More children or higher standard of living?

[Mum2SweetCs]

This has been on my mind for a while and I still have not found an answer to it.

What did/will you choose if you were able to choose to have more children and sacrifice your standard of living or live comfortably with 1 or 2 children?

Ive always wanted 3+ kids but I also don't want to deprive them of anything. I want to be able to support them and give them what they want in life but can probably only do that with 2 children.

Being raised in a family where we had all handme downs, where the kids use to laugh at our broken shoes, I dont want my children to go through that

BUT having said that, I love the fact that I have 3 other siblings! Sure we fought heaps but being older and wiser, its great to have their company!

How did you make up your mind?

Thanks all!

[minimatron]

I have the same on my mind too. I am one of 8 and we had hand me downs and quite often lived off food boxes from the local church. We never had a great deal of anything but love.
I have 2 dds and am at the ?#3 stage and often wonder if we will be sacricing what they can do by introducing another sibling. For me, I am a bit worried about it...worried is probably not the right word, but it just plays on my mind. I dont want them to miss out, but I dont want them to think that they can just do anything because they can iykwim. So we will probably go ahead with #3 and not worry too much about what they can have in this material world, but just offer them love and friendship.....
Hope that makes sense!

[ladybird11]

Depends on what you mean by higher standard of living I guess?

I've seen kids with all these electronic gadgets and game consoles etc, and it deprives them of their family time in some instances (not all times though), the best clothes etc, but at the end of the day I feel the most important things for kids is to feel loved. And not to feel love through presents and having 'the best' of everything - but to feel it from attentive and caring parent/s (and siblings), going to the park, reading books, playing sports together as a family etc.

DH and I are sending the kids to private school - thats our 'splurge' if you like on them, as we feel this particular private school reinforces our family values very well.

This may mean that we can't afford to have big family holidays, instead we'll just hire a shack up the river or something - but the kids will be still gaining life experience no matter where they go. I still plan to do the 'hand me down' clothing thing with bub #3 when he/she comes along, but instead of having toys as pressies - god knows we have enough, we always ask for clothes if ppl want to know what to get the kids - so they can still have 'new' clothes of their own.

[Nelle]

For me, I think the balance would fall in favour of a larger family. I didn't grow up with as much as some other kids and while at times it bothered me that my clothes weren't super cool and I didn't have a brand name schoolbag, I think it shaped my character...we all want our children to be cool and liked, but I learned some valuable lessons through times of being uncool (and of course make up for it by being completely totally cool now).

[Lulu]

If you take the 'name brand' side of it out I think it goes a little further than shiny things V house full of love .

I vote for a better margin on the financial side. It's good to also plan for the things you cannot see coming iykwim?
Like if one of the kids needs something that requires more $$$, or if they show some sort of skill/talent that you would like to extend for them.
Things like holidays (although can be exxy) can also be an important part of family life and life experience.
Sometimes an opportunity might come up for the family or an individual family member that would be sad to pass up for lack of $$$.

Not to mention the effect that strained finances can have on a family.

[Mum2SweetCs]

I defintely dont want my kids to grow up having the latest gadget, wearing the latest trendy clothing. I never grew up like that and would instill these values (of not being materialistic) into my children as well.

But we want to send them to a catholic school or have the option to send them to a private school without having to think about where the next term's fees will be coming from.

I would love for my children to go overseas and visit family (something I couldn't do) and regularly visit their grandparents in Melbourne and would love for them to be able to places such as the zoo, aquariums, trips down and up the coast these things aren't cheap at all.