Graceful Parenting in Austin

One of the sessions I went to at the women’s retreat last weekend was a book group for the book - “This Day in the Life: Diaries from Women Across America” (Joni B. Cole, Rebecca Joffrey, B.K. Rakhra).” The editors recruited over four hundred women to keep detailed diary entries for June 29, 2004. It was fun to get a little insight into different careers, like life on the road for a barrel racer in the rodeo, the amount of administrative tasks for a fire fighting officer on the day shift and how a nun, in-between prayers and work in a hospital, spends time checking her email. Several women in the group commented that the older women seemed to have it more together and the younger ones seemed to buy a lot of things and go to Starbucks. I thought, how odd that I identify less with my own generation. Then I thought, how odd that I still think I’m that young.

Sarah was leading the group and she had recommended that we all keep diary entries for the Tuesday before the retreat. I read this part of my diary to the group:

9:30 AM – I’m at Babies R Us, in the diaper aisle, debating the role of coupons in my life. I don’t really comparison shop, I haven’t found time for that, so I don’t know if the price is better. I only have a general feeling that buying diapers in the grocery store each week is SO convenient that it MUST be the most expensive of all. And I MUST be saving money by doing the LEAST convienient thing, which is keeping track of the coupons, buying more than I need, finding room in the garage to store the extra boxes and making another trip to the store when she grows out of a size before we get to the last box. That MUST be cheaper.

I just think it is funny, that we have so many options and so much information, but how much of the time do we really know what we are doing?

Then another Mom in the group, one with three kids under five and more incentive for comparison shopping, said to ditch the coupons. She said if I wanted to save money, Costco was worth it, except their diapers were a store brand, but they worked great, so it wasn’t a problem.

So, I followed up with very unscientific survey of Pampers size 3 diapers, on November 14, without coupons, and this was the cost per diaper:
HEB - 24 cents
Babies R Us - 21 cents
Target - 19 cents
Costco - 17 cents (store brand only, not Pampers)

Which might seem like pennies, but using about 180 diapers a month, the difference between Costco and HEB is over $12 a month and $140 a year.

Well, I haven’t made the Costco commitment yet. We live in a house built in 1950, with closets that make me wonder if people actually wore clothes back then. So I don’t know where I would put the extra diapers, paper towels and toilet paper. And it is hard to make an extra trip, with Baby Girl sleeping a lot and not a lot of extra time in general. But I shop Target already, so I can get my diapers there. No coupons, no bulk amounts, no extra trip.

I love this women’s retreat. Partly because of the amazing women and their stories and the interaction between women of different generations and how I feel more relaxed and stronger, but also because I’m going to save some time and money when I buy diapers. It’s all good.

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