<p>Im sorry but the buck stops here.
I realize that some rent limos for prom and even middle school graduation & I am resigned but irritated that the college support program is telling my D, she has to apply to 8 colleges even though she is taking a year off, but I am not spending $18,000 for senior year.</p>
<p>I’m not sure there’s much to be done about college app/CB fees, and when DS travels to visit his final choices, he’ll be on a cheap flight or on a frequent flyer ticket and doing the sleeping bag on someone’s dorm floor. $18K!!! It just wouldn’t happen in our house. My kids wouldn’t know how to spend that kind of money.</p>
<p>Don’t know about senior year, but the disparity in extravgence around here for Sweet 16 celebrations is huge. Some kids have dinner cruises on the Hudson river or limo trips into Manhattan for Broadway plays. Others (like us) have a backyard bar-b-q. </p>
<p>I couldn’t care less how other people spend their money. D has enjoyed some wonderful party experiences with very nice friends. But I would never feel pressured to keep up. It really holds no interest for me & D is fine with our lifestyle choices.</p>
<p>My kids wouldn’t know how to spend that kind of money.</p>
<p>Mine would
She could do it- no problem.
While her sister is still wearing clothes I bought her in high school ( she graduated in 2000), my youngest has a Vogue subscription and likes “couture” clothing.
She has very high end taste even in jeans- lucky for her she found some seven jeans at a thrift shop- cause I am not likely to fork over $150 for denim for a 17 year old.
Besides her legs go up to her armpits and she has about 19% body fat- she should have the designers pay her to make their clothes look so good! ;)</p>
<p>I wouldn’t complain about the college fees, but since she is taking a year off, we will have to pay them again next year as well. ( state schools dont allow you to defer and I am also expecting different choices)</p>
<p>IF she wanted a fancy dress for prom, I would probably buy it, but luckily the style is short dresses, so at least they can wear them again easier.</p>
<p>Neither of my kids had a sweet-16, bought a prom dress, went to a prom, and the oldest’s graduation party had us wearing plastic Viking helmets and party-colored crinoline tutus. Nary a complaint (or even a request) from either of them.</p>
<p>My younger one just bought a Speedo bathing suit for her Egypt trip. At Value Village. Cost $3.50.</p>
<p>Oh, the wonders of a deprived childhood where you don’t even know enough to ask. ;)</p>
<p>I would love to see pictures of that party, Mini! :)</p>
<p>D did go to the prom–dress cost about $60. Ironically, the same as my wedding dress had cost 18 years earlier.</p>
<p>I know we didn’t pay anything close to these numbers. People are certainly entitled to spend their money how they want, but some of those profiled didn’t seem to see that it was a choice. </p>
<p>I think the part that surprised me most was the hundreds of dollars for graduation announcements–I mean, if people weren’t close enough to us to know our kids were graduating, why would I need to tell them (and spend money to do so?)</p>
<p>Basically, folks who were celebrating something new and good in their lives were invited to tie the party-colored crinoline around their waists. And then other folks could ask them what it was for. It was all part of our “gratitutooed with horns” party. (I do have picture somewhere.)</p>
<p>$45 for makeup? $50 for nails? I’m glad I have boys. I’m going to have to stop complaining that they quickly wear holes in even the sturdiest, double-kneed pants, that their preferred style is covered in mud, and that they consider trips to the barber shop an excruciating waste of time.</p>
<p>It could be worse. At least they both love their daily showers.</p>
<p>What bothers me the most about the article is that some of the families who are dropping excessive amounts of money are clearly low-income.</p>
<p>It’s definitely cheaper to have boys( except video games). But I do think some kids whose parents have lower income than mine outspend my kid also.</p>
<p>My daughter spent about $350 on prom (dress, $135; shoes, $40; purse, $25; restaurant, $45; prom ticket, $45; her share of the “party bus” $60). No makeup, no nails, no professional hairdo, no flowers, no after-prom party. This seemed within reason to me, but I can see why it might be a formidable expense for others.</p>
<p>One basic black dress ($125), worn with preexisting shoes and purse, got her through the rest of the senior year special events.</p>
<p>Most of the kids are at the beach right now, which is expensive (and in my opinion risky), but my daughter isn’t there because her summer job has already started. How convenient. </p>
<p>A lot of people who have less money than my family does outspend us. This is why they have less money than we do!</p>
