We all want the very best of everything for our new baby daughter or son but the financial cost of having a baby can come as a big shock to new parents, especially if they don't know anyone who has already gone through the experience. Not only are there the major items to cover such as medical expenses and buying a crib, a car seat, a stroller - there are all the other things that add to the cost such as bottles, diapers, bedding for the crib, burp cloths, bibs and all the numerous other items you never realized were needed for babies. So, unless you have unlimited funds, it makes sense to economize on some items and buying cheap baby clothes makes a lot of sense.
When you make a list of the essential items of clothing you are going to need for your new baby, you will begin to realize just how many "onesies", sleep suits, socks, hats and other outfits are needed. But should you succumb the recommendations for organic or natural clothing (possibly more expensive!) or are regular products sufficient? And once your baby is born and you settle into the day to day routine of looking after your baby, you quickly realize that while it might be nice to have designer clothes for your little one, they go through so many changes of clothes during a twenty four hour period (who knew babies could be so messy!) that designer clothes would be rather an extravagance.
Because babies grow so fast and are not very mobile during the first few months, they tend to outgrow their clothes rather than wear them out. For this reason the most practical clothes to put your baby in are all-in-one play and sleep suits. They are very comfortable for your baby to wear, which is the main criteria when choosing any infant clothes, and the design of them means that they make dressing and undressing a wriggling baby easy and the poppers make for easier diaper changing. Not only that they are among the cheapest of baby clothes you can buy and are suitable for either a girl or a boy.
As you will need a reasonable number of these items both for day and nighttime wear it is cheaper to buy them in multi packs. Take a look at the Gerber packs of short sleeved and long sleeved "onesies" that are available in places like Wal-Mart and Target starting for about $7.50 for a pack of four. You will also find multi packs of sleep suits, bibs, socks, mittens and hats at very affordable prices in these stores. It is also worth checking out other big stores like Babies R Us, JC Penney, Sears and other department stores to see what they have to offer.
Another way to save money on baby clothes is to wait until the stores have their sales. For instance after summer, when they are getting ready to introduce their winter clothes, and again after the Christmas holidays when the new spring and summer clothes are due to arrive you can often find some incredible bargains. Okay, so maybe the clothes will be last season's lines but they will still be cute and you will have got them a lot cheaper than buying them when they first come out. And don't forget to look in the paper for coupons to get even more money off your purchases.
For another great source of cheap baby clothes look in your local paper for garage or yard sales and make a note of any that specifically mention baby clothes. You can quite often pick up whole bags of nearly new and often brand new clothes for a fraction of the cost of buying them in stores. The same is true of visiting thrift stores.
However, if you really do prefer to buy new, then as well as checking out the big stores it is worth doing some research on the Internet. There are so many on-line retailers to choose from and again you will be able to buy multi packs of essential items.
So, although you may want the best for your baby, if your budget doesn't allow you to go out and buy designer outfits your little one isn't going to feel you don't care. Let's be honest, he or she is not going to know the difference between a Ralph Lauren sleep suit and a Wal-Mart own brand one! Buying cheap baby clothes makes economic sense for the parents and you can always suggest to the doting relatives and friends that they might like to buy the designer outfits for those special outings.
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