Grow With Your Child

As parents, we know that frugality is not a word that we can thoroughly engage with during the first few years of our child’s life. There is always something that will need to be purchased, no matter how hard we try and save on our money and cut back our spending. Once our children are finished with one thing, they’re straight on to another; it’s unfortunately just the way that life works.

There are things that we will just need to keep replacing until our children hit teenage years or until they outgrow the need for them. But what are these things, and how much do we need to set aside for them as they grow?

Beds

Moses baskets, cribs, cots, co-sleepers – whatever you have and whatever you are using right now, it will eventually need updating. Moses baskets typically last up to 5 or 6 months depending on how big your baby is, and they can then be transferred to a cot. Or you could cut out the moses basket/crib and go straight to the standard baby cot.

It is recommended that your child sleeps in the same room with you until they are at least 6 months old to prevent the risk of SIDS, and so you may find it is easier to have a smaller sleep space for them until they go into their own bedroom. The good thing to know is that once they are in their cot they can stay in there for a couple of years, until they outgrow it and will need either a toddler bed or a single bed.

Stores are cottoning on that it’s becoming tedious to keep replacing beds, so many like IKEA are offering extendable beds to solve the problem of constant replacement. This can cost anything from a couple of hundred across the years to thousands depending on how much you want to spend on a good night’s sleep.

Car Seats

The good thing to know about car seats is that eventually, your child will not need them. The other thing worth noting is that you can get car seats that are set in stages once they are out of the car seat that they have used from birth. Check to see which is the right one for you and your child by taking down details of how tall they need to be and how much they need to weigh to go into a particular seat – always assess the safety first.

You can look online for baby seats reviews to see what suits your budget and your lifestyle. They come in all shapes and sizes nowadays, offering everything from ease of access to get your child out of the car to reclining seats for those kids who can’t help but doze off on a short journey.

Clothes

This is the most obvious, but at least when you get to a certain point in teenage years you won’t need to keep buying for size – only to keep up with the latest trends that are cropping up. This is one thing you can be frugal on, and asking friends and family for hand me downs should not be frowned upon; where else are the clothes going to go and what else are they going to be doing? It’s better that they’re put to good use!