May 2007

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After the exhilaration of the great news that a new baby is on the horizon, many new parents acquire a sense of panic and dread when they think about how this new bundle of joy is going to cost them a bundle of cash. There are simple conservative measures that parents can take to make the first couple of years of childhood a breeze.

Alternatives to Baby Wipes: Instead of purchasing expensive baby wipes, just take a roll of ordinary paper towels and cut it in half. Then take a 1 ½ cups of water and approximately 1 tablespoon of gentle baby shampoo and approximately 1 teaspoon of baby oil and mix it together. You may add a couple of drops of lavender oil for fragrance, but it isn’t necessary. Place the paper towels in a leak proof container, a plastic bowl with a sealable lid works great. Pour the liquid mixture over the paper towels and then wait until the paper towels have soaked up most of the liquid. Carefully pull out the cardboard tube from the inside of the paper towels. Now you are ready to start using you inexpensive baby wipes. Pull gently from the center of the roll and clean up will be easy.

Alternatives to Disposable Diapers: We’ve all heard of them and many of us were graduates of Cloth Diapers. The start up costs involved with using cloth diapers is hefty, but the savings in the long run is amazing. There is a little more work involved with cloth diapers such as rinsing and washing, but once again, the bucks you will save is tremendous. I do recommend contacting your prearrange baby care person or people and find out if their child care center will use cloth diapers. If not, you can always save on the number of disposable diapers you use by only using them at daycare and use cloth diapers at home. The style of cloth diapers has change immensely in the last few years. All in one cloth diapers (AIO) have the “rubber pants” built into the diaper itself. The whole thing goes in to the washer for easy clean up. Instead of using pins, which can even make the most seasoned person on diaper duty a little nervous, snaps and Velcro tabs are attached to the all in one cloth diaper.

Cloth diapers and homemade baby wipes are a tad more work, but think of the money you will be saving in the long run.