Re-uses DSs Christmas gifts for DS no 2?

[pontipinemum]

I am expecting DS 2 this summer, I had DS 1 Summer 2022 so the baby will be the same age as DS 1 at Christmas. His main santa gift that year was a jumperroo I think I'll just re-give it. DS1 won't remember and DS2 clearly won't know. I bought very little for DS1 his first Christmas. My relation who I get on very well with has similarly aged children and she buys about 5x what I buy, so maybe I need to up it.

Also how much do you save? I've been putting aside €50 per month and we will add more in Nov/ Dec wages. It's only 3 adults and 2 kids for Christmas day, and my mam buys the turkey + ham we buy the other food, she comes up for about 10 days. No alcohol though - we're all boring 😂

That is perfect, please don't be swayed by what others are doing (I say this as someone who made that mistake and is difficult to come back from 🙈) children need very little when they are so small and don't remember or even understand ehat is happening.

@AncientSkaterGirl thanks, no need to up my budget this year so. I am positive once they are older Christmas will be expensive enough but for now I'll keep it simple. I'd prefer to spend the money taking them places.

If you up the amount of presents to "match" you'll just be buying crap for the sake of it. What a waste of money and things!

If your kids grow up with maybe 3-5 gifts from you/FC they'll be fine, that's all they'll know. Plus it means you buy them something decent rather than piles of plastic shite that won't get played with.

I imagine many others would buy for them too, they'll receive tons anyway.

I think it's fine to do. But then my 2 got so much from extended family for Christmas that I put some of the eldest ones presents from us away after Christmas and rewrapped them and gave them to her for her birthday.

Babies get overwhelmed by too many presents. Re-using existing stuff is fine, they really don't need much at all - they do like empty boxes though!
If it helps, mine had most of their presents and clothes from car boot and jumble sales until they were school age. They neither knew nor cared.

DS anyway does get other presents, from my mum, his godmother, godfather and his aunt. Plus he got a nice bit from us/ Santa, 3 'main gifts' and a stocking. His grandparents give money which I save for him. I'd imagine it will be similar for DS2

I haven't decided if all will be from Santa or some from us. Growing all mine were from Santa and maybe a small gift from mum like an Atlas children book or similar.

That's plenty of presents - really.

Set expectations now. Don't be pressured into buying into the consumerism if Christmas. So what are f you know someone who buys 5 x the amount and spends £3k? Doesn't mean they love their kids more or that the kids are happier etc.

DD4 thinks FC brings the stockings. Everything else is from us.

When we had DC2, DC1 was old enough to notice the difference in the number of presents but was older than yours. We did regift some things but got him to help wrap them and said they were from him. Some went in the stocking. (Eg baby books and little bath toys ), bigger toys on the presents pile. Other stocking gifts were things you would buy anyway (baby bath; new socks as they didn't really survive being passed down, ditto bibs; vests - anything that they were going to need on the next 6 months or so).