Splurge or Save? Baby items, Part 2
Disclaimer: I am not being compensated by any of the companies whose products are listed in this post. These are my opinions after 1 year of raising P.
On my last post, I wrote about baby items that you should splurge on and we also discussed how spending more money on daily use items is pretty reasonable when you calculate price vs. times of use. In this post, I’ll be discussing items that you should save on, that you either probably won’t need or won’t use often enough.
Save!
Clothes. Having a baby girl is sooo tempting because baby girl clothes are so cute! However you’ll be surprised by how little each item of clothing gets worn. No need to spend money on quality clothing because each piece will incur very little wear and tear. If you have offers of secondhand clothes, take them up on it! J and I are lucky to belong to a church where the mothers pass their clothes onto other moms. Most of the clothes are in good condition when I receive them. If not, set up a wish list for friends and family who want to purchase gifts for your baby, shop sales /clearance, and look in discount stores like Marshall’s or Target.
Naked babies are cuter anyway.
Toys. We got a secondhand baby swing and baby bouncer when P was born which we gladly accepted instead of purchasing brand new ones. So thankful that we ended up doing this! P ended up hating both of them and we ended up passing them onto to someone else. We also got an exersaucer from friends and a jumperoo. She eventually got bored of the exersaucer and she’ll only be using the jumperoo for a couple more weeks, I think. Many baby toys have a very short lifespan and babies grow out of them quickly. Find items secondhand, borrow one or request it as a gift. Babies also have a knack for loving things that aren’t toys, like remote controls, plastic tableware, wooden spoons, scarves, etc. I have a baskets around the house full of baby-safe but interesting non-toys that P likes to play with. I rotate the items from basket to basket to keep things interesting.
Who needs toys when you can play with random junk?
Books. This is a controversial topic for me. I love gifting P books since she loves flipping through them and I’m a former teacher! But books also have a short lifespan and babies love variety. I’ve purchased books for P but either on sale, at a discount store like Marshalls, secondhand at a garage sale or consignment store or we’ve gotten some as gifts. We also visit our local library to add variety and to foster P’s love of the library.
Excuse me, I’m reading.
Highchair. Fancy highchairs like the Stokke or the Boon high chair are totally droolworthy. However it’s a bit out of my budget so we received a portable booster chair from Fisher Price. Love this purchase. It’s lightweight, portable, adjusts for different heights and P loves it. My parents ended up purchasing the padded, more expensive one from Fisher Price when we were visiting them and they had to return it because P really preferred her simpler one.
Daddy, I have simpler tastes…for now.
Diaper bag. This is a very personal choice but after a lot of hemming and hawing for months, we decided to retire our awesome Skip Hop Duo Deluxe diaper bag in favor of a simple backpack. The shoulder strap kept slipping off our shoulders when we wore it on one shoulder. When we wore it crossbody and bent down to pick P up, it would almost swing down into her face. Even though the diaper bag was pretty roomy, our smaller backpack seems to fit more things into it. Another major bonus is that J is more willing to wear the backpack instead of carrying the old diaper bag. Score for me! Diaper bags do have some nifty features but I would definitely try repurposing a bag that you already have before buying a diaper bag. However, if there's a diaper bag that you love, love, love, who am I get in the way of your handbag love?
That’s the end of my Splurge and Save 2 part series. Did I miss any items that are also save items?
