by Laura Falin posted in Parenting

We had a tight budget with our first baby.
First of all, we had to spend money on this whole new person coming into our house. We had to buy things for him to sleep on and ride in and wear. We had to buy diapers. So. Many. Diapers.
Also, we'd decided I would stay home with him, so our income was halved at the same time we added another person. We went from being pretty carefree to watching every penny and cutting out a lot of non-essential things.
But there are a few splurges that are so worth the money. If I had any extra at all, I'd spend them on these things and not regret it for a second. Sometimes these little splurges even make cutting back on bigger things more manageable. Here are the ones I either splurged on or wish I had at the time.
1. Curbside grocery pickup
Oh. My. Goodness. I finally used the pickup service at our local grocery store this last spring break. I knew we were coming home to a house with no food, and I wouldn't want to spend an hour at the store after traveling all day. So I ordered our groceries online, pulled up to the designated spot an hour after we got home, and the clerk just...loaded everything in my car. I almost cried. It cost me $5, which I actually think I saved by clipping some ecoupons while I was shopping online. Even if I didn't, that $5 to save the time and hassle of shopping with kids was so worth it. If I were a new mom, I'd so much rather do this than take the baby out of the car, load him ...