What do I need for this Baby? Good and Bad Gear Advice Needed

In My Humble Opinion
61

Prob some duplicates but here’s my list, and I just sent the same thing to a friend a few weeks ago. Mom to 2 girls :slight_smile: And yes, if you’re having a shower don’t buy anything until after the shower. We bought things like the crib and rocking chair because our in-laws were paying for it and lived out of town.

Having the Diaper genie I and diaper genie 2, I’ll throw in my thoughts about it. We used the diaper genie almost exclusively once we went on solids with Baby 1 (nursing/foods at 6 months). With baby 2, we just throw the wet diapers in a small trash can and use the diaper genie for the gross diapers. Definitely have saved some money that way too.

Pass:
-Baby bath: we actually were given this piece of molded foam to put in the bath. It worked out really well and kept her from sliding around.
-Temperature duck: I’ve never seen it get hot, even when I use it in the tub!
-Blankets and toys: EVERYONE will knit, buy, sew you some type of blanket. No joke, our baby got 10 blankets and we live in FLORIDA! Some were downright ‘interesting’ too. Oh, and everyone will pick you up some type of stuffed animal toy too.

Must Have:
-Bouncer: some vibrate, others have tunes
-Foam baby seat: We had a Bumbo. It was nice to put the 3-4 month old in while I did some light housework. Helps kid learn to sit up, still need to keep an eye on them otherwise they will try to use their legs to ‘launch’ themselves out of it, and fall over.
-Boppy: We nursed and this was great, but also great for tummy time, cuddling, learning to sit etc.
-Electric nursing pump: I pumped and froze milk for those ‘just in case’ times, and we were also traveling on a 10 day trip and wanted to have milk on hand for the in laws to feed the kid. (Yea…that worked out GREAT…) I had a hand one for the first 6 months and after sucky results (yes literally), we spent the money on a very nice electric one. My suggestion, look online at the medical suppliers, you’ll easily save $100-150 dollars off retail. Ours came with a cute little carry bag too! I got a Medela Pump In Style.
-Sound machine: From the first night we started a routine of reading the girls stories, turning on the sound machine and off to sleep they went. Other than sickness and the undiagnosed contact dermatitis (for NINE sleepless months…), and have had few sleeping problems. This clock is a sound machine and projects the time on the ceiling. We’ve actually gone through a few of these because time projection thing stops working for no reason, but it still will leave a light blue light up on the ceiling.
-Darkened room shades: Dark room = happy baby.
-Night light: Somewhere on the path to the baby’s room for those first few weeks where you forget where you’re at and where you’re going and inevitably trip on something.
-Sleep blanket: Halo makes these great sleep sack type things. If you are crafty, or have a crafty person in your family they are a BREEZE to make yourself too! Put the baby in, zip 'em up and you don’t need to worry about a blanket in the bed. I think Graco and a few others have their own brands too.
-Cloth diapers - for burp clothes. I think they’re called birdseed or something, you can easily find them at Walmart.
-White onesies - You will go through a lot of onesies the first 6 months with spitup or nighttime outfits. It’s like baby’s basic white tee!
-Baby Monitor - We got the digital monitors from Graco. We got the 1 parent monitor version, but that was quite awhile ago.
-Baby play mat - washable!!! must!!
-Highchair, you could probably wait 2-3 months until your baby has better head control. We didn’t purchase one until Julie was about 5-6 months.

Nursing Book: So That’s What They’re for: Breastfeeding Basics - Loved it. Helped soothe my brain about things during growth spurts and why I had no milk etc…

Don’t go nuts with buying bottles and bottle accessories. If you plan on nursing we still had a bottle or 2 and a small can of formula (the ones that come as a free sample usually) as a just in case thing. ie: I had to go on meds once and had to pump/dump for a day. Plus you never know what your baby will like. Baby 1 wanted Avent bottles warmed for the first months and only from mommy?! Baby 2 needed Playtex Ventaire for gas and could care less if my milk was ice cold and who it was from!

I’ve also had lots of great luck with the Graco products. They’re very reasonably priced and I have gotten more than my moneys worth from carseats, high chairs, strollers, monitors etc.

