how much are we spending on our kids?

Dorastar

phunkles wrote: »

I dont have kids - But I do make a lovely spreadsheet every year which I update when I buy gifts for my family/friends/oh.Nice Actual price paid and original price columns which allows me to see that this year for example on my oh I have spend £109 actual in money and the real value of his gifts is near enough double that at £199
Helps me make sure I dont go over budget as well - have seperate worksheets for different family member and friends - with budget and some nice formulas in there As well as colour coding fonts for gift ideas and hinted gifts from people

Blimey that is organised! Not sure I could cope with doing that. Have already got ds a huge 'new-to-us' playmobil police station with loads of accessories for DS. Think we plan to spend a maximum of £100 on each child but DD has just announced that she would like to go and see Take That next year so we might have to shuffle some money to get her a ticket (and mummy will have to go too lol)

carlamarie_2

we spend about £200 each on our two.
plus stockings (about £5 each) and xmas eve hamper (about £20ish altogether)
i like to spend as near to the budget with roughly the same sized piles of presents. they are only a year apart in age and are young so they would notice if one has a huge pile an dthe other doesnt.
ds's main present is a bike this year which was £90 so when i have been buying toys in 3for2s i have wrote the free toy on his budget so that they get the same money and amount of toys, iykwim?!

upsy-daisy_3

I only have 1 daughter and shes 2. She will have about £300 spent altogether. That includes the stocking presents/selection box and christmas eve hamper x

zippybungle

I have no idea how much I have spent so far on my 3 Kids.
I do buy things all year round, but am not organised like a lot of you on here, I have no spreadsheets . I am not even sure where it all is :eek: some in the loft, some in the garage, some in my wardrobe........

I try not to pay full price for anything, got lots of bits and bobs from Home Bargains, B&M Bargains, Boots 3for2, Argos 3for2, Tesco Double Up (which is supposed to be happening again soon ) and will hopefully get a few bits from the Sainsburys half price toys event on Thurs.

My Kids are at an age where they still don't really appreciate the value of a toy that cost £1 or £100, so I don't always spend the same amount on them, just make sure that it looks like they have all got a simular amount of prezzies to open. They like lots of little things to open.

Zippy x

themull1

rinroo wrote: »

Aww your daughter sounds really thoughtful and selfless

Thank you, she is very thoughtful. She's only 11, going on 20!! i have a little notebook that i write in each present as i buy it, then when i get the presents out later to wrap, i cross it off the list, so i don't forget anything.!

xtina1_2

Wow you are all so organised.

I did my first of christmas shopping this weekend for my only daughter (22 months).

She didnt understand christmas or presents last year so wanted to make this year very "christmassy" (even though she still doesnt fully understand)

We got her:
lights and sound washing machine
Zingzillas talking toy
Peppa pig talking Peppa
Wooden beads activity cube (big one with twisted wires to move beads around)
Keyboard
Magna doodle
Minnie mouse teddy
Peppa pig alarm clock

Still to get:
Play Kitchen
Cleaning set (vac, brush, mop & bucket)
Few bits of clothing and shoes
and stocking fillers

All in all i'll probably end up spending £200 - £250 on her this year

I dont have mounds of disposable cash but Christmas is the one time of the year i'd give up toilet roll and toothpaste to make it special for my baby! I've started reasonably early so hopefully that wont be the case:rotfl:

Rosanna79

Like Phunkles we don't have kids but thoroughly enjoy plotting and planning the next surprise for my cousin's three sons- twins aged 7 and an older boy aged 9. Their dad married so late that they never knew their paternal grandparents. In fact they're very short on relatives and our surprises each year seem to go down very well.

We usually buy a container of some sort, often from TK Maxx and then scour the shops for bargains which are individually wrapped. Last Christmas this was a treasure chest.

For their birthdays it was a model HGV lorry for each boy with his name on carrying a cargo of 50 p pieces! They really liked that one- £15 each..... !

We take most of the year for ideas to come together. These children are such delightful kids and are being brought up with very good values. None of the 'Gimme Gimme' culture one so often sees these days. I love them to bits and hope we can keep some sort of magic about Christmas for a few years yet.

My husband says that they'll soon be too old for this and it does seem that children grow up far more quickly these days. We don't really have a fixed sum for their presents but it must be quite difficult for parents these days with the very materialistic society we live in. I'd say whilst wanting to ensure one's children don't grow up to be greedy, grasping brats it's still natural to want to give them the best Christmas one can afford? Surely that's what our parents did when we were kids?

Did anyone see the BBC morning programme today where there was an item on this very subject? I didn't catch the lady's name but she seemed to have a ? website called spendabitsaveabit or some such. She advocated talking , even to very young children about what they really really want and the cost of things.... How practical would parents find this I wonder.

Here's hoping you all have a great time with your kids this season and for those of us who're spoiling other relative's children....isn't that one of the pleasures of being a relative?

nicolefrenzy

This year so far

DS (8 yr old)
ipod touch £150
BMX he wants one for £480 i say NO WAY BOYO so will be £190
rip stick skateboard £50
big traks car £35
and probably another £100 on other bits and pieces

DS (5 yr old)
nintendo wii £160 (won this so cost was free)
4 wii games £40
spongebob cd player £30
board game £5
scooby doo play set £20 (won £20 amazon so this was free)
lego train set £110
and probably another £100

DS (aged 3)
cant remember what i have bought cause his is all wrapped up in my cupboard lol probably spent £150 so far on him

and omg just added the total but i started shopping in may lol.When i look back at the list it looks like my boys are spoilt rotten and yes i do spoil them at xmas because i dont spoil through the year.They dont get pocket money and normally get £20 for birthdays and i also order the park vouchers so tend to spend more than i budget for and i love xmas so do start early

SugarSpun

I'm another with a lovely spreadsheet keeping track of everything. I spent just under £250 in total on all the gifts, including husband, parents, brother, daughter, two nephews, one niece and four good friends.

My daughter's gifts were £45ish in total, she's getting a music set (£30, paid for with Amazon vouchers), a ball pit tent thing (£5) and some bits for her stocking (about £8-10 total). She'll be 16 months old and have no idea what's happening, last year we gave her a Learn and Groove (£5 ebay) and all our wrapping paper and she was the happiest baby I've ever seen.

themull1

when my brother was a baby he sat in a large cardboard box at christmas and bashed it with a little plastic hammer, couldn't get him out.!!