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I think it's entirely up to you and your DH. You just have to do what works for your family, and ignore comments because really, it's nobody's business what you spend on your kid. It sounds like you are a reasonable person with finances, so I don't think you appear to be spoiling your lo.

we spend our money on good food and experiences.

I think it's perfectly fine for you to prioritize baby purchases. After rent our biggest expenses are food and preschool. We've had to scrimp in other areas for LO to go to school but it is worth it to us. Any "fun money" we have, I personally prefer to go towards a vacation fund, but this is something that we talk about on a regular basis and adjust according to our current situation.

@Arden: $25 a week! That's awesome!

@Baby Boy Mom: I'm glad you mentioned preschool. Our childcare is more expensive than our rent! Sigh. And then is food and my loan.

@Arden: people gave me grief about my son's party too (it was more than $300, closer to $500 I think... and I sold a lot of items to cover it and also worked extra hours!), but it was important to me and that's what mattered. It was important to DH too. I actually wrote a little bit in J's birthday party blog post about why I wanted to celebrate his first with a big party... and the party wasn't even that big - I think 20-25 people?

@sunny: 55 people for $350 is amazing! did you have to rent a venue?

@Mrs. Pen: Nope! We have a summer baby so we had a giant party at our house/backyard. I didn't do too much for decorations. I just bought a few things to make some cute signs and I bought a tablecloth.

I ordered a few platters of Chinese food, picked up fruits, cheese/crackers/prosciutto at Costco/Trader Joe's and we bought our cake at Safeway.

We also had so much leftover food I sent people home with boxes of leftovers!

@Arden: I figured you had something in mind.

Our money philosophy is all about structuring our lifestyle in a way that maximizes our time with each other and our children. This sort of naturally means that we are very anti-debt. Our number one priority after tithing is killing our law school debts. Once our loans are paid off we will have the flexibility to consider if whether or not I should stop working and stay home.

Then we will throw more money to retirement.

Then its making sure our kids have a good K-12 education. Right now we're leaning towards homeschooling or private school, which would either mean a loss of my pay or higher tuition costs, but we have a few more years before that's a factor.

Saving for a downpayment on a house is thrown in there somewhere, but we're not house crazy at the moment.

College we're less worried about, although we will save where we can for that. Our kids will have access to free tuition at state schools bc of DH's veteran's status or they can choose to attend the college DH teaches at. If they choose to go to a different, expensive private school, we will help where we can, but they will have to work for the rest. DH and I put ourselves through school and while student loans are unfortunate, we worked very hard for our educations all the way through and we did not take our schooling for granted.

We also don't mess around with things like our taxes, accounting, health insurance, long term disability insurance, life insurance, etc. So we pay a lot for those things. We're insured up the wazoo and we pay our accountant to keep our books and taxes in line. We're lawyers, so we like to have our stuff in order.

The trade off for all of this is that live very frugally in every other category. We do not have any debt outside school loans. We drive older, paid off cars. We buy all of our clothes on sale or clearance. We meal plan and pack lunches. We seldom eat out (although right now during my first trimester, all bets are off) and don't really drink. We don't have cable TV. We have cell phones and Internet, but its through DH's business, which is a write-off. We live in a very cheap, somewhat run down house. When we do buy a house, it will be a moderately priced home that can be paid off in 10 years or less. We are very cognizant that all of this will impact our kids in terms of frills and toys and vacations and what not, but we think having parents that are a lot more present and involved with their lives is more important than all that other stuff.

We prioritize saving above spending in our home. We don't have a fancy home or cars, but what we have works well for us. We don't spend money just to spend it, like we don't walk around the mall or go out to eat just for something to do. I haven't bought clothes in years but when I do I shop second hand. I've never bought DS a new outfit or toy...they've always been second hand. We spend a large part of our budget on farm stuff because it is important to us to raise our own humane meats and we enjoy caring for a garden and animals... They bring many positives to our lives and will teach our children a lot of life lessons. Food for us is huge because we like to eat well. One of the reasons we don't waste money eating out is because I can cook better tasting meals from scratch. In saying that though, what we grow is organic, but I don't spend money on organic foods when I have to buy from the store. I'm not convinced that organic food is best for the earths resources as a whole. As an example, I'd rather buy the conventional apples from NY (my home state) rather than the organic ones shipped in from the state of washington.

Really our priorities just boil down to save and stay as far from debt as possible. Put money into things we enjoy, that "give back" our investment (aka the farm).

People think its weird that we travel a lot and have "nice things" but that we still rent. Buying in NYC is a little weird though. A place we would want to live would be about $500k with a 25 percent down payment. Then co-op fees and all of that. We would have to penny pinch for so long to afford a place that it just doesnt make sense for us right now.