See if your area has a momslikeme.com website, and see if anyone posts there with suggestions and such! Sign up at the website for Huggies, Gerber, or the formula companies for freebies or coupons. See if your local grocery store has a baby club. Publix in the south has a really great program.

Congrats!

62

One thing I found very helpful was a baby monitor with a motion sensor - a plate placed under the mattress that sets off an alarm if the baby stops breathing (or if you forget to turn it off before picking the kid up). Truth be told, it doesn’t do much for the baby, but it really helps the parents sleep calmly.

63

Great idea. Most moms keep in touch with the moms they met in pregnancy yoga class. In fact, that is the best maybe only, reason to go to such a class. Me, I just made a leaflet inviting all parents of babys and preschoolers to my home for tea and to meet other parents in the neighborhood. The leaflet I put in the 200 mailboxes on my block, in a two -street radius. That got me two nice contacts with other young parents for exchanging hand-me-downs, playdates, tips, and company.

64

Absolutely! But if your baby likes one of them, the giver will be so proud, but the trouble is that you can’t buy a spare one.

So instead, put all those stuffed animals somewhere out of the way (they aren’t allowed in a crib anyway, for safety reasons) and buy several pairs of one safe stuffed toy, not too big. Put it in sight of your baby from the start, and with your baby in the crib starting at 4 months. If your baby starts to get really attached to it, around 12 months or so, you will have several spare ones, and those can be a life saver if Snookie goes missing, (your baby won’t be able to sleep without Snookie!). Or when you need a Snookie both in daycare and at home, and don’t want to bother with relocating the tattered thing four times a day, always wondering if your kid won’t drop him in transit so you will have to get back to the parking lot to look for Snookie under the parked cars. Also, Snookie will become filthy and will lose half his bulk in the washmachine, and then having another Snookie will make both you and your kid happy.

All this requires some scent management (I wore it in my T-shirt and repaced Snookies often) to make sure the new Snookie doesn’t smell too new.
And ditto the dark room = happy sleeping baby. Easy to forget, as baby stores don’t sell them, so they don’t push them.

65

Or else buy something generic and corporate, like a Pooh. You can find replacement Poohs anywhere.

66

Just coming in to ditto the Bumbo seat - we liked ours so much we got them for our friends.
Also, the wife swears by Lansinoh, but I wouldn’t know, they’re not my nipples (…anymore sob).

I do know I liked using the ring-sling, especially for quick walks to the shops and the like. Since I was the stay-at-home dad & primary caregiver from 3 months or so, it was pretty handy to be able to carry baby and still do things.
Also, plain cotton nappies come in handy for all sorts of things, so we always had a clean stack in the nursery.

67

Nope. My nipples don’t really sweat. I also took them off when I got home, for the most part–they were just for wearing at work.

Speaking of work, if you’re pumping at work, La Leche League makes a WONDERFUL hands-free pumping bra that is not very expensive and comes in nice big sizes. I got one that was a size too small and just put it on over my normal nursing bra rather than wearing it full time, but it was the best handsfree nursing device I found. Medela makes a hands-free pump called the Freestyle, but I found out (too late, after I got it from my mom as a gift) that you can’t be any bigger than an F cup to use it, so I had to find another option for hands-free pumping. Life got much easier after I found the LLL bra–I tried many other options that weren’t nearly as good. I tried rigging my own, using nursing bustiers and weird wire devices, and they all paled in comparison to the LLL bra.

Also, everyone is hyping the Lansinoh nipple ointment. I actually preferred the Medela brand, because it was more easily spreadable and less sticky and tacky.

68

Save TONS on baby plates and hours of cleaning baby food off the floor with Ploppies, little cheap double sided suction cups. They allow you to use your ordinary plates (the one that fit so nicely in your cupboard) instead of bulky baby plates. The suction cups will fasten the plate to the table. Which is good, because babys will indicate they have had enough to eat with a mighty swipe or by turning the plate upside down. Plates with interesting images will also be turned over to see them, with the food still on them. Those plates are really for older kids, not babies.

69

I cannot describe how much I love this idea!

