friends giving you second hand baby things...

[mameulah]

We seem to have lots of people who are very kindly offering us their second hand baby things. Lots of big items, prams, car seats etc. What are the rest of you doing? Taking it and saying thank you, I mean they have no need for it at all now and over the years we have done plenty of lending and sharing etc. Or do you offer to pay for it? Or does it depend? And if it does depend then what does it depend on?

Well good on you for making sure they don't think that next time!

We offered to pay for everything we have been given, most people just wanted to get rid of the stuff (fortunately they are all like-minded people and didn't pass on crap!) so they could make way for new things.. The only thing we did pay for was the travel system, as it is only 3 years old and looks like it's just been wheeled out of mothercare and I couldn't not give any money for it, IYSWIM. We've saved tons of money, thank god for having lots of family and good friends!!

halloweeneyqueeney - i'm curious to know what it was that was so sentimental that it couldn't be put in the machine, but was suitable for a baby to 'borrow'?

i think lending things is a pain. babies don't care if it has to go back! I would rather buy myself something on ebay or find on freecycle i coudn't afford than worry about my baby, well, being a baby on it!

i've got some stuff from friends and i'm very grateful for it. boyfriends mum tho keeps buying me stuff at jumble sales and it's urgh revolting. really worn and rank and not my taste! not that i'm a snob, got myself loads of great bargains at jumbles including over 20 babygros for a quid for the lot. i'd never buy things from a jumble for someone else's baby though!

Post six months very few of DS's clothes have survived so I'd hate to borrow and ruin. I have lent out things I consider fairly indestructible (Bumbo for example) that I expect to be returned when new baby is big enough.

"halloweeneyqueeney - i'm curious to know what it was that was so sentimental that it couldn't be put in the machine, but was suitable for a baby to 'borrow'? "

well exactly! EVERY baby item we got from her was very "sentimental" total hoarder and therefore IMO shouldn't have been lent at all

it was a play mat, it didn't have a care label, we did a good job at sponge cleaning but it still left a SMALL mark. IMO it would have been fine in a quick cool wash and would have come out like new but we weren't allowed to "risk it"

most people wouldn't have even noticed the mark if we hadn't shown it, or gone "what that, gosh don't worry that's nothing" when we showed it, but we got catbumface....

Like I said we BARELY used it anyway out of worry about returning it as it was. We accepted the "loan" of a lot of the stuff before really understanding the terms and conditions

I have happily taken second hand items which were offered however wouldn't have accepted if they were meant as a loan - personally I would never have remembered which items were loaned to me and who by! I have always offered money and generally been told just to pass them on to someone else or charity shop when I'm done with them. Have read far too many threads on here about people taking thing and then the original owner deciding it had only been a loan, so paranoid now about it :)