When I was a kid, my family didn’t have a lot of money. In most areas, I never felt deprived. I have three younger brothers, so I was always busy playing outside with them. Or picking on them, but we won’t talk about that.
One area where I did notice that my family didn’t have as much as others was clothing. With four kids and not a lot of money, we didn’t have a lot of clothes. My brothers and I each had three school outfits. We wore two of the outfits on Monday and Tuesday, the third on Wednesday, while my mom did the laundry, and the first two outfits on Thursday and Friday. Every week.
I even remember my mom commenting one time that one of my friend’s moms had mentioned that her child had enough clothes to last a week without doing laundry. My mom didn’t know how they could afford it. I remember being jealous.
Now that I’m an adult, surprisingly, I’m not tempted to overbuy clothes for myself. I hate shopping for myself, and my relatively small wardrobe shows it. However, I do have a tendency to overbuy for the kids. I think somewhere in the deep recesses of my memory, I’m afraid that they won’t have enough clothes. Mind you, I don’t pay a lot for their clothes. I buy everything on clearance and usually with a coupon. However, I’m not saving money by buying too much.
Fortunately, I’ve found that there’s hope. I’m not destined to a life of buying too many clothes for my children. In situations where my heart is threatening to overthrow my finances, I’ve found that setting down some ground rules for myself helps a lot. In the case of my children’s wardrobes, I made a list of every single item of clothing they owned. I determined how many days I wanted to be able to go between doing laundry for them. I picked 9 days. I actually do their laundry once a week, but I like a couple of extra days, in case I’m sick or busy and don’t get to the laundry.
At least 6 outfits had to be school worthy. Older outfits on the weekends were OK. And a couple of church worthy outfits were important for Sundays. After deciding what my children actually needed, I matched up the list of what they had with the list of what they needed. Voila! I knew exactly what I needed to buy. For a long time I kept that list in my purse, in case I came across a great clearance sale. Unfortunately my master list was lost when my computer crashed last spring, so I need to make new master lists. But it’s a system that has worked well for me.
When you’re tempted to overspend, setting up a system to circumvent the temptation is important. Your system might include lists, a budget, waiting 48 hours between seeing an item and making a purchase, or any number of things. The important thing is to know your weaknesses and be prepared for them. It makes sticking to the budget much easier. It’s less wasteful, too.
How about you? Do you have any areas of weakness when it comes to spending? Do you see a link between your past and your present? Please share your stories in the comments.
Photo by Porcelaingirl.
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The experiences we had as a child have really shaped the kind of adults we become. My family (single mom) had very little to work with, but turned to credit to finance a somewhat better lifestyle for me than we really could afford. Of course, eventually that caught up with her and I saw first hand the problems debt caused. Early on, I followed in her footsteps, but now I am breaking the debt cycle and changing my family tree.
As a child, I wore hand-me down clothes almost all the time. And I’m the eldest sibling. As an adult, I don’t buy second-hand. But, I don’t over buy clothes either.
Lots of the things that were restricted by my parents when I was a kid, I now indulge in quite a lot – things like drinking soda or eating out or buying clothes. I accept that this is partly an irrational reaction, but I’m ok with that.
you are so right about knowing your weaknesses. I have thought a lot about this recently. pinpointing my weaknesses and attacking them head on has helped me tremendously on curbing my spending.
It’s fascinating to me how much of what we learned as kids or experienced is effecting what we do today. Right down to clothing.
Great post!
I honestly could have just about written this post.
I too grew up not having a lot, and I only got new clothes once a year. New – to me, not necessarily new. And not enough to last a year. lol. I distinctly have in my head a day in junior high where a girl asked me if the shirt I was wearing was the only one I owned. heh.
I tend to wear the same things over and over now as an adult, too. You’d think I would want variety…
But for my kids, I totally overbuy. And I also had to resort to making a list and sticking to the list. I remember when my son was about 12 months old and in 18 month clothes… I had 11 pairs of overalls for him. 11. Just overalls. No child needs 11 overalls! I buy things on clearance, at thrift stores/yard sales, but still buying too much negates savings.
So I started making lists. And I mostly stick to them. Do my kids still have more clothes than they need? yes, probably. But I am improving and improving and I actually see times where the kids are starting to run out of certain items if I don’t do laundry for a week.
It is winter clearance time now though….. need to examine my lists again. ;)
As a teen we went through a pretty poor period. Mom did her best, but we were constantly out of clothes and didn’t have money to eat out etc..
So when I got older and started to make some money I went through a period were I way overspent on those things.
Realizing why is the first step to stopping!
Wow. We had our poor period too. I went through one year of high school with one pair of jeans. One. I have been a clothes fiend for about 10 years now. In fact, I just went through my 10 foot closet and purged about 1/2 of it. Some items have never been worn.
Thanks for the post. I never thought about why I spend so much on clothes!
I had 5 school outfits in Jr High and I remember a boy asking why I wore the same five things every week. I was humiliated. In high school I made a list of all the things I owned and put them together in different ways and would see how long I could go without wearing the same two things together twice. Why did I care so much?
My mom would shop for two weeks and the second week we would run out of milk and other stuff. We would end up eating macaroni and cheese or biscuits with gravy for dinner to get by. I think I have a lot of childhood feelings coming up when I stock my pantry. I get a high to look at shelves filled with multiple things and know we have food to eat. Dave Ramsey talks about the emotional help it gives for people in crisis to have food first. It is so true!
