and the waitlist for the preschool program was nearly two years long. I’m forever grateful to my in-laws for that gift of early education. It was a warm, welcoming place that is still beloved by our family. Yes, now there are many self-described Montessori preschools cropping up everywhere.
My mother was an art teacher and was drawn to the creative side of the Montessori program. I think she realized that it didn’t force kids to learn rules and follow them when they were tiny.
I love that your parents gave it as a gift. I think it means more than anything else they could give their grandkids.
Things that can be done now, with your toddler, @YnJvd24:
Reading aloud with books: some at current age level - others (like fairy tales) at above age level. (This is extremely important bonding/language/literacy learning. It can be exhausting but is crucial.)
Gymnastics lessons for agility, flexibility, strength and coordination. Dance as well when your child ages into classes.
Art! Drawing, painting, collage… When older, the opportunity to take drawing classes. Drawing is a technical skill that can be learned at any age, but it’s easier to start gradually from childhood.
Language - very helpful to start young. I was educated in an immersion school, and had my kid do K up to Grade 4 in French school. Handwriting was taught, and the curriculum is rigorous and challenging.
If you cover language skills, physical development and art skills, your young child will have a huge advantage in terms of brain function, health and creativity. This will stand them in good stead for whatever their future path(s) may be.
Redacted as irrelevant (but I do agree with @arbitrary99, just to be clear)
In my humble opinion, you choose school to fit your kids, not fitting your kids to the chosen school.
I am not talking that neither good prep schools nor ivy league universities are necessities, although it could be true; but I wanted to remind that kids are not blank commodities that can be engineered to any shape. The discovering part is bigger than the designing/planning part for the parenting process.
It all depends on the child, my friend, not everyone likes to learn from childhood.
We have a saying in my native country when a kid/adult misbehaves – his/her first 7 years are missing. IMO, as a parent your job right now is not worrying about college but is making sure you don’t miss the first 7 (or 4, or 5) years to teach him essential skills that will serve them for life. Things like good eating habits – eating a healthy diet with plenty of cooked or raw vegetables, no sodas or much refined sugar, etc, social skills – saying good day and thank you, sharing their toys, resolving disputes with peers, listening, etc, good etiquette and hygiene – not slouching, eating with a knife and fork, brushing their teeth for 2 min. Once the window to make these habits their second nature closes, it’s an uphill battle to change them afterward.
In terms of character, the most important traits to develop in them are independence and grit. Independence can be taught from a very young age: feeding themselves, tying their shoes, riding a bike, going to the store by themselves, biking to school alone, baking, and on and on it goes. This is THE hardest thing to do as a parent – teaching your child to be independent, not hover, not trying to save them from making mistakes. Independence leads to self-esteem, responsibility, motivation. The other part of the coin is grit – to not quit when the things get harder. Yes, you need to pick an activity that your child enjoys but they need to stick with it beyond the trivial level. My daughter played piano since age 7 and ran cross country in HS. She is not naturally gifted in either activity. Until the age 10-12, I had to make her practice the piano (not like Amy Chua but still it is not pleasant). In HS she had so many activities that I asked her to stop the piano. She never did and eventually completed the Certificate of Merit program which is quite difficult. Now, my daughter NEVER quits. She would try and try again until she succeeds. She runs 30 miles per week.
There is so much wisdom here that there’s not much I can contribute. But one thing that I am trying to do each day is to tell my children to do their best, not be the best. There is a huge difference, obviously.
I view my role as a parent is to expose them to things we can and to help develop their moral/ethical compass. Their interests are their own, and nothing we as parents do can change that. Just do your best is all that I ask of them.
There are a few, but surprisingly few, posts in this thread that focus on this: SAVE MONEY NOW. Open up a 529 plan now and put what you can reasonably put in each month. It will make a huge difference when that time comes to shell out the cash for wherever they may go.
I’ll second that financial planning is really important. I thought that’s what this thread would be about - how to pay for college, not whether you need the right preschool, lol!
For OP: It’s also helpful to discuss college payment plans with family, as you never know who might be willing to help out. My mom opened up a 529 plan and saved $30,000 for the grandkids (which my nephew will use even though she meant to split it up; his family really needs it).
