Best Way to Save/Invest Money for Child's College?

What is the best way to save for my childs education. I have been buying savings bonds and converted them on treasury direct and now I get 35$ a week deposited in there automatically. The money is kinda just sitting there waiting for me to invest it into something? Is there anything I can purchase savings wise that I can't touch for say 4-5 years? I have a 14 yr old, 12 and 4. I understand that I have a few more years to save with my 2nd and 3rd child but my oldest will be 15 in December. I would appreciate any advice, no smart answers please! Thanks!!

The savings bonds are a pretty good idea for the 14 year old, and probably the 12 year old. They don't have many years to go before starting college, and you could be taking too much risk if you put their college money in the stock market. Savings bonds are safe. If your income falls below certain levels ($78,100 if you're single, $124,700 if you're married), you could get a tax break if you use savings bonds for college expenses. You might want to think about buying the I-bonds, which protect you to some degree from inflation (not completely, since college expenses have been rising faster than the general rate of inflation).

As for the 4 year old, you could consider a low cost 529 Plan or a low cost Coverdell ESA account. Since that child has about 14 years before going to college, putting some money into the stock market may provide some long term growth. You can open a Coverdell with many banks, brokerage firms, credit unions or mutual funds. A 529 Plan will usually be sponsored by a state--the low cost ones have to be opened directly with the sponsoring state. There are lots of high cost 529 plans sold by stock brokers, but these aren't a good idea because of the expense. For more information about these accounts, look at the webpages listed below.

You're saving relatively small amounts, and may not have enough to open a 529 Plan or Coverdell account until you build up your savings a bit. In that case, keep buying savings bonds until you have enough for an account. Good luck.

Best ways:
1. Take insurance policy/policies which will give return in 10,11,12,13,.. years.
2. Invest in Mutual funds which are specialized for child en, e.g. some schemes of HDFC or Franklin Templeton
3. Put Fix deposit if you have cash in hand
4. Please know that it is very difficult and not practicable to deposit money in bank account every month, Only some forced cut off would serve the purpose