PGMabley

If you have to ask you can't afford it!!!

Cheers
Paul

ps joking - kids are better than cars, you can have a car any time.

messiah

Mya (or Mia in our case) is the name the fiancee's set her heart on for our first if it ever arrives. (personally I prefer Madison but doesnt fit with the surname - also ends in ...son)

Sat down with the mothercare catalogue and made an excel spreadsheet of things needed and how much. Nearly needed a nappy myself!

Scooby96

Christ and I didnt even factor in nappies, wipes, milk powder, car seats, cots, toys.......

My god I could be living like a King if only I'd kept it in my trousers

weapon69

Just worked out i cost my Dad £13,000 in my lifetime!

Eck i never even saw him!!

Diesel

Check the NCT (.co.uk?) they have 'as new' sales for baby stuff - they outgrow this stuff so quickly after all.

Mine’s 5 weeks old now and I am again one of the lucky ones – she sleeps 6 to 7 hours at night; just top her up to the gills with organic formula after the breast to be sure of sleep!

Regarding a motor I bought a nice 4.6 Range Rover HSE. It’s a good few years old but it meant I KEPT THE SCOOB. I’d rather grow potatoes in the Scoob than sell 310BHP for £12k on 25,000 miles… I have full Landrover workshop and *EFF manuals too and a Shell card!

I am a bit pissed off that I’m skint now without the missus’s bit (no maternity pay). Holidays now involve parents rather than unpronounceable foreign place names, but ho, hum, I fell in love with Grizzler the second she popped out!

D

PS I use the term ‘popped out’ VERY lightly

* EFF = Electrical Fault Finding. It's bad when you need an acronym. Gulp!


[Edited by Diesel - 10/28/2003 5:21:01 PM]

Neverguess

If you wait until your "financially ready" to have kids you never will.

Just go for it!!!!!!!!!!! Everyone manages some how and what you get back by having your own Mini Me has got to be the best feeling in the world hasn't it?? Babys are amazing.

And you have fun practicing for a baby too......

Don't analyse to much, just enjoy

met

indeed, my motor pool now consists of c300bhp subaru in garage locked away & 5 door polo as family run about & an old mercedes 200 four door barge as my smoke about, will swap for estate one day i'm sure but no way am i selling the scooby

Gordo

"If you wait until your "financially ready" to have kids you never will. "

and that's why we have council estates full of multi-child couples and single mums scrounging off my taxes......

Diesel

Met - will have a lovely Range Rover Estate to sell you once I save up enough for an Audi RS6 Estate; I'll post here circa 2008

I dont actually need two cars (and a bike), but I just cant sell the horses – you get so attached to those horses under the bonnet!

D

PGMabley

I have a Boxster S and a family RB5!

Cheers
paul

Pistol_Pete

I liked daiscooby's costing breakdown at the start of the thread, thing is work out what cars have cost you over the same period. Purchase price, depriciation, repairs, servicing, insurance, modding and petrol - Now I bet that would be really scary.

We had our first child six months ago. What can I say ? It changes your life, reduces your sleep and costs a fortune. But he is our world and we love him to bits. It is without doubt the best thing I have ever done.

Diesel

PG - clearly no big dog in your house then

PGMabley

There's a joke there somewhere but I daren't!

Paul

met

5 days overdue!!!!

stevem2k

We got to nearly two weeks ... it will appear when it is ready

JR55

We managed 1/2 an hour before inducement! Little darling was just building her part!!

andym172

Can't be arsed to read right through the post, so sorry if I'm repeating what's already been posted, but I remember there being research that each kid costs its parents around £120,000 from the time it's born, to the time it leaves home.

A mate of mine is one of seven kids, if those figures are correct that's £840,000!!

Although I reckon hand-downs cut the costs...

weapon69

120k You're havin a larf!!!!

met

and the answer to the question is





































it doesnt matter how much they cost, kids are the best thing in the world....... Gabriel was born eventually on the 26th of November.

have slept much since though


[Edited by met - 12/7/2003 7:13:34 PM]

DRUNKNORGY

Ahhhhhhhh, they are all nice and cute when they are born, but they don't stay that way for long, and you substitute one load of agro for another.
The thing is that they are the most compicated lifeform on this planet and when they are handed to you, there is no rule book or instructions to speak of.
You will make mistakes along the way, and the learning curve is as much yours as it is theirs.
I've got 2 Daughters of 10 and 13 and its fair to say that it just doesn't get any easier as time goes on.
I got the eldest one a Horse (Boyfriend Substitute )which costs a fair amount but the biggest investment from that is the time it takes out of my day to help sort it out.

Love the Kids (as you do), but if I could turn back the clock, and weighed it all up, would I make the same choices again, Erm if I am honest, I am a lazy fekker really and so the answer would probably be not (and so would the missus).
It probably took a couple of years to realise that its not like buying a car which you can sell on if it costs too much to run, and the commitment is lifelong (and mostly thankless), Kids by definition are a selfish bunch, so the rewards are mostly dilusional .

What I really don't like is the life choices which I have been forced to make to ensure that I give them stability. You do have to eat shyte to keep a roof over their heads.

Think long and hard before you take the plunge, as kids test a relationship, they don't strengthen it.

Just my 2p's worth



[Edited by DRUNKNORGY - 12/6/2003 6:27:09 AM]

met

in a way i agree mate, he is only 9 days old & i can see what you mean, the baby was not planned & we were goig to have kids in a few years, i am indeed also a very lazy ****, weve only been together for 3 yrs when we met her mum had been suffering with cancer in various forms before it spreading to her brain which she eventually passed away from, after that my missus threw herself into her own succesful business working 6 but mostly 7 days a week, since then she has been heavliy pregnant we moved house then he was born so life over? not as such but a major change & one that i wasnt expecting, it is as you say not the money either as i am not short of a few quid & neither is she it is totally the sheer scale of the life long commitment & thanklessness. i love the missus & we havent even been on a holiday together, but he is here now & i do love him, i'm sure things will become easier happy days to follow, just different to my previous lifestyle

weapon69

The best piece of advice my Mum gave me when i became pregnant the 1st time (i was 16)-life won't get better/worse it will just change. I don't have to give up on what i wanted to achieve, just go about it differently.

met

your ma is a wise laady , we shall go about getting where we were going in a different way & enjoy it in a differnet way too

Diesel

When you wake up in the morning and pick this 2 month old little 'un up and she gives you a huge great 'so happy to see you daddy' smile all over her face, then I stop whinging about not being able to go away to stay with our mates in the 'States this Xmas - ohh and the fact that nurseries are a grand a month where we live! We are also very lucky as she sleeps through the night and is a very happy baby - not a poor sleeper, moaner or a grizzler.



All I'd say is have them a bit later in life - I did an awful lot of living and travelling and made an awful lot of friends () before this one came along

D