Now that I’ve been a mom for two months, I know precisely two things: when it comes to kids, there are lots of opportunities to spend money and there are lots of opportunities to embarrass yourself. Take, for instance, the weekend I stood up in a wedding. I met the other bridesmaids at the nail salon. At the start of the session, the manicurist filled up the little glass bowl with water, took one look at my nails, and inquired about what appeared to be an old French tip on my nail. The only problem was the white she was seeing wasn’t actually old nail polish. It was dried diaper cream crusted under one nail from an hour before. Hashtag new mom don’t care…or something like that. And it turns out, trying to buy baby gear on the cheap can also lead to some shrugs and cringes.
Diaper Disasters
If I ever make a fortune for inventing something as seemingly useless as headphones that can be worn on a pregnant belly (they exist and they’re expensive!), it will be for diaper suspenders. Up until recently, HP was quite the pipsqueak. While his legs have filled out considerably, he still has the same caboose as his father. Which is to say he doesn’t have one. As a result, it’s been more than a little bit of trial and error to keep everything—errrrr—contained in his diapers.
I thought I had a winner. The brand sported a cute print and was still relatively eco-friendly for disposables. Unfortunately, they also resulted in a lot of laundry. But I wasn’t willing to give up. On day four of the diaper disasters, my mom tried to understand why I was still bothering with these diapers. I explained: “They’re filled with certified wood pulp. They’re chlorine free. They’re better for the environment. Plus I already bought four bags, and they’re not cheap!”
She promptly returned, “How good for the environment can they be if you have to do 17 loads of laundry a week because of them?” Touche, Mom. Touche.
My dad, sensing the other part of my diapering woes, offered, “I can save you a real buck. We’ve got a pile of wood chips out back that we don’t need. Find a cloth and get to stuffing.” Hardee har har.
A Diaper By Any Other Brand
After said diaper disaster, I moved on to another brand. More specifically, I moved on to every brand that I could get my hands on. This past weekend, we traveled north and brought a jumbo pack of diapers with us. My dad noticed it was a different brand. “Why’d you switch? No, wait. Don’t tell me. You had a coupon.”
To be fair, I had a coupon and an Ibotta rebate. What can I say? Sometimes people just have your number.
The Dresser Debacle
Months before our baby was born, my parents made it known that they wanted to gift us a new furniture set. I protested. I requested my old crib. I played the nostalgia card. I lost. (If you don’t already know, the grandparent card trumps everything.)
In an effort to maintain hold of my claim to frugal living, I selected one of the most inexpensive cribs that I could find at Buy Buy Baby. It was a simple white style that would fit nicely in the room. It was also dramatically cheaper than many of the other models.
After what can only be explained as a lesson in you get what you pay for, we had taken delivery on three different crib and dresser sets. The last dresser was damaged so badly during shipping that fault lines appeared whenever you opened the drawers. Not sure what I mean? Picture the seams in Jenga tiles. Buy Buy Baby was really apologetic again and sent over another delivery crew to pick up the damaged set again. One of the guys pulled no punches as he picked up the dresser: “I hope they don’t try to charge people too much for this. It really is a piece of $hit.”
So Tell Me…Any good frugal fails you’d like to share?
Awww daaamn, hahaha. These are some good ones. 🙂 I think my latest frugal fail was trying to make whey powder at home. I tried to reduce whey and then dehydrate it.
Yeah, it turned into a weird, burnt caramel thing.
Oops.
That is too funny!! There are a million ways to spend money with a baby. At first I was thinking cloth diapers but the laundry that it would produce would have made the cost savings and environmental help of cloth diapers negated.
I already do baby clothes 2-3 times per week due to the amount of clothes I have so I find I either save money on laundry by buying more clothes or save money on clothes by doing more laundry. Basically you can’t win.
Every so often in my development, we’re required to get the dryer vent cleaned and submit proof, which is important in preventing fires. I was caught in a moment of weakness when one company called me with a sounded-too-good-to-be-true price for cleaning all the vents in my home. Sure enough 5 minutes after they arrived they insisted there was mold in the furnace vent which they’d be happy to take care of for a not-so-small fortune. I know from my online research that this is usually a scam, so I told them just to do the cleaning when I probably should have sent them away. They did go to all the vents in the house with their machines and showed me there was a clog in the dryer vent (which I believe), but I have no idea if they really took care of the problem. I may end up having another company come check it out just to be sure.
Good luck with the diapers and the crib set.
Yes! Babies can come with so many gadgets. For example, Mr. FAF took our baby to an outdoor show. His friend offered a ride. We had to install the car seat in his car and take a stroller for Baby FAF. One tiny baby and two bulky items!
We were lucky to get crib, high chair, and assorted other hand-me-downs from my parents…aka the Baptist grandparent network. And we just kept using pampers, because that’s what they gave us at the hospital and they seemed to work just fine. And we spent so much money on premixed formula…it was ridiculous, but so much easier for us than powder. Do I second guess that decision? Heck no. When we were barely conscious, it was a lifesaver.
Where we skimped and shouldn’t have was the swing. I wanted to get one under $100, and did. But it didn’t have the motorized mobile that kept her entranced at the grandparent’s house, and she would barely tolerate the one at home.
Besides cloth diapering, none of the organic brands we used compared to Kirkland Costco diapers (comparable to Huggies) or Huggies. They just didn’t seem to absorb as much.
My in laws bought our oldest child’s entire nursery and at age 8 he is still using it. It was from Babies R Us so nothing crazy, but solid wood. It has some scratches but the conversion to a full bed worked for us (now we need bunks lol as he is the oldest of 5!)
We try to use coupons and Amazon prime and save where we can, but sometimes you get what you pay for. For furniture and shoes we tend to spend a bit more and just buy less often….I would rather have a good pricey pair of shoes for a much longer time than 4 cheap pairs, but that’s just me! And it’s less stuff to take care of 🙂
I have so many similar woes of instances where I tried to save money and failed. Too funny.
For what it’s worth (sorry, this is definitely unsolicited baby advice), I thought it was definitely worth it to get a new (to us) crib. I also was trying to get my old one from my parents, but newer ones are designed with safety features (like certain slat/spindle widths, etc. not to mention no drop sides) that aren’t on the older models. We are using my old crib mattress with Bean, though.