Babies First Christmas....Budget??

makingitpretty · November 2010

Hello ladies,

Just thinking about Christmas, and wondering what you plan to spend on your little ones' first Christmas. We have twins, but I just wanted to get a feel for how much you think is appropriate per child.

P.S. DH and I are having a differce of opinion and I'd love an unbiased opinion

Thanks in advance!

dunvilles · November 2010

$250

That is just because he has SO much already plus all of our friends/family will get him gifts and his birthday is 22 days after christmas.

Christmas

PBK anywhere sofa ($200)
Truck that DH picked out ($30)
Melissa & Doug puzzles ($20)

Birthday

Small table/chairs for play room ($80)
Clothes ($50)
Bookshelf from IKEA ($80)
Toy box ($60)

Que*Syrah · November 2010

I think the gifts he is getting total about $75. Then I'll do stocking stuffers as well but a lot of that will be fruit and candy so I'll probably spend about $20 on it.

JessLingle · November 2010

DH and I have differing opinions also. I think we will end up spending maybe 120ish with the stocking stuffers. I would buy LO everything that I saw and liked, but DH doesn't want to spend a boat load on toys that he won't be interested in that long. I am sure my MIL is gonna go bonkers anyway because LO is her only "real" grandchild.

MSUMamaof2 · November 2010

dunvilles:
$250

That is just because he has SO much already plus all of our friends/family will get him gifts and his birthday is 22 days after christmas.

Christmas

PBK anywhere sofa ($200)

Truck that DH picked out ($30)

Melissa & Doug puzzles ($20)
Birthday

Small table/chairs for play room ($80)

Clothes ($50)

Bookshelf from IKEA ($80)

Toy box ($60)

Not flaming, but are you actually justifying the fact that you're "only" spending $250?

OP, I'll be honest. I'm not buying a bunch of presents for Christmas until my LOs understand it a little better. They have so much stuff already. I've spent probably $100 between the two of them thus far and I'm close to done. More of the things this year are for my toddler as he's starting to understand Christmas and receiving presents.

I still don't have a birthday gift for Elijah (his birthday is in 2 weeks, party is next week) and I'm honestly not sure he'll be getting one. My house is over run with baby stuff. Eli has plenty of clothes that I recently bought for him, so I guess we could call that his "present."

SpartanGirl · November 2010

Being completely honest, we spent less than $30 for DD2's first Christmas last year. She was only 3 weeks old and the third child (i.e. we already own every toy known to man).

On a typical Christmas for each of the kids we spend under $100 (not counting DD1's birthday). Our goal is to stick close to $60 per kid though we do sometimes go over that.

dunvilles · November 2010

MSUMamaof2:
dunvilles:

$250

That is just because he has SO much already plus all of our friends/family will get him gifts and his birthday is 22 days after christmas.

Christmas

PBK anywhere sofa ($200)

Truck that DH picked out ($30)

Melissa & Doug puzzles ($20)
Birthday

Small table/chairs for play room ($80)

Clothes ($50)

Bookshelf from IKEA ($80)

Toy box ($60)

Not flaming, but are you actually justifying the fact that you're "only" spending $250?

OP, I'll be honest. I'm not buying a bunch of presents for Christmas until my LOs understand it a little better. They have so much stuff already. I've spent probably $100 between the two of them thus far and I'm close to done. More of the things this year are for my toddler as he's starting to understand Christmas and receiving presents.

I still don't have a birthday gift for Elijah (his birthday is in 2 weeks, party is next week) and I'm honestly not sure he'll be getting one. My house is over run with baby stuff. Eli has plenty of clothes that I recently bought for him, so I guess we could call that his "present."

I guess I didn't think that was much since I was reading about how ppl are spending $500 on the birthday party alone (favors, food, invitations & decor!) lol

We're turning our family room into DS's play room, so the couch, table/chair, booksheleves etc is for that room.

BrittKav · November 2010

Eh...we might be going a bit overboard, but we're spending $300-$400 on gifts and another $100 on Christmasy things for her (stocking, Christmas dress). For her first Christmas though, when she was 1 month old, we probably spent $50-$100.

elyshaswedding · November 2010

I don't have a set amount, but I won't go crazy. We are doing a joint "big" Santa gift for Lilah and Grady - a huge set of nice wooden blocks that costs about $75. Then each child will get one Santa gift that is around $30, plus stocking stuffers. Their only gift from Momma and Daddy is Christmas pjs. There are lots of grandparents who go a little overboard on gifts in our family, so I'll leave all the silly, toy-of-the-moment gifts up to them.

mefsta777 · November 2010

DDs birthday and christmas gift budget is $400. so, $200 per holiday. we set this budget to continue as she is older, as we feel it is sufficient for an older child/teen as well. GL!

PrincessShay80 · November 2010

I don't have a set amount- but so far I have spent about $250- and I still have a few things to buy, it will probably be around $350 when I'm all done. DD"s birthday is also on Xmas eve- so I am buying birthday and xmas presents, and will just divide them up.

daisy_dueller · November 2010

We're spending $200 on DS at Christmas, including stocking. His birthday is Chistmas Eve, though, and we're spending another $100 for that.

lvmomjbj · November 2010

Honestly, we are probably not going to be spending much. DD turns 1 about 2 weeks after Christmas and her paternal grandparents go waaaaaaaay out for Bdays and Christmas gifts so I'm sure she'll be pretty set as will my other kids. I still have Christmas gifts still in their original packaging from last year for my boys because they just don't play with anything other than hot wheels and trains. LOL.

