Age gaps and mums with 3 or more kids please...

[Louise1970]

I have a ds1 of 20 months & dd2 of 5 months. We had our children close for our own reasons of age, health & money. We are really not sure if to stop at 2 or have a 3rd. We would like 3, but that means building another bedroom. Longer time off work, does it cost more later on with growing up etc. And all that. I really can not decide. I know we are lucky to have 2 healthy children already. But is it being greedy and selfish. Is it right to bring another one into the unknown worl. Should we have a similiar age gap to the other two or should we wait. Oh god help...

22.5 mo
39 mo
29 mo
33 mo

having just been to a July birthday party today - it was indoors due to rain. it's probably a waste of time planning summer birthdays for this reason.

(but then i do live in a very rainy part of the UK).

I planned 2 of mine for the spring to have summer maternity leaves. both summers were particularly mouldyrainy summers (last year and 5 years ago).

Hi Louise. I have three - gaps are 4 yrs and 2.5 yrs. I would have preferred a closer gap between the first two but took longer than planned to become pregnant second time around. I don't know if I'd have had a third so soon (or at all maybe) if the first two had been closer in age. I always did think I wanted three and now i have them i feel my family is complete and definitely don't want any more.

I know quite a few families with three where they have had the first two fairly close together and the third after 4 yrs or so - this seems to work out well as the older two are at school/nursery during the day and you can give uninterrupted attention to the baby. Bigger families (i.e. more than 2 children) seem to be fairly common where I am. Don't know if this a trend that is happening everywhere?

Do you really need another bedroom straightaway? Maybe that could wait until they are all at school and/or you have more money? As someone who had to share a bedroom with THREE sisters growing up, I know that it is lovely to have your own space but not really an issue until the teenage years.

I have to say money has been a bit tight for the past six months or so - not sure why it has changed suddenly - probably partly because we have gone to visit our families three times so far this year and we didn't last year as I was heavily pregnant/baby was too small. I also found that some baby items just didn't last - second stage car seat, bouncy chair for example had to be replaced for the third one and I will probably need a new buggy before he outgrows needing one. Also after school activities will get more expensive as you have more as i think someone has already mentioned.

It's true that it can rain on summer birthdays, but what I find is that with DS 1 and 2 being winter babies, we only had wionter toys (we don't tend to buy many ourselves, leave it for father Christmas and birthdays). Now we have a summer baby we can get the slides, sand pit etc without breaking the policy, much better- how many train sets does one family need FGS? it would perhaps be different if we weren't an all boy family though

Mine all fall in the winter -

dd - late November
ds4 - December (9 days before xmas day)
ds3 - January - (9 days after xmas day)
ds1 - end of January
ds2 - early March

As you can see - horrendously expensive as they all fall near to xmas!!!

Gosh sympathies, one in December and one in Jan enough for me!!

I had a 16 month gap between my first two. I then had an 11 year gap before my next (surprise baby!). I love having three children but the financial implications that we have found are - 1)Most hotel rooms are only designed for a family of four, so we need two rooms.2) It looks like we will be supporting two children through college at the same time while still having to support another at home.
Having said that, a large age gap has worked for us because I can give full attention to the little one. We also have built in babysitters!

i have small age gaps between my first 3, then a 5 year gap, followed by a 15 month gap. I would have liked all 5 of them to be close in age, but that isn't how it worked out.

Having said that, it is great having older ones to help out with the babies. On the other hand, we can't all go to the cinema together anymore, because the smaller ones won't sit through what the older ones want to see.

DD1 & DS - 3 years
DS & DD2 - 6 years

hey there louise1970 sorry I have not posted to this thread for couple of days but been hetic...but no have no family up here with me.....(your earlier posts) I am on my own totally with four kids and no family..and no family from my husbands side..MY family are down in Surrey....and have no friends where I live to talk of so just me........hope that you get back....

We have 4, who are now 19, 17, 15 & 13. We had 19 mths between the first 2, then exactly 2 years, then 2 years 1 week.

It was very very hard in the early years & we didn't go anywhere altogether because it was just too hard (number 3 has ADHD which didn't help matters). Once we got out of the toddler stage though, life became easier. They are all a similar age so all like the same sorts of things & tend to entertain eachother while out/on hols.

Difficulty comes with things like hotel stays (2 rooms), "Family" tickets to attractions which are for 2+2 or 2+3, enough seats in the car (it was years before we could afford a 6/7 seater).

Lately we've had the one doing A levels/next one doing GCSEs stress, which will continue for the forseeable future..

tallulah sounds like you got your hands full!! and I though I had it bad.....LOL.......

1&2 2y9m
2&3 16mo
3&4 15mo
4&5 2y5mo
5&6 20mo
6&7 17mo
7&8 23mo
8&9 3y4mo

I have exactly two years between dd and ds, and 2.5 years between ds and the twins. So when the twins were born I had four under the age of four.
If I were in your situation I personally would wait another 6 mnths, so that dd is out of nappies by the tiem the baby is born and your ds is walking. Otherwise thigns would be very hard. I think with mine it hasn't been too bad, cos the older ones were walking well before siblings were born, and potty trained. I'm not sure how I could cope with three under 3!