As someone else said, your 4YO will not notice or care. That said, 4 year olds do not stay 4 years old. As they grow up they start noticing differences in how people live and act. For us, this has been a teaching opportunity. Why do those other families have/do/buy more XXX than we do? Because mommy and I value time with you more than material stuff that will be broken or forgotten about shortly after you buy it. This sort of message has also been framed as a norm in our house for years. This has been successful enough that my 11 YO is far more interested in the idea that she will likely learn to drive on our 2005 minivan than the fact that it is a 10 year old minivan.
I also have found that there are two strategies that have made life easier for us:
- Camouflage: we chose to live in a pleasant, middle class suburb with excellent schools. We are not surrounded by millionaires or even particularly high consumption types. So our dull-normal lifestyle does not brook any comment and if you were trying to figure out which house on the block to rob by what you could see out front, you would most likely pass mine by.
- Have a stereotype/story ready: Most people do NOT want to hear how you are breaking convention and (they feel) implicitly questioning or rejecting their societal norm lifestyle. Give them an easy out by having a persona or two that they will be comfortable with. Depending on the crowd, I either throw out the card of "work from home consultant" (see, I still have to work like all of you), or suburban redneck (hunting, fishing, camping, pickup, etc.). If you pick your story carefully, most people will be satisfied and not poke past that, their egos appeased.