I would be lying if I said that having children is not expensive. It is. And there are many things that are involved. One thing people don’t talk about much is formula. If you are a formula feeder like we are, formula can range anywhere from 15$ per can to over 30$. And with that being said, ready to feed and concentrates are even more money. Forget diapers too, they are about 30$ a box depending where you are and what box you are getting. One thing though is to remember as you read this I am Canadian and I am sure that things are going to be more money than other countries or vice versa and cheaper than other ones too.
One big thing when it comes to deciding you want to have multiple children, and something that is huge when it comes to saving money is by saving things from one child to the next. Clothes in particular. For my family, we are currently pregnant with our 3rd boy. We had been given a lot of clothes in the process of having out first to the point that we kept a lot of things. WE received a lot of boys clothes which was no problem. That being said, whenever we had to buy a few things we always made sure that it was actually a neutral color. That was a huge help too. There is absolutely no reason why you need to be buying new clothes each child. Obviously things happen and maybe you were not planning for another child, there is great second hand stores that you are still able to get cheaper clothes than brand new off the rack.
Bulk buying has been a nice too. This is more so when you are preparing to do solids. Chances are you have one child already eating solids and starting a second one can be a bit of a financial burden even if they don’t eat a lot. One thing that is important to remember is that when you buy the jars of food, that is more money in the long run then when you are going to make homemade baby food. I actually talk more details about the pros and cons of store bought baby food and homemade baby food here. It doesn’t have to be hard to make baby food at home and at the end of the day it is far better nutritionally! We would buy bulk packs of meats, like chicken the 12 back of chicken breasts, sausages the same, and we split them up into freezer bags and take them out as we need them. It helps to limit waste because you are only cooking what would be used and eaten.
I dont know if you are someone who needs to hear this, I know I was and it still doesn’t matter. Toys slowly take over a lot. But let me be the first to say, YOUR CHILD DOES NOT NEED A MILLION TOYS. I say this because it is true. At the end of the day they literally will have more fun with the boxes that they came in and will enjoy that a lot more than they would the toys themselves. We have so many toys over the years here that we actually hide some and bring them out in different times of the year. That way they seem to be new. There is so many things that money can be spent on do not make toys one of those things. Is it hard? Yeah it is. I know when I go out I am always thinking of things to get my kids because I know they would enjoy it knowing they will toss it aside as soon as the new toy appeal wears off. Save yourself money, and don’t buy this stuff for them when they have a lot already.
Second hand though, is a great way to buy the bigger ticket items that you know your kids may enjoy. Think toys like the cars they sit in and push with their feed, jumpers, play sets like kitchens and tool benches. All of those things are a great thing to have because at the end of the day people want to sell them for cheap and get rid of them from their own homes. If you check market places or second hand spots you are still able to get these without spending all of the money you think you should be spending. Sometimes people buy things and their children have little to no interest in them so they literally try to sell if and you can get it pretty cheap. Personally we don’t normally go this route I use my crafting business in order to try to fund these little extras and that is a huge help also too.
And lastly, create memories. I know this seems to be a no brainer but its not. At the end of the day your kids would be happy with play dough that you make with flour, salt, and water. You do not need to spend money on fancy sets and things. The internet has a wealth of information our there for different activities that you can find for your kids. Think of the vinegar and baking soda volcano. How much fun did you have mixing that and watching the bubbles and foam and see how it looked. These are the things that they will keep talking about, not the things that you spent money on and items you bought for them to play with.
If you know that you play on having other kids, like we did for example, save things. Having kids is expensive. But now that we are on number 3, we have all of the bigger items still that we have saved to used for the 3rd one. We are able to just spend money on things like diapers, and formula because you can’t save those things. However 95% of the things that we have we are able to use and at the final baby grows out of things we will for sure be paying it forward cheap for people to have the same experience raising kids that we did!