(no subject)

[ocelot]

Yesterday, I saw this list posted somewhere:

The average cost of preparing for a baby
Crib, mattress, dresser, rocker $1,500
Bedding/Decor $ 300
Baby Clothes $ 500
Disposable Diapers $ 600
Maternity/Nursing Clothes $1,200
Nursery items, high chair, toys $ 400
Baby Food/Formula $ 900
Stroller, Car Seat, Carrier $ 300
Miscellaneous $ 500
Total $ 6,200

WTF? That's the *average* price? If I had to buy all this stuff new, I could probably get it under $2000 (decent enough quality to be safe and attractive, but not necessarily top of the line), and how many people actually buy all of it, let alone new?

I'm not sure which is more disturbing - that "average" means that quite a lot of people spend more than this, or that so many people believe that all this stuff (and spending this much on it) is truly necessary.

The list was attached to a comment basically trying to convince a 14 year old that she couldn't afford to be a mother. Stupid, really. The list is WAY too easy to pick apart, and it draws the focus to the exaggerations, not to the real issues involved in a 14 year old becoming a parent.

We head back up to lala land in a few hours. I am filled with various vague discontents.

Comments

[gdmusumeci.livejournal.com]

You know, you could cut $1500 off that figure by breastfeeding and using cloth diapers.

That's all I'm gonna say. :-)

[cymrullewes.livejournal.com]

using cloth diapers.

You're forgetting the cost of washing those cloth diapers.

[mayna.livejournal.com]

Negligeable. Babies create a massive amount of laundry anyway. We do a load every day of burp cloths, clothes that got spit up on, receiving blankets that were grabbed for emergency spit up clean up, toddler shirts that got food on them, toddler pants that got wet from playing in the dog dish water, wash cloths from washing off cruddy toddler hands (from dinner/snacks/etc). Not to mention the clothing that gets poopy from poop escaping when my baby wears disposables. I wash everything together, every day, since there's plenty of body fluids on their laundry anyway, and only about half of that is diapers.

And cloth diapered babies potty train sooner. My toddler just turned 2, and she's been half-potty trained since 16 mos, and all the way trained since last week. She'd go through on average 3 pairs of cloth training pants per day (changed right when she went), and now she stays dry so is in panties. It's not just a girl thing either, my babysitter's son has been in underwear with only a rare accident since 19 mos.

[cymrullewes.livejournal.com]

I suppose I must have been extremely lucky with my three daughters. Never used burp clothes because they never spat back. When they started walking I took away their diapers and let them go naked and they potty trained by 18 months.

When I used cloth diapers I did them separately because I always bleached them and used hot water/hot rinse water. The cost is on par with using disposables.

[mayna.livejournal.com]

$40-$50/mo to wash diapers? gas/electricity and water must be really expensive where you live. That kind of wash routine will kill your diapers, the bleach eats away at the fibers and the hot/hot does too. (I'm allergic to bleach too and don't use it on ANYTHING. My husband uses it on mildew in the shower once in a blue moon, does it right before we leave for a weekend for it to air out, rinses the shower thoroughly when we get back, and I still break out from it).

People with $15 cloth diapers don't dare do stuff to threaten their longevity and resale value. ;-) I'm right now using all the diapers on my son that I used on my daughter, and they're still in pretty good condition. They'll be packed away for baby #3 if we decide to have a 3rd.

That's obscene...

[tangodiva.livejournal.com]

We got a LOT of second hand stuff, but still those numbers are ridiculous...

Crib, mattress, dresser, rocker $1,500 $0 - I may let him have his own room when he's 5 ;-)
Bedding/Decor $ 300 $0 heh, not.
Baby Clothes $ 500 $200 I spent a lot here because of the Animal costume fetish.
DisposableCloth Diapers $ 600 $300 (the disposable number seemed a little low to me...)
Maternity/Nursing Clothes $1,200 $300 and that is only because I had two weddings to go to and had to buy new shoes.
Nursery items, high chair, toys $ 400 probably closer to $100
Baby Food/Formula $ 900 $50 breastpump/bottles $50
Stroller, Car Seat, Carrier $ 300 $200 (homemade sling... but I bought an expensive backpack carrier)
Miscellaneous $ 500 (we'll leave this in because I am sure I forgot things - plus things like extra washing for dipes, extra take out, etc.)

grand total $1700... I wonder where they got their numbers

Re: That's obscene...

[silkensteel.livejournal.com]

Nearly forgot about the nursing bras. Never skimp on those. You don't want those cheap plastic tit clips popping if you're "blessed" by the Milk Explosion Fairy.

I never bought any "nursing" shirts. I can see if someone's small enough in the breastline to need those, but mine were big enough that I could sit comfortably, have a baby's face tucked under the shirt, and just nurse. Once I had a sling, I could stroll in the mall and nurse. (sort of like walking and chewing gum.)

[silkensteel.livejournal.com]

I think I spent 1/10 or 1/20 of that. Bought everything used, mostly from thrift shops; I spent the most on the crib - a decent, sort of generic Jenny Lind style crib is what I spent the most on.

Infant car-seat carrier I bought had a good sturdy frame, it was cheap because the padding was torn up and stained. I used a polyfill sort of fire-retardant-treated christmas tree skirt (checked MSDS on the retardant used, for safety in contact with kids) to thicken and reconstruct the padding, and a nifty geometric designed cotton with bright colors and stuff, using the old cover cloth as a pattern. (Yeah, ignore my protestations, I *can* sew when properly motivated.)

Bedding, onesies, jammies, I bought at Salv. Army and St. Vince thrift shops.

The only thing I bought new were the cloth diapers and diaper covers, which were either pretty crappy or really, really expensive in the early 90's.

I gotta ask - WTF is "decor?" :) When Debbie was born, the "nursery" was a room with boxes and the crib, and a comfy chair for nursing. The comfy chair was from an office surplus shop.

Oh, I had some weird bright Disney wall decorations, I got those free from the lady who sold me the very good crib-sized inner spring mattress for... what was it? $10? $20? Something like that.

Man. That's just funny. Six grand for fitting out a newborn? Quick, someone tell the people overseas. They're so deprived.

[mayna.livejournal.com]

$600 in disposables is like 60 packages of disposable diapers... that's MAYBE a year's worth. So "preparing" for the baby? You'd only need a couple of packages, but be prepared to buy it constantly. They'd need more packages than that to go through potty training since they tend to potty train around 3!