@Arden: To answer your original question...I think it's complicated. Especially in light of past posts I've read from you about not being able to afford a second nursing tank, being stressed over money, etc. I guess things like photography and clothes and birthdays really depend on the overall financial picture.

Like you, I emotionally prioritize nice things for my baby, like pretty photos and cute clothes. And I will admit that these things are probably fueled by seeing other people's nice photos and pretty nurseries, etc on FB, Pinterest, and here on HB. My first instinct would be to scrimp on something like food or things that I kind of need for myself, to afford something like newborn photos for my LO.

However, my husband is the opposite and considers all of those things (any kind of designer clothing for a baby, even on sale; fancy photo sessions as opposed to taking our own or taking LO to Target for pictures) to be a total waste of money.

And at the end of the day....really, HE's right. Babies don't know or care what they are wearing, so long as it's clean. Our desire for our babies to be mini hipsters/mini preps wearing Tea Collection and Freshly Picked moccasins is dumb when those things can only be worn a very short time by an infant who doesn't care. They are really, truly (if we look down deep and can admit it to ourselves) very frivolous things to spend money on.

I sometimes get the "why don't we have nice things" blues when I see our cheap kitchen table and chairs, and get annoyed that we don't have curtains in our house or bedside tables next to our bed or rugs! We have crap knives and like..1 rusty pot that I cook everything in.

Especially when I know our combined income and I know we make probably twice as much as a lot of our friends make, but somehow they have nicer places and nicer "things" and nicer clothes for their baby.

But then my husband reminded me that we were able to move to one of the most expensive housing markets in the country and buy a place with 25% down. With a sum that is more than 3 times my annual salary. And have a good amount of money left in investments and savings. And how many people our age are able to do that?

So at the end of the day, I work hard to squelch my desire to consume, consume, consume...even on behalf on my daughter (I know we as moms want to say that spending for our children is always a good cause). I'd say I'm only successful part of the time, and i do get frustrated sometimes that my husband doesn't want to spend on hardly anything....
But it's nice to know that if he lost his job tomorrow, we'd be okay for a year.

So back to your original question: Personally, I think $300 is not a lot to spend on a 1 day Bday party, if all your other needs are covered and you have saved enough to account for your husband losing his job and saving for retirement, major illness, etc.

If those things aren't covered...maybe $300 IS too much. I don't know. In any case, it's definitely complicated and I understand your desire for nice things for your LO. As others have said, it's probably a good idea not to discuss finances with family any more so you don't have to deal with their judgement. If they don't know that you can't afford certain things, then they won't judge when you decide to splurge in other areas.

@Anagram: I thought your comment was really eloquent. We can't afford much of anything right now because we decided as a family that I was going to stay at home for awhile. In a few years our financial picture will look very different, but it's hard to be patient! We too are prioritizing our future home, but as I sit on our busted futon I get a little pouty. It's really hard not to compare "things" with other people. And I want ALL the things. But like I said, this is honestly one of my most disliked parts of myself, and something I'm trying to change.

@Silva: said a lot of what I think.

We prioritize savings emergency fund and retirement. Then healthy and local foods. I am working hard to stop impulse buying clothes, even if they are from goodwill, for LO and have a specific needs list and try to make the bulk of it myself. No one questions our choices because we don't really discuss them I guess? It's just not discussed.

To echo others, and I don't want this to come across as a personal attack, I know I've read you saying mental health was out of financial reach and that you identify as being broke/poor. To me, that doesn't equate with purchasing nice baby clothes and shoes. I don't think that's really spoiling her, since I doubt she cares about stuff like that especially at this age. But if you're talking about similar financial constraints to family members I'm guessing they are questioning from a similar place.

With that being said, I'm sure I've said things are out of our budget before that actually weren't, I just didn't want to pay for them. You're not accountable to anyone for how you budget. But yes, in my life it's hard not to question,out of love and concern, family who talk about scrambling for groceries but also regularly travel (or similar examples), although so far I've been able to hold my tongue.

I think it's incredibly personal, and no two families can have the same formula. DH and I like nice things, but we prioritized debt repayment and aggressive retirement savings right now. We don't want for much, but we aren't frivolous at all either. We try to keep the long run in focus. Dd doesn't know that the shirt she is wearing we bought in a used lot of clothes for $20 and her pants are a Carter's set from Costco. Because of stuff like this we're overpaying our mortgage and putting way more than necessary into retirement now. 10 years from now we won't have to be so aggressive and she will know the difference. Does that make sense?

@scg00387: omg this is so true. Now that I'm off work and waiting for BB#2 all I want to do is shop all day long for cute things for DD. Keeping up with the Internet Jonses is a full time job and I just can't!

This is why I don't read any blogs any more. It's just too tempting to spend money on things and I frankly don't like the fact that most of the people touting things on blogs get them for free. It's not a realistic picture for a lot of people.