How to Buy Used Baby Clothes OnlineWritten by Sharlene Rollins
There are multitudes of ways to purchase used clothing for your baby. In this article I will cover only online options available in hopes that it will help you to maximize your spending money with least amount of hassle, stress or risk. I hope to cover some of key issues of buying used clothes online such as private sales versus online stores, use of PayPal and other forms of payment, purchasing through ebay and non-ebay auctions or non-auctions alike, online classifieds and more all in hopes that you will benefit from some of things I've learned and avoid mistakes that I as well as others have made. First of all let's talk a bit about where to find used baby clothes online from private sellers. There are some areas on web which allow you to post used clothing ads such as ebay and classified sites. Some classified or "for sale" sites are even specialized in either family or baby related items. Ebay, for those of us who are familiar but not necessarily all knowing about it, is a giant online auction with items being posted constantly in all possible fields and topics. Those selling can choose to list their items in an auction format in which sky's limit. Bids can start as low as one penny or they can choose to invite people to purchase items out right by using a buy now feature in which they set a price for their items. As a general rule buyer pays all shipping costs on top of selling price and most payments are made through PayPal, which I will cover later. Baby clothing on ebay tends to be mostly new with or without tags attached and is either sold in batches of items known as "lots" (grouped by gender and size) or individually as outfits. Since I am focusing on used baby items let's discuss those. Batches of baby clothing on ebay tend to get bid very high as there is a seemingly large number of people wanting to buy in this way and very few meeting demand. I have found that items and batches of clothing of any note on ebay tend to sky rocket in price above what is reasonable for used clothing -- particularly if they toss in a few name brands such as Gap, Osh Kosh, Gymboree etc... and more often than not a bidding war ensues and you are inevitably outbid or worse you get caught up and spend more than you'd originally expected for items you haven't even seen and have no quality guarantee! Auction and classified or selling sites other than ebay can be very chancy -- since ebay is established it has ability to set down rules which keep most dishonest people out while smaller sights haven't same pull with those posting. Quite often these sites (this doesn't really apply to local purchasing) are riddled with people who are no longer allowed to post on ebay for one reason or another. I have had experiences myself in which items promised ended up being fewer than what I'd paid for and set a price based entirely on quantity! I can't tell you how upset that made me, and what was worse -- I was informed that three of items had small stains when in truth about 50 fell into stained category. So what had originally been a good deal turned out to be very disappointing! There are of course no guarantees with a private seller, no return policy or customer service after sale is closed and once sale is complete you must find a new seller down road when you need clothing again and you run risks of stumbling across a swindle or a sour deal every time.
| | Friends Are A Gift You Give YourselfWritten by Skye Thomas
My oldest boy is fifteen and was a real jerk about a month ago. He had gotten pretty full of himself and acted like he was too cool for rest of family. Pretty typical teenager behavior, but I didn't like it. I had gotten to end of my patience with him and laid into him about how lousy it felt to be treated that way. We ended up in a huge fight. He argued that he wasn't acting any different than normal and that I was just choosing to see things negatively. So, I laid out numerous examples of his selfish "me me me" behaviors without stopping to take a second breath. He hates it when I go off like that, but once he was ready to really talk, I came down off of my soapbox. He was close to tears. Apparently, I'd hit a nerve. He confessed that his closest friends at school had been trying to tell him same thing recently and he wasn't hearing them. Now he suddenly knew what it was they had been trying to say. He felt awful and began to make immediate changes in his behaviors towards others. He really hated idea that he was hurting anyone's feelings by being cold and uncaring.We talked a lot that night about how family sort of has to put up with each other. Family is always there for you. Family can embarrass you and you still have to acknowledge them in public. Family can and will scream at you until you finally get point that you're being a jerk. You really don't have much choice over who your family is. Friends, on other hand, are a gift that you give yourself. Friends don't have to put up with your attitudes if they don't want to. Friends can leave you hanging if you're not very nice towards them. Friends aren't friends for very long if you're embarrassing them in public. Friends usually won't scream at you to get their point across. You handpick your friends to be something different and special. They aren't quite same as family. In order to have friends, you have to be a friend. Do you listen to them? Do you care for them? Do you encourage them? You have to give a lot of yourself to be a good friend to someone. But in end, you are one who benefits most. It's not about becoming some kind of martyr without any personal needs or thoughts towards your own well-being. It's more about nurturing a cherished relationship. That way, you have a dear friend to hang out with when your family is driving you bonkers. You have someone to laugh and play with. You have someone safe to share your hopes and dreams with. You have someone to talk to who isn't going to blab to rest of family that you think your mom is an overbearing control freak or that your stepfather isn't turning out to be your idea of what a dad could be.
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