Day 3 -Thrifty Tuesdays

And the corny list begins:

 Thrifty Tuesday......essentially what I am trying to do here is explain how to get more bang for your buck, save a buck or not spend a buck! Every Tuesday for the next month I will highlight projects that emphasize saving your money. We can all stand to save a little especially with the crazy gas prices right now! So as a pledge to my pocket book and my sanity I will showcase some great ways to save.

Starting with my kiddo. The majority of my money is spent giving her everything she could ask for, so what better place to save than with what I spend on her. As of this past weekend my kiddo received a special birthday present ( She had asked for this a long time ago and a friend graciously offered to get it for her birthday. ) It is a Baby Alive babydoll. These are fun for kids not so much for the parents pocket book however! This lovely toy uses its own kind of food and disposable diapers. These two items are all you have to buy but you will need to buy a lot if your kiddo is like mine and wants to play "mommy" all day everyday!!! Needless to say we had the doll less than 2 days and all the food and diapers were used up and gone. So if she is to keep playing with it the way it is meant to simulate play then the parent would need to go to the store, buy a pack of disposable diapers ( Toys'R'Us - $7.49 for 6 diapers!) and food packets ( Toys'R'Us - $7.49 for 10 packets) and juice packets (Toys'R'Us- $7.40 for 10 packets). This toy gets very costly very quickly! I don't mind that you have to get things for the playtime experience I just refuse to spend this amount of money on a baby doll. This is almost like paying for a real baby!! So I Googled how to make your own food for doll (find more here).
Easy as 1,2,3: Baking soda, water and food coloring (FYI: comments were made that the food coloring could dye the baby doll so be careful if you try this.) This simple homemade mixture will do the same thing as the pricey packets at the store! Always test before hand for the dye! I told my daughter that the baking soda and water only mixture was like her baby cereal, no color needed! Problem solved and no complaints from the kid! :) So now for under a couple of dollars I can have all the baby food she could need. The juice packets have not been addressed at the moment but I am sure that a small drop of food coloring with water would do the trick! (or it would be 'healthy' for baby to have water!! )
With the first half of the expenditures taken care of, its on to the most costly- diapers! I know from many adventures in the pattern section of the fabric stores that they make patterns for baby doll clothes, diapers and anything else that a little 'mommy' would need to care for her baby dolls. But just going to the store and buying a pattern and fabric etc is not feasible to my wallet once again so I needed to improvise. Being familiar with pattern making, I am sure that I could have made my own but I know that the trusty Google search will give me one already made!! And thats what I did, I searched for patterns and printed off one (find the pattern here). With that pattern I made a mock up and sized it down for the size of our Baby Alive (12" tall) babydoll. After I had a pattern created I went to the fabric store and purchased baby flannel. (This fabric just happened to be on sale as well!) I also picked up the velcro to attach the front and back of the diapers. I won't go into details about the sewing process just to let you know I made 8 of these in about an hour and a half today. The following is just a peek at what they look like.

This toy started out as expensive and ended up being just a few more pieces in the laundry and thats just fine with me and my purse!! Above all I spent as much as I would have buying 1 set of diapers to make more than 8 reusable diapers and the food ingredients were already in the pantry! I felt great that I have saved money today and for a long time in the future of Baby Alive in our household!. If you or someone you know has a Baby Alive please pass this tip onto them. Even if you know a wonderful little "mommy" that adores dressing and redressing her babies suggest the idea of getting her some reusable diapers so that the cost is kept low and the experiences are accelerated. I hope this helps and gives you an idea of how these little things can save you money and save our planet from unnecessary  trash filling the landfills.

~With Luvz,

DEZ