Last week we reviewed Amy Dacyczyn’s Tightwad Gazette, the ultimate guide to creative frugality.  We could ooze on for hours about her innovative outlook on reusing and reducing, but instead we’ll give you some concrete examples of how she made budget friendly, eco-friendly choices with her twin babies. 

Since Dacyczyn thought her fourth child would be her last, she had given away all of her baby things, only to find out that she was having a surprise set of twins.  She spent less than $100 on their first year of life by employing some zany acts of simplicity.  These are just some of the items she skipped with her babies:

Baby Shampoo: She just used regular shampoo and was careful not to get it in baby’s eyes.

Bottles: Since she wasn’t working outside the home, she nursed the babies until they were one year old and then taught them to drink from a cup.

Changing table: Dacyczyn used a towel on top of a dresser with changing items stored in a shoe box.

Disposables: Even when traveling, Dacyczyn used cloth diapers.  She invested $65 of baby’s first year budget on diapering supplies because she knew it would pay off in the long run.

Crib: Dacyczyn writes that people can get creative with dresser drawers or use a playpen as a crib. (I know this might upset some readers, but it is an interesting idea, although neither Rebecca and I nestled our infants in our bureaus.)

Shoes: Until baby is toddling, these are totally unnecessary.

Despite our enthusiasm for The Tightwad Gazette’s baby tips, we’d be hesitant to endorse Dacyczyn’s stance on diaper pins and plastic pants—she states that they’re the best option for cloth diapering families. The book is over ten years old now, and there are so many more Velcro options on the market than in the mid-nineties.  We’ve been able to find many gently used Velcro diapers for bargain prices.  Cloth diaper tightwaddery is now updated for the new decade! 

Although we also wrote a post about what baby doesn’t need, Dacyczyn shows that reducing and reusing can be taken much further than most of us realize.   Some find her extreme, but we at Green Baby Guide harbor great respect for the sense of fun and pragmatism she brings to living a simpler life.