PrincessShay80 · November 2010

MSUMamaof2:
dunvilles:

$250

That is just because he has SO much already plus all of our friends/family will get him gifts and his birthday is 22 days after christmas.

Christmas

PBK anywhere sofa ($200)

Truck that DH picked out ($30)

Melissa & Doug puzzles ($20)
Birthday

Small table/chairs for play room ($80)

Clothes ($50)

Bookshelf from IKEA ($80)

Toy box ($60)

Not flaming, but are you actually justifying the fact that you're "only" spending $250?

OP, I'll be honest. I'm not buying a bunch of presents for Christmas until my LOs understand it a little better. They have so much stuff already. I've spent probably $100 between the two of them thus far and I'm close to done. More of the things this year are for my toddler as he's starting to understand Christmas and receiving presents.

I still don't have a birthday gift for Elijah (his birthday is in 2 weeks, party is next week) and I'm honestly not sure he'll be getting one. My house is over run with baby stuff. Eli has plenty of clothes that I recently bought for him, so I guess we could call that his "present."

I don't think she is justifying howw much she is spending- I think she was trying to say that she got more furniture type things (bookshelf, sofa) and didnt spend a bunch of money on toys. Buying nice wooden furniture is going to cost more then a bunch of toys.

bakermommy10 · November 2010

I think i might try to stick to $100 for christmas and then 100 for bday (he's born 3 days after xmas). $100 for bday will include invitations, decor, and presents. We don't have a lot of money to go overboard, so we've been grabbing good deals as we see them. Not sure what he will get for bday and what for xmas. Both sides will be spoiling him rotten so we'll let them do that happily

lissah23 · November 2010

I'm not even going to respond with my amount because I'm sure I'll get flamed for the amount I plan to spend. If you have an issue with $250, you'll definately have an issue with what I'm going for.

jessloveschase08 · November 2010

To be completely honest we have spent a little over $300 for William's Christmas.

Krisann79 · November 2010

lissah23:
I'm not even going to respond with my amount because I'm sure I'll get flamed for the amount I plan to spend. If you have an issue with $250, you'll definately have an issue with what I'm going for.

I'm on your side. Honestly if I spent way more than that I wouldn't care if I got flamed for it. It's our money. We can spend it how we please. PERIOD

Confused

ESD_0707 · November 2010

Originally I thought we would spend about 50 dollars for Christmas and 50 for birthday.

In reality, we've overspent (big surprise). For her birthday, we spent about 70 on toys and books.

For Christmas, we are doing well so far. We have only spent about 15 dollars on one toy.

We don't count clothes as gifts, though, and she has SO MUCH that we've bought her.

I keep thinking though, we should save our money now when she doesn't care about gifts. When she's a teen, I'll need more money I'm sure! haha1

Katalen72 · November 2010

Between Hanukkah and Christmas, DH and I will spend on Drew's combined holidays about $350ish....but its our money and our kid and we will spend how we see fit. Wink

arte79 · November 2010

I have not budgeted anything. I may buy a couple of toys to be opened on Christmas. So it may end up less than $50, maybe even less than $20. That said, we don't wait for special events to buy things we want/need for our LO. I'm sure some of the people at "The Nest" would give me a sideeye if they see that I'm not spending more than $50. LOL.

Sizzline · November 2010

We will probably spend $100-$150. I'm sure, as she gets older, we'll up that by quite a bit, but at this age, she doesn't care what she gets. I'm also sure that she's going to get a ton of stuff at her birthday party, which is a month before Christmas, and that her grandparents are going to go bonkers buying her stuff for the holidays as well.

That being said, I suck at sticking to a budget for this kid, so that amount may go right out the window, and I may wind up spending a flame-worthy amount.

Shannonlea · November 2010

I spent $125 between the two of them for Christmas and their birthday (which is a week before) My family is already planning to buy them tons of stuff including Land of Nod chairs and toy boxes so I stuck with the stuff I really wanted them to have. Last year, I almost forgot it was Christmas because I was so tired with two babies. We did not spend anything on them

yani · November 2010

So far I have spent about $150 on toys and we still have a few items left to get. I don't mind splurging on his 1st Christmas since he does not have too many toys right now.

MSUMamaof2 · November 2010

Krisann79:
lissah23:
I'm not even going to respond with my amount because I'm sure I'll get flamed for the amount I plan to spend. If you have an issue with $250, you'll definately have an issue with what I'm going for.

I'm on your side. Honestly if I spent way more than that I wouldn't care if I got flamed for it. It's our money. We can spend it how we please. PERIOD

FTR, I made sure to tell that PP that I wasn't flaming her.....just telling her she didn't need to justify the fact that she was "only" spending $250. I was telling her I thought $250 is plenty. Feel free to spend more than that or less than that. I don't give a rat's behind how you spend your money. As long as your Christmas is wonderful and you have a good time with your LOs, that's all I care about.

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