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window treatment, Christa wanted what is called a cornice. She got quotes from two different fabric store vendors and it was going to cost her $200 to have it made by them. Instead, she found a kit and made one herself (no sewing involved—she has no idea how to do that stuff) for $30. These things aren’t as hard as they seem. With the leftover fabric, her talented sister-in-law made her a round tablecloth for the $5 side table she found on sale at Kmart.
    Christa’s nursery looks like a million bucks. She did it by shopping around at some of the expensive baby stores, but leaving her purse at home. You can find some great ideas in their displays and re-create them on your budget. The catalogs also provide an easy way to carry your ideas with you.
    Take a similar approach when buying furniture for older children. Kids grow up so fast these days, and their tastes change very quickly. So buying your child an expensive bed that looks like a race car may seem like a great idea when he’s four, but he isn’t going to want anything to do with it by the time he’s eight. When my oldest daughter Rebecca was little, we put these self-sticking cartoon characters on the wall, and she loved them. Then one day, when she was just eight or nine, she said she didn’t want them anymore, and we took them down. Why spend a lot of money on furniture that has such a short life cycle? Buy that kind of item at a garage sale.
    Baby Formula
    Mother’s milk is the best nutrient for infants. But a lot of mothers use formula, either exclusively or as a supplement. If you do need formula, you might be surprised to know that generic, or store formula, is exactly the same nutritionally as name-brand formula. In fact, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration sets out the requirements for baby formula, and you can compare them can to can. According to the FDA’s Web site (www.fda.gov), “the safety of commercially prepared formula is ensured by the agency’s nutrient requirements and by strict quality-control procedures that require manufacturers to analyze each batch of formula for required nutrients, to test samples for stability during the shelf life of the product, to code containers to identify the batch, and to make all records available to FDA investigators.”
    One of the big brand names got in trouble for going to doctors’ offices and telling them that their formula was better. They were trying to get the doctors to tell patients not to use generic formula. But their claim of superiority wasn’t true, and they had to stop using that as a sales pitch.
    I spoke with a caller, Annette, who heard me touting generic baby formula on my show. She called me to say that she just wouldn’t risk her child’s health to save a few bucks. I explained to her that the FDA regulates infant formula, and that if she would just compare the labels on the two canisters of formula, she would see that they are the same. Still unconvinced, Annette asked her pediatrician during her child’s checkup appointment. When he told her that the generic formula was equivalent and perfectly fine, she decided to try it. Two weeks later, she called me back to rave about how wonderful the generic formula was, and how much money she was saving. Her child didn’t flinch when she switched the formula, and she was able to pocket some money for her little one’s future.
    Generic formula is usually half the cost of brand-name formula, a bigger discount than other generic products because the stores have to overcome the hesitancy people have about giving generic formula to their child. Just about everybody sells generic formula, from supermarkets to discount stores. It’s widely available and a big savings in your budget. Unfortunately, there isn’t the same competition on food for older children.
    Disposable Diapers
    The second big budget-buster for new parents is diapers. People laugh at me because both of my daughters were generic-diaper babies, but again, the savings are