For those of you who are planning to have more children (or those who haven't made your minds up yet), what are y'all doing with the infant gear you've grown out of (like travel systems, high chairs, jumperoos, etc.)?
We have a very small condo with very limited storage, so right now all that stuff is stacked in the corner of the nursery, and I am sick of tripping over it. I feel wasteful getting rid of the stuff then having to re-buy, but I don't know how much longer I can tolerate looking at it. I'm curious what everyone else has decided to do.



Re: Infant Gear - Keep or sell?
All hazel's baby stuff has been hanging out in my moms attic. Most of it was hand me downs, except for the travel system. I'm going to trade in the bigger hand me down items at BRU since they are pretty beat up now.
I saved all hazels clothes. I'll be pretty heartbroken if I don't get to use them again. They are all so beautiful. I think I will have a really hard time parting with them if #2 is a boy, but we are probably done at 2. I see myself saving them to maybe give to a friend. They're too pretty to just get shipped off to consignment for a quarter of what they're worth.
We have it squirreled away in about every closet in our house. We do have an attic, but it's not climate controlled and our temps get over 100 in there pretty regularly.
If we didn't have decent closet space upstairs I'd prioritize what big items we kept - the snap-n-go stroller frame, the infant seat (assuming it won't expire), the exersaucer (I could fit the parts under our bed if needed), and the pack-n-play. I'd keep a few infant toys and just a smattering of clothes. Those will be the little things that people will have fun buying and gifting to #2.
BFP #2 5/27/12. EDD 2/1/13. m/c and D&C 6/21/12.
@lrn - I'm glad I'm not the only one thinking of selling. That's awesome that you regained so much of the value of the items. If you don't mind me asking, did you sell them all through a consignment or resale store or did you craigslist any of them?
My mom's house is even smaller than ours, so there is no way she'd let us store stuff there. If anything, I think she's looking to send more stuff from her house to ours. LOL
@missmuffin - I understand about the clothes. I was re-boxing DS' baby clothes this weekend to get more organized, and some of the little tiny outfits were so cute, I was thinking, I am going to be so sad if I never get to use these again.... If I have a girl, she might just have to get used to wearing some rocket ships and puppy dogs! LOL!
I'm fine with waiting til then to get rid of it but I haven't starte my battle yet of getting a new seat if we have a girl lol
I sell clothes (C's and my own maternity stuff) at a local consignment shop. I get 40% of what they sell and they stay on the floor for 3 months. (This store doesn't take gear but many do.) I usually book that appointment after one particularly large (weekend-long) consignment sale where I sell clothes and baby gear. Some consignment sales are run by large companies (Rhea Lana is an example) while others by non-profit orgs. I prefer the non-profits personally b/c I like knowing that their percentage goes for a good purpose. Let me know if you have any questions! There's a couple other moms (pitterpatter, I know) that are big consigners too. As for the resale stores (like Once Upon a Child), you can sell fast b/c they'll buy most of your stuff from you but the amount you get is pretty low. Craigslist is a really good option for larger baby gear and furniture, but I like being able to take all of the pieces to one place (the consignment sale).
Thanks for all the info. I figured CL would net more money, but also be a lot more work. I'll have to see what DH says once we decide what we're getting rid of.
It's all in the basement. H thinks we are having another child, so he refuses to let me sell/donate, which I think is dumb. Even if we did have another it would be at least another almost 2 years before it could theoretically happen and by then, the car seat will have expired I think, I'm sure there will be better models of swings and such so someone else could have gotten use out of ours while they were still "new" and B hardly even touched most of the stuff since any device meant to calm or entertain an infant was met with scorn and increased screaming.
I have 14 full tubs of clothing. It makes me want to scream looking at it rotting in the basement.
At least he finally agreed to let me give away the toys she has outgrown to our nephew who is 13 months younger, it works out well, but the time she has outgrown something, he's just getting to the right age for it!
BFP #2 4/13/10. Bridget born 12/28/10
BFP #3 Finn born 8/11/15
[url=http://www.thebump.com/?utm_source=ticker&utm_medium=UBB&utm_campaign=tickers][img]http://global.thebump.com/tickers/tt1cb8c4.aspx[/img][/url]
Our house isn't teeny, but I hate having clutter around. We kept the essentials in the attic. How I decided what to keep/get rid of - replacement cost & sentimental attachment. The cost to replace the car seat & 2 bases, stroller, swing, play mat, etc. made me keep most of those things. Anything that I wasn't sure that I loved or wanted to reuse? Donated it. The only thing I kept that I wasn't 100% on was our swing. It was a hand-me-down, and might not make it or the kid could hate it. I wanted an option though, and we can get a better different one at any time.
P's clothes I kind of weeded through as she outgrew them. Once I found out boy on this baby, I sorted out what we could re-use & what to get rid of. I swapped clothes with EMO-mama, I am sending several boxes to OSC, and I donated a bunch of things to P's daycare & a low-income shelter that my uncle works at. It was hard to get rid of them, but it was really nice to know that the clothes have good homes!
I can't wait to sell all of it after we have this baby! :-)
Actually, once we find out what we are having, if it is a girl, we will go ahead and start getting rid of some boy things by selling. I think we are going to have a big garage sale. I also plan to sell all of my maternity clothes. If you have name-brand things, you can sell them on Ebay and make a little cash.
We weren't sure if we were going to have a #2 after DD, and we lived in a small apartment. I sold off all the baby gear. When she was 3 we started holding onto some outgrown stuff (toys & books, and random things like her booster seat for the dining room table, potty rings, etc.) because we were in a bigger place with more storage.
When we got pregnant with DS I wasn't too concerned about re-buying only because by then I knew what I NEEDED and what I WANTED better than anything. I bought a lot of items (like PNP, bouncer, etc.) on super clearance or I bought used, so I didn't feel like I was spending a lot of $$ all over again.
Now we're not sure about #3. But if we do have #3 it will NOT be 6 years after #2, so I've held onto a little bit more in terms of gn clothing and toys.
We're hoping to have a second. We have a lot of storage space, so I've pretty much kept everything in DS' room or our spare bedroom. I'm hoping I won't have to buy much for #2.
Plus my sister just had a baby boy, so I've loaned her a lot of things: clothes, infant car seat, tummy time mat, Boppy.
Since space is limited for you, I'd maybe look into renting a storage unit. Not sure how expensive that might get. Or you could sell it now and keep that money set aside for one #2 comes around, so you're not really spending any more.