It doesn’t hurt to think outside the box, either. Do you have any resources or assets you can think about differently? My husband is retired from the military (USNA class of '92, MS from Tufts, but retired as a reservist), so even before we had kids we knew we’d have his GI Bill for our first child (who will start college in the fall of '23). However, we also knew he’d start receiving his pension at around age 58 (which is when our first will be a junior in college). Instead of counting on that pension money for our retirement, we saved for retirement as if we weren’t going to get it and instead earmarked that pension money for college - about $30,000 a year before taxes (and we’ll get that until he dies so it should cover kid #2 unless he doesn’t make it to age 64 or so, depending on how expensive the school ends up being). This plan meant living well below our means, but 16 years later we are incredibly happy with all that effort. I am really proud of my younger self for coming up with a plan that utilised our particular resources and for making those financial sacrifices.
Of course, living below our means was really hard for the first eight years when we lived in a house/neighborhood that was definitely below the socioeconomic level that we had imagined for ourselves (or could afford if we just spent every paycheck), and was definitely a step down compared to all of our friends. However, it kept us from losing money during all the housing downturns and even allowed us to be able to turn each of our first two houses into good rental properties. If my husband dies early and thus the retirement pay comes to an end with college bills coming due, I can sell those homes and still have all of our regular retirement funds to live on.
Obviously your options will be different, but thinking outside the box about your current financial situation now can really help down the road. What are you willing to sacrifice now to give your kids choices later? Do you have any current or future resources you can use or think about diferently (e.g. us chosing to think of the pension as college money rather than retirement money)? I didn’t know anything about rental properties when we considered turning our first home into a rental, but I knew I could use my evening time (after the kids went to bed) and the internet to educate myself. It wasn’t quick - probably four years from the time we first thought about it to when we actually did it - but totally worth it. Rentals may not be for you, but maybe there’s some other long-term financial opportunity out there that interests you that you can learn how to conquer.
Even if you just keep it simple and go with a 529 plan, start now. It’s unlikely you’ll regret it.
People from outside Massachusetts won’t know this, but given that the OP lives in Dover (along with other comments), I don’t think that saving money for college is a major concern for them.
LOL, true.
However there have been threads along the lines of: My father makes 1.2 M, but he pays alimony to 3 women, and there’s salaries for the maids and chauffeur, plus the upkeep on the Aspen chalet; can I get FA?
And my favorite- “we own a home but Atherton is super-pricey and we’re practically poor after paying real estate taxes, and it looks like the financial aid forms are asking for the value of the and the beach cottage. Should my parents transfer the deeds to the vacation property to my uncle?”
Perhaps, perhaps not.
We live in the Bay Area, where are there SO many Dover, MA around here. The cost of buying a “middle class” house here is so exorbitantly expensive that there are tons of folks that are house-rich and cash-poor.
Looking at the ridiculous full-pay “tippy top” schools needing $300k plus just for a BA at today’s rates, I think it’s wise for most folks to start a 529. I am not sure there are any downsides, and it really harnesses the time value of money for education costs that will get higher each year.
Now if I had a home in Atherton and a beach house to boot, I might be in a different boat altogether (probably a yacht)! 
Do what feels right for your family. It’s too early to ask your kids what they want but eventually they should get a say. My kids went to private Montessori 1-8 and then large public (mediocre) high school. They are happy and have at least a shot at elite colleges though they don’t all want that. We are glad we didn’t pay for private HSx3 and did other things with our money instead (save for college, travel, etc.) They are glad they didn’t go to private college and are instead meeting “normal” and socioeconomically diverse friends. Don’t make their entire childhood all about college goals.
This will be last comment on this, but it’s not comparable because Massachusetts is not nearly as expensive. In California, spending $2.3M gets you a nice starter home in a suburb with 2000 square feet and 3 bathrooms, on 0.13 acres of land. The equivalent home in a MA suburb would be less than $500k in a safe town with outstanding schools.
But if you want to spend $2.3M, you can get a home in Dover with 5300 square feet, 6 bathrooms, and almost 6 acres of land.
Excellent point. I thought about that after my post, but figured I’d leave my post since it might be good reading for others who come across this thread later and are not so financially fortunate.