Good job! Every time I try to shoot without one, it's rough..

TLDR is no, of course you don't need to. Just look at Alexa's videos! If you are really interested in doing it for some reason though... As, with most things I say try it. Try https://www.pexels.com/videos/ for free stock footage before you pay for anything. But, first answer the question why? Are you trying to increase retention? Communicate a point more clearly? Satisfy your own creative streak? It can add a lot of time to editing especially when you are just learning how to do it so keep it minimal at first to manage the learning curve. I spent literally 2 days trying to figure out how to animate text just the way I wanted to with FCPX, but now any time I want to do it, it only takes 15-20 min. And recently, I have been studying my retention curves and found some of my animated text (on full page "power point" style slides) is actually causing dips in retention. So, experiment, see how much time it adds to editing, and study those retention curves to see if it's working would be my advice.

I have always thought about make videos for my kids. This is very nice! I like your art!

@Ty Myers Beautiful content calendar man! Question: Your screen capture only showed the past. Does your calendar look that good for the future as well with titles and thumbnails at least drafted? What am I using? I am using Thomas Frank's free video project tracker for Notion: https://thomasfrank.notion.site/Video-Project-Tracker-for-YouTubers-4fbb9d0c128142a5b7d6ccec69b1580c But, not really as a content calendar, more to capture ideas, flesh them out and take them all the way into production. I'm not sure I would really recommend it. I find it too heavy for my needs. Thomas Frank has a team of people so maybe it's more useful for people like that. I only have ideas (sometimes with titles and thumbnails) for the next 2 to 3 videos planned out and on my todo list, then I get them done as fast as I can which for me right now is taking 6 to 8 weeks. It's taking longer now because I am trying to be more consistent and disciplined about posting SEO content that I know will perform rather than getting in reps and sticking to a schedule. I think it just suits me better. I'm actually thinking about building this idea of a content calendar into that software I told you about. But, for me it would be less of a calendar and more of a idea funnel that suggests which videos to make 1st, 2nd 3rd etc. from a channel size and SEO perspective.