WHAT'S THE ISSUE?
Everyone who has children has stories about how it changed their lives. Since we decided to have a child, we've heard hundreds of them.
If you look at each of the warnings listed, you'll
notice that there's no data. What does, "You won't be able to go to
restaurants any more," actually mean? We'll go from 10 restaurant visits
per month to 3 per month? 0 per month? Will we go from doing laundry
twice a month to 5 times a month? Every day?
When trying to decide if you're ready for a child, it would be nice to have actual numbers to go along with these stories to get an idea of how it will change your life.
WHO ARE WE?
I am a full-time software engineer with a physics research background. My wife is a full-time accountant. We both like numbers, trends, etc. We are also having our first child in October 2015 and will both be working full-time after his birth. We have found ourselves having to buy things we didn't expect already, and want to know what (maybe non-obvious) impacts the baby will have on our lives.
WHAT ARE WE DOING ABOUT IT?
We want to try to quantify as much as we can how having a baby affects our lives. There are a lot of effects that can be tracked. Some examples of things that we will be tracking are:
WHAT TOOLS ARE WE USING?
The majority of the data analysis and plots are handled with Python. The interactive plots are created in Tableau. The other plots are created with Excel, and most of the data are tracked and organized in Excel.
If you enjoy this site, I run others that you might enjoy:
CityProjections
SomeSolvedProblems
Everyone who has children has stories about how it changed their lives. Since we decided to have a child, we've heard hundreds of them.
- "You won't be able to go to restaurants any more."
- "You'll have to do so much more laundry than you're expecting."
- "Diaper expenses will overwhelm you financially."
- "You'll start having to drive places constantly."
- "Grocery expenses are going to go up more than you could ever imagine."
- "You'll gain so much weight and never lose it."
When trying to decide if you're ready for a child, it would be nice to have actual numbers to go along with these stories to get an idea of how it will change your life.
WHO ARE WE?
I am a full-time software engineer with a physics research background. My wife is a full-time accountant. We both like numbers, trends, etc. We are also having our first child in October 2015 and will both be working full-time after his birth. We have found ourselves having to buy things we didn't expect already, and want to know what (maybe non-obvious) impacts the baby will have on our lives.
WHAT ARE WE DOING ABOUT IT?
We want to try to quantify as much as we can how having a baby affects our lives. There are a lot of effects that can be tracked. Some examples of things that we will be tracking are:
- How much do we spend on groceries per month?
- How do our weights fluctuate?
- How many more loads of laundry do we do per month?
- How much do we spend on healthcare each month?
- How does having a baby affect your shoe size?
WHAT TOOLS ARE WE USING?
The majority of the data analysis and plots are handled with Python. The interactive plots are created in Tableau. The other plots are created with Excel, and most of the data are tracked and organized in Excel.
If you enjoy this site, I run others that you might enjoy:
CityProjections
SomeSolvedProblems
