Thursday, April 24, 2008

I'd Rather Be WEIRD!!!




For those of you that are Dave Ramsey fanatics like we are you will probably recognize that saying already. For those of you who don't: Dave Ramsey has a famous saying that "NORMAL" in American is broke. If you don't want to be broke -than you must be WEIRD. I'd rather be weird. With five kids to clothe and our quest to be completely debt free I have started to shop more and more at resale stores. I know that garage sales tend to be cheaper overall than resale stores, but there are several reasons why I like resale so much.

1. With five kids to find clothes for it is easier to go to a store where the clothes are already divided in sizes.
2. Gas prices are sky high and it's so hit or miss with garage sales. You might hit a load of great bargains or you might drive all around town and find 3 items for your time and gas. Time is worth money too.
3. When you shop used you are saving a lot of clothes from the landfill and that is great for the environment as well as the wallet.

Years ago Goodwill and the Salvation Army carried goods that had that definite "old" look to them. Everything was worn out and pilled. With America's great love of spending, and dumping out perfectly good items, it's easy to get great deals. I challenge anyone to point out in my kids closets which items I bought new and which ones were purchased second-hand. After wearing an item for one time it looks exactly the same.

Each season all of the kids usually need new clothes in the next size up. This spring after seeing all of the kids down in the garden (in the mud) with their dad, I realized that we really needed "play clothes" along with regular ones. In the past the kids would just play outside in their regular clothes and I would just treat the stains. Now I realized that it would be great if they had clothes that they could just get into anything with and I wouldn't care. I was able to find a lot of items for each child for usually less than $1.00. It is definitely worth it.

All of the clothing pictured here cost me $14.24 at Goodwill and $36.02 at The Rustic Market. Grand total of $50.26. Not everything was pictured because they have already worn some of the items. Olivia got: 8 pairs of shorts/skorts, 10 shirts including 2 long sleeve for this fall. Isaac got: 6 pairs of shorts, 13 shirts total including 3 long sleeve for the fall. Savanna got one outfit, Justin got a spiderman t-shirt and Logan got a pair of dress shoes.

One last note: did you notice that there were some designer items in there? Isaac got Tommy Hilfiger jeans, an Izod shirt and U of M shirt. Olivia got a lot of Old Navy and Children's Place clothes. I could care less what brand something is as long as it looks good and is in good condition but a lot of people care about brand names. I come across a lot of Aeropostale, Gap and Old Navy clothes. It would be easy to stay in designer brand if that's something you worry about.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

When my husband and I were first married, he told me that he planned to buy only used clothes for our (future) children. I was a little aghast, but having now seen the babies' and kids' clothes at Salvation Army, I have no problem with it. They look great, and they're so cheap! I know I'll fall for the occasional new outfit, especially for our first child, I'm sure. But overall, second-hand is the way to go. I wish my husband and I could buy used too, but we're both hard to fit. We're tall and unusually proportioned. I try from time to time, but it's always a frustrating endeavor.