When my husband and I had our first child, we were broke. I had only been at my job for three years, so my income was low, and I had student loans to pay off. My husband was in graduate school, so we were paying college tuition. Oh, to make our finances even better, we lived in the suburbs of Chicago and paid a lot for our (run-down) apartment. I scoured the internet for ways to save on baby expenses, but some traditional advice was not helpful. Here’s why.
Two Recommendations to Save on Baby Expenses That Are Bad Advice
Ask for Diapers at the Baby Shower
Yes, diapers are expensive, so I was delighted when many people gifted me with them at my baby shower. The problem? I ran into two issues:
Babies Come in All Sizes
Many well-meaning people bought me the smallest size diapers available. I had many packs, but my first baby weighed almost 10 pounds at birth and fit in the tiny diapers for a few weeks before he outgrew them. When he moved up to the next size, I had tiny diapers I couldn’t use.
In addition, because of his body shape, Pampers fit him better than Huggies. You won’t realize what diaper fits best until the baby is born, and you may have many of the other type of diaper.
Babies React to Certain Diapers
Thinking we learned from our first child, we stocked up on sale-priced Pampers before the birth of our second child. However, our second child had chubby legs, so Huggies fit her better. In addition, she got a rash from some other brands of diapers, so she could only wear Huggies.
Find Out the Sex of the Baby Before the Shower
If you find out the sex of the baby before the shower, you may ask for gender-specific items. If you’re having a girl, you might register for the pink car seat and baby stroller. Even if you don’t ask for clothes, your guests will be unable to resist buying adorable pink baby clothes.
However, having gender-specific items can be problematic if money might still be tight when baby number two comes. You likely won’t want to dress your little boy in his older sister’s pink rompers or push him around in a pink stroller.
If you anticipate you’ll need to be frugal as you have more children, gender-neutral purchases are the way to go.
We didn’t know we were having a boy before our shower. (He kept his legs crossed during the ultrasound, so the technician couldn’t determine his sex.) That was for the best because we received gender-neutral items we used for all three of our children. Not having to buy new things for a baby of the opposite sex as our first saved us hundreds of dollars.
Final Thoughts
Having a baby is more expensive than most people think. You may think that stocking up on diapers beforehand is a smart idea. Likewise, you may want to have gender-specific items for your precious newborn. However, in our experience, doing both of these things is a bad idea.
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Melissa is a freelance writer and virtual assistant. She earned her Master’s from Southern Illinois University, and her Bachelor’s in English from the University of Michigan. When she’s not working, you can find her homeschooling her kids, reading a good book, or cooking.
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