Why does it cost $500,000 to raise a child?

Free Water Fountain to Play in! What fun!

After this past long COLD winter, we finally had a chance to enjoy the outdoors and the sunshine this summer.  What has been amazing to me recently is all of the activities that we enjoyed with Baby Breeze!

Recently I read an article that stated the average cost of raising a child from birth to 18 (this is NOT including college) is anywhere from $100,000 to $500,000.  Wow.

So I was looking at all the expenses I have spent on Baby Breeze this year, and without the consideration of his portion of the electric, gas, and home costs, we have very few expenses with the exception of Daycare.

What I found was the number of activities that cost absolutely nothing, or very little, that we have been engaging in lately.  So I thought I would list them to see if it will help others generate their own ideas:

- Our neighbor gave us their old turtle sandbox, and with a little scrubbing we were able to bring it back to life.  It still has the lid [helps keep the neighborhood cats out of it]. So for a $3.00 bag of sand at WalMart, Baby Breeze has been learning how to fling sand, dig tunnels, make simple sandcastle and just have a great ole' time.

- We have a plastic baby pool that we bought for our dog a few years ago, but he didn't like it. Baby Breeze is now having a blast playing in the water, blowing bubbles, splashing Momma and Daddy. What could be better than water and sand.

- We have also being going to the local parks around us.  We are surrounded by three parks:
1. An Island park with a bike path, and splash park
2. A large park with tons of playground equipment
3. A Children's garden with a waterfall, walking paths, remote control airplane field and small lake.


- Childrens Science Museum - In our neighborhood we have a Children's museum that allows the kids to explore science, such as the planets, gravity, hydrolics, recycling, the court system, and running a restaurant and grocery store.  There is also a small Zoo attached with River Otters, Meerkats, ducks, bobcat, and many others.  We purchased a family membership as a Christmas gift for $125.  If we go just once per week, and there are three of us this is less than a $1 a visit.  Plus they are open year round (great place to go during the cold winters).

- Dairy Farm - We took Baby Breeze to a local dairy farm/ice cream store.  He had a blast mooing at the cows, and petting the goats.  Sure we just "had" to buy ice cream [now a new favorite word], but for $5 bucks we made an afternoon out of it.

-When Baby Breeze was just 2 months old, my husband started talking him for walks in a Baby Bjorn someone gave us.  Since they used it so much, I purchased a nice Opsrey baby backpack when he was around 6 months old.  This was about $300 at REI, but I knew they would use it.  Baby Breeze and Daddy have over 150 walks with that backpack.  Which puts it at $2 per use.  It should last us another year, so I expect to come down to about $1 per use or less.  I find that when we look at larger expenses this way, we tend to use the item and get our value out of them.

- Plus other fun activities like visit the grandparents and visiting Mommy at work.

All of these activities have allowed us to spend time together as a family, make memories, and bond with Baby Breeze, yet I can't imagine how this is going to add up to over $100,000 over his childhood.

I would love to hear other low cost ideas you have with your children.