Am I going overboard - presents for baby

[5littlemeninasaucer]

My baby will be 10 months old at Christmas and she is the first child and first grandchild on both sides.

I was thinking of spending £200 at Christmas but would this be too much?

(The £200 is broken down into £50 of Argos vouchers that I made doing surveys and £50 from a cash back account) the remaining £100 will be from mine & DHs pay.

I can’t picture what this would look like. She doesn’t have that many toys at the moment but are we going overboard. I know she’ll only be interested in the boxes and paper anyway.

As she’s going to be 10mths at Christmas have you thought about either saving some of the money or getting it in the winter (often cheaper!) a decent garden toy? DD1 is a Christmas baby and we used to to ask for money for her/put money aside from our present, to get a decent garden toy, something that you would get anyway but it’s out of money that you/others would have spent anyway.

I would use the £100 vouchers to get her stuff and put £100 into a savings account, if she has one.

Buy her books worth 100 pounds? Or 200 pounds?

£200 seems fine. Just buy the things that she needs and will grow into.

My first was 10 months for her first Christmas. I got her one gift and an outfit. I’m so glad that we only get these as the sheer amount of stuff from family was shocking. She was totally overwhelmed and got tired so quickly. She spent most of the day napping! Save the money. It’s totally pointless.

It depends how much storage space you have - bare in mind that although all those toys look great under the Christmas tree, where will they go afterwards? We bought a fair few, didn’t get too much but then didn’t consider how much the rest of the family were buying as well. She’s too young to really appreciate it so I think it’s better to save the money for christmases to come.

Our first was just under a year old at Christmas and we went totally overboard and thoroughly enjoyed doing so . One purchase was about £100 on a very large fluffy dog ( mutsy) who still lives in ds bedroom even though ds is now 26 and only here a couple of days a month at most . If you can afford it spend whatever you want it’s more for your benefit than the child’s at that age .

You sound like you have worked hard to earn that money.
Save it for now and treat your baby to something lovely that they will appreciate in future.
Or even better (in my opinion) just buy something very small and sweet and save the rest in a children's saving account.

It really depends on how much £200 is to you, and also what you plan to spend it on. £200 worth of £20-£30 toys would be a bit overwhelming in my opinion, it took DS1 5 days to open all his first birthday presents. But it could be one big thing - we got DS2 a climbing frame for his first Christmas which cost about £200. We don't normally spend that much but we saw it as an investment.

My kids all got one thing for their first Christmas (a music box).

When they are 3(ish) they will understand what's going on. Even now I limit the gifts from Santa to 3 plus stocking.

Family will also go bonkers.

Rein it in or you will end up living in a mad house

It's your first Christmas as a mum. Go overboard. Enjoy every minute xxx

Following this as my baby will be 11, nearly 12 months at Christmas and I have nooooo idea what to buy.

Someone recommended me the Bright Starts Whale Ball Popper earlier which looks great!!

She will change a lot between her first birthday and her second Christmas so I would perhaps get stuff for her to grow into... A slide for the garden maybe. Or a membership for somewhere like a softplay, swimming pool or farm.

Yes! I went crazy with presents for my DDs first Christmas. She was overwhelmed and only really played with a couple of the toys! The next Christmas I got a couple of toys, couple of books then spent the rest on clothes for the next size up. She liked ripping those presents open but wasn't overwhelmed by too many toys

Way too much. Buy a cute outfit a couple of toys and keep the rest of the money to buy age appropriate things as needed. Kids need love not stuff