I grew up poor, but not in poverty. We always knew there's be food on the table, even if that food was hamburger meat with potatoes shredded into it to bulk it up so it lasted a few days. Once when i was about 12 our oven broke and we didn't have money to repair/replace it so for 3 years we only ate what could be cooked in the microwave or grilled on the stovetop. My parents' financial situation improved when i was about 15, and while they've never been rich, we're much better off than we used to be. We replaced the oven with my dad's first money from his new job and bought all the ingredients for chocolate chip cookies; its one of my favorite memories, all my family crowding the oven and eating hot cookies.

We also shared clothes; my older sister received hand-me-downs from a better-off family friend, and then they'd go to me, then a neighbor, then my cousins, and finally to my little sister. We'd get a couple new outfits for school, and a new dress at Easter, but my mom always shopped the sales. We'd pick out our back to school clothes months ahead and a size up in case we grew before school started. Luckily for us, bullying about clothing style/fit wasn't really a thing until my younger sister was in her early teens.

My parents both grew up similarly, poor but not in poverty, so they stretched their resources the way their parents had and splurged here and there to make us feel like normal kids. We were always allowed to participate in sports/dance, even though my mom could sometimes barely swing the costume fee or have to make monthly payments to the coaches. Every year a popular local amusement park would have a discount day, and we'd pile a cooler full of food and she'd pay the still ridiculous but slightly discounted entrance fee, and we'd stay from the minute the gates opened until the park shut down and the lights turned off.