<p>For years, my daughter used to complain because other families went on expensive vacations every year and we didn’t, and because many of the other kids got cars as soon as they got their licenses and she didn’t. Many of those families’ kids are not attending their first choice colleges because the financial aid packages were inadequate and that was a dealbreaker. My daughter got to go to any college she wanted. She’s not complaining anymore. (And she’s still not going on exotic trips. She’s spending her summer running a cash register in a craft store, and she and I are sharing one car between us.)</p>
<p>My daughter’s prom dress was less than $140 and we considered that to be very expensive. A major expense for us was the AP tests both my kids took. At our school, there is a rule that students must take the AP test if they have taken the AP course, or they will be dropped one letter grade. For some of their senior AP classes, they did not need the scores for college placement but still had to take the tests at over $70 each. My daughter took seven altogether and my son took nine. In his senior year, he took five and that was an unnecessarily large check we had to write out to the College Board, as he really only needed the scores from two of them that year (Physics and Calculus).</p>
<p>Well, they don’t. It especially ridiculous for seniors who are already admitted to college and know which tests they need scores for and which they don’t. I actually asked the school if there was relief for students taking so many AP tests, and I was told that only if there was financial hardship involved, which is not the case for our family. </p>
<p>My son graduated in 2002 and I remember that we were at an admitted students’ program in April when my husband called to say that my son’s friend had been told by the teachers to contact him. My son had not turned in his check for the AP test and the deadline was the next day. I think the tests were $70 each at the time. I told my husband and he said, “OK, I will write a check for $70 to give the friend to bring to school.” He was horrified when I told him, “No, they are $70 EACH! You have to write a check for $350!!”</p>
<p>The girl in that article whose single mother is working more than one job should be ashamed of herself for spending even $350 on a dress (at least it wasn’t the $700 one!) Instead, one would hope she’d limit her spending and give the extra to her mother or continue to save it for college. But then again, why the heck was mom and grandmom taking her anywhere where a $350 or $700 dress was even an option? My girl spent $75 on a drop-dead beautiful dress for a special occasion this spring which we bought at the end of last year in the after-Christmas sales. She will use it more than once this summer. It’s not like people don’t know these events are coming up and can’t plan ahead.</p>
<p>Just wait 'til some of these ‘prom princesses’ get married! No wonder weddings are a multi-billion dollar business!</p>
<p>(Designer’s name changed to protect the innocent.)</p>
<p>I know a family whose daughter’s prom dress was made by Betsey Johnson. Not Betsey Johnson the fashion house. Betsey Johnson the HUMAN BEING.</p>
<p>I kinda thought, at the time, that maybe it would’ve been sufficient for one of Betsery’s underlings to actually fit the dress on the daughter’s body after Betsey sketched the original design for her. But no. We’re talking about Betsey herself with pins in her mouth, adjusting the hem.</p>
<p>I mean, how do you top that when it’s time for the wedding dress? Bring Coco Chanel back from the dead to sew the buttons on the gown?</p>
<p>I make a distinction between the HS or College required expenses (no matter what they may be) and the over-the-top vacation/cruise/party/etc. costs.</p>
<p>“We have worked hard for 4 years, so we DESERVE it” is not a way of thinking that will serve our kids well in the future, IMO.</p>
<p>I have seen too many of my friends’ children who, having been given just about everything they ever wanted, are now young adults and unwilling to live beneath the standard of living of their older, successful parents. Result: incredible debt and/or continued dependence on Mommy and Daddy.</p>
<p>I don’t see how this is doing our kids any favors.</p>
<p>Novelisto wrote: “It’s not like people don’t know these events are coming up and can’t plan ahead.”</p>
<p>A defining difference between poor and middle-class households is the ability to plan ahead.</p>
<p>So, if some single mom drops $40 on a nail job for her daughter on prom day, I can’t judge that. I’ll spend dinner for 2 at $40 to eat with H in a restaurant. The single mom isn’t in the restaurant because she’s home cooking. Same $40.</p>
<p>Like Marian and Mini (LOL on the tutus) we kept h.s. school costs down because college was always on our minds.</p>
There are some advantages to having a somewhat anti-social boy.</p>