This reminds me that a good system in place is the solution. It’s also the slogan for one of those armored vehicles but I think it is very true and applies to most aspects in life :)
I like the list idea. My wife and I do this, really helps to remember sizes as well as I can never remember what sizes they are currently wearing (changes so quickly). But the list really keeps us on task and makes me accountable for my spending.
I think you’ve struck a common chord amongst a lot of readers. I can say that I’m one as well. A lot more people come from the middle class than the upper, and not having things growing up does shape their outlook, either for the good (“As God is my witness, I’ll never be poor again!”) or for bad (“I never had anything good, so I don’t deserve anything good.”)
I still see it myself when I buy things for my kids. They get a lot more stuff than I get and I don’t want to put them through the same type of status-conscious issues I went through. Maybe this is wrong, but if I can prevent it, I’m going to.
As a kid I wore 10-year-old hand-me-downs. So at 7, for example, my clothes were more than twice my age. I’m sometimes worried I’ll try to compensate with my kids. But I’m also really stingy about not buying what we don’t need.
Micah has strong feelings on the issue too–which is that kids shouldn’t be dressed in something which is 10 years behind the times because they’ll be teased. I certainly was. So I’m thinking consignment, second-hand, and the like. That way we can get enough outfits for them to have changes of clothes and keep them reasonably up-to-date without spending too much.
You’re lucky you don’t have to have your kids wear uniforms to school AND have other clothing to play in to keep their uni’s clean. What a huge money pit that was!
I found that when my kids have too much clothing, they turn into divas and change their clothing 5 times a day, which makes too much laundry. I culled out 1/2 of their clothing and left them with 7 play outfits and 1 church outfit. If they change more than once in a day, then they have to wear something dirty.
I always buy their clothes @ the goodwill because I can get Gap and Old Navy for 2.00 instead of paying 15.00 and then it gets ripped or stained.
Clothing is so expensive.
When I started school, we had one outfit a week for school, always a size Mom expected us to “grow into.” I wore them out before growing into them. Eventually, Mom discovered charity Christmas stuff. All the same, I didn’t learn ordinary attitudes about clothing (and other material things) for a long time. By that time, I was in 12-step recovery and accustomed to taking inventory. I carry one week’s clothing.
It’s a little harder with the grandkids, but I let my wife handle that. She is better at moderation than I am.
I read an article a few years ago about people who “overstock” — always buying extras to ensure that they never run out, whether it is food, clothing, cleaning supplies, or whatever. Turns out that this is a common behaviour for people who had endured poverty early in life or people who were prisoners of war.
I feel ya! My kids both have more clothes than they can wear. I watch clearance racks & yard sales for them. They are the only grandkids on one side & the youngest on the other, so it seems we always have things coming in… As for me I never have anything to wear, even with a full closet!!! Just the way I’ve always been I guess LOL!
Nice post. I found your site from Mommy Gets PAID. Great stuff!
When I was growing up, I had no issues with clothing. I always had clothes. TONS of clothes. Just not the clothes that I wanted. No brand names. I know, such a horrible life, isn’t it?
Fast forward to now when I have my own children. Not only do they have TOO many clothes, they have TOO many BRAND name clothes.
I guess the point is that even when one did not lack in an area necessarily, there are still things that cause an overspending in a certain area.
Also, I envision those kids I knew that did not have a lot of clothing or money while I was in school. Everyone “knew” their economic status BECAUSE of their clothing. I do not want my children to ever have that humilation. Which is why I overbuy in clothing. That way they “look” normal.
I am getting better about it. I have stopped buying brand name clothing. Anything they have that is brand name comes from Grandma, yes, the same woman who would not buy anything brand name for me. How funny is that? I also have stopped buying clothing once a week and only buy when they need things. But when I do go out to buy, I still buy too much.
Maybe the inventory list will help me!
Nice Post.
I’m the opposite really: my mum was tight with the clothing dollars – I only had three shirts and one pair of jeans to wear all three school seasons when I was in high school – so I went CRAZY with the clothing moola as soon as I was able. I never wanted that “I look stupid/I am deprieved” feeling again. I went to school in a rich area so socially I “suffered” because of my crappy wardrobe or lack thereof. When I started earning my own cash, I had a huge and stylish wardrobe – and didnt give a darn that I used CCs for it as time went on. (of course I eventually outgrew that and don’t care how stupid I look now :P).
The upside though to my parents tight purse strings – it motivated me at a young age to earn my own cash so I could afford things for myself they refused to pay for (contact lenses, clothes, movies, travel, toiletries, etc).
As far as your suggestion on how to outline for clothing purchases, I started that new system myself recently. I reviewed my 2007 expenditures and my jaw dropped when I realized I spent $1800 on clothing (all clothing, including socks/underwear, shoes, etc) that year – and that was in a year I actually thought all along I wasnt buying anything! Ack!
I went shopping this w/e, coupon in hand to buy one specific thing: a pair of black pants dressy/professional enough to wear to work and/or with my suit jackets. Found it, paid for it, left the store. The end. Whew!
con’t…
I enjoyed the other comments.
This is my first visit to your blog.
To add to my previous post: my parents were well off – only because they were so cheap. We had plenty of money but they refused to spend. It is still true to this day, but it works for them. (I think I resented their “cheapness” more because they refused to spend it on me; if they didnt have the funds I think I would have endured it better. The rejection was tough – b/c they never said “No, we cant afford it.” It was “No, because I said so).