When did you start buying things?

[oatlattetogo]

Just that really.

I’m just over 13 weeks, have had my dating scan and everything looked fine. I’d rather spread the cost of bigger items (or everything really!) and start buying a few bits now. I’m also keen (for financial and trying-to-be-environmental reasons) to get some of the bigger bits second hand, so I’m aware that if I decide I want a particular pram then I might have to wait a while for one to appear for sale online. To me it makes sense to go and have a look at new prams soon and then when we’ve picked one we like start looking straight away.

My partner is very much in the ‘it’s too early’ camp though, and doesn’t really want to start buying anything until a lot later on in the pregnancy. He fully admits that he’s superstitious and that’s the reason, which I am finding quite frustrating. Just to clarify he’s not said “I don’t want to buy anything now because I would find it even harder if something did go wrong with the pregnancy to have baby things in the house” but has actually said that he thinks it’s bad luck.

Did anyone else start shopping before 20 weeks? Am I mad?

I went and looked and chose what I wanted around 15 weeks and then waited until after the 20 week scan before making the purchases - Black Friday timing fell well for us though. There’s no bad luck in looking, and you can start figuring out which items you want whenever you want. Then you can decide if you feel ready to buy if any bargains do pop up.

Buying things don't make bad things happen. As far as this superstition goes, you can buy the things but you shouldn't keep it in your house.
I have got everything and packed my hospital bag by 28 weeks.
Purchased the bigger items (pushchair, nursery furniture...etc) around 16 weeks as I got them on second hand. You have to start to look early and go for it if you want to save money. Personally, I think it's much easier spending months on the Internet, searching for deals and sales and slowly buying everything than running around with a huge belly last minute and buying everything full price.

I'm 17 weeks and I'm practically done for up to 1 month and 0-3 month clothes. We also bought the next to me crib last week as it was on offer.

It is anxious but if anything happened we wouldn't never try again, and like you say, I feel it's better to spread the cost of things.

We are also looking at 2nd hand prams so want to check them out and then keep an eye on marketplace etc.

My OH is very level headed and quite reassuring and supportive of getting things.

We waited until after our 20 week scan before we bought anything. Currently 24 weeks, and have bought our pram, and nursery furniture because there were good deals.

Thank you for the advice everyone! Good idea to put some money away each month if we’re not going to buy anything now

Thinking about it, it might only be the pushchair that will be second hand. I don’t drive and we do a lot of walking, so I’d like a really decent one- I know decent doesn’t always mean expensive but it quite often seems to with prams! My thinking was it would be better to buy an expensive one second hand for X amount than to buy a cheaper, new one for the same amount.

And no, I won’t be buying too many clothes! I know it’s hard to predict what size a newborn will need and in my limited experience clothes are something that other people tend to buy as gifts.

Best of luck to everyone else for their pregnancies

@oatlattetogo just be careful with second hand prams as they can break and warranty isn't transferred , we had a bugaboo fox which was over a thousand and the frame broke within a year, I know uppababy have a service I think you pay maybe £50 and they fix and service the pram something like that so that would be a good one to look at second hand