Our most unnecessary baby expense

Before Little Man was born we made quite a few expensive purchases. And during a recent clearout, we came across one that both Charlie and I agreed was our most expensive – and wasteful – pre-baby purchase. What was it? Well not one of the main baby purchases, but it was something we really thought we’d get great use out of with a baby in the house.

It was a camcorder. We’d never owned one before – we didn’t think we’d make use of it. But once we found out Little Man was on the way, we thought we should get one, to capture all those childhood memories.

A Sony Handycam - our most expensive unnecessary baby purchase

But now, almost two years on, that same camcorder that we spent hours deliberating over, as well as spending our hard-earned money on, well I think it has probably been used about 10 times in total.

It’s not that we don’t want to capture those special moments from Little Man’s early years. Not at all. As you’ve probably gathered, I spend plenty of time capturing and documenting our favorite moments.

No – what we didn’t foresee was the difference that smartphones would make to us. A couple of months after Little Man was born, I got an iPhone and Charlie got a HTC phone, and that was that. The camcorder was relegated to a corner gathering dust. True the video quality of the camcorder was better than that of the smartphones, but it just didn’t have the same convenience for us. When you’re in the middle of a special moment that you want to capture, you don’t want to go rushing off looking for the camcorder. You use whatever you have to hand, which is why I think so much of the footage and photos that we capture are phone quality.

We sold the camcorder on a few days ago and to be honest, I doubt we’ll notice it’s gone.

So that was our most expensive unnecessary purchase. And one I didn’t expect to be a waste of money – but it was a waste nonetheless! What was your most expensive unnecessary purchase when having a baby?