We also swear by light-blocking curtains (I never got around to making them pretty by adding other fabric - who cares?) and white noise generator. Actually, I love the white noise (Honeywell mini fan, old model before they made it quieter, the bastards). My husband believes that I’ve made the kids dependent on white noise and he hates having to bring a machine on vacation or to Grandma’s. I say it’s worth it!

70

That’s key- have lots.

Our oldest daughter was given a plain, cheap cloth diaper as a snuggle toy. (“Wubby”) We bought countless packs of them to replace the missing one. She’s twelve now and still has one hanging around. She likes it when she’s not feeling well.

The kids have a cousin who’s dragging around a stuffed Care Bear. It looks like hell, and you can’t imagine the drama involved when he leaves it somewhere and can’t find it.

As another tip, get the baby on as much of a schedule as you can. Sleep when the baby does.

Father of twins here.

71

One more item that isn’t on most lists: If you have an old house with a wonky thermostat, or heating that is adjusted by room, get a digital room thermometer with a large display, that is also a hygrometer, and set it up on some surface in your baby’s room. You can’t rely on your own estimate of how warm or cold it is in his room; you are influenced by how warm you are dressed, if you just came from a warm or cold room, etc. Being too hot or too cold, or the air being too dry or too moist, are things that babys mind and that can be easily adjusted if you just know what the problem is. For instance, babies need an hot water bottle when the temperature in their room will drop below 16 degrees F at night.

ETA I saw that Ploppies aren’t for sale in the US, at least not by that name. This is the closest match on Amazon. If someone wants to get rich, start importing them :slight_smile: They are light and small, so they make a good present by mail.

72

I know this wasn’t directed to me, but I have a couple pairs of Dr. Brown’s breast pads and I really like them; however, they may not be for you if you’re a leaker. Luckily, while I do leak sometimes, it’s not all the time. Anyway, I can toss them into the wash with my other things and they’re large enough they cover enough of your breast that they’re not visible through clothing. Wearing a lined nursing bra also helps make breast pads less visible.

Ooh, and ditto the Medela-brand nipple stuff. It’s much thinner than the Lansinoh, so you don’t have to work as hard to spread it. If your nipples are very sore, handling them to put ointment on can hurt; the more easily spreadable, the better.

73

If anyone wants the aforementioned box of disposable breast pads (johnson&johnson brand) they are free to a good home.
PM me your address.

Medela ointment isn’t available here (or at least I don’t ever remember seeing it) so Lansinoh was the one I ended up using after trying all of the “lanolin-free” vegan ones and giving them up as less than useless. I’m afraid animal products are the way to go for sore nipples. A little goes a long way- I’m still using the first tube I bought and irishbaby is 6 months old now.

Our Tomy brand baby monitor has a built in nightlight and room thermometer- which is handy.

I think everyone has their own favourite baby brands- someone mentioned Gracco- mine are Tomy, Tommy Tippee and Cosatto, which have all proven to be worth the money I’ve spent on their products.

If you live near an Ikea check out their kiddy section, even if you are not keen on their furniture for your little one. They do cheap plastic bowls, towels, washclothes, potties, toys and bedding that are all perfectly serviceable. Their stuff is also the kind of thing that would work for occasional use at the grandparents’ - where the budget option makes much more sense.

Not a baby product- but every pregnant woman or nursing mum needs an attractive and sexy nursing bra- Womama, Cake and HotMilk do some lovely things! The links are to websites selling lingerie for pregnant ladies- possibly NSFW (depending on how your work feels about pregnant ladies in lingerie).

74

How exciting to be planning for your new little one!!

I’m a little late to the party, but thought I would share the best advice we received when our baby was new (she’s 13 months now).

The first thing our pediatrician told us was: Don’t let anyone tell you you’re holding your baby too much. She said there are so many products and devices that separate us from our babies–bouncy seats, strollers, high chairs, car seats, bassinettes, etc. And there will be people who tell you that you’ll “spoil” the baby if you hold her too much. But what babies want most (other than food) is to be held safe and secure in your arms.

I also wanted to second the advice someone mentioned earlier in the thread, that night time feedings are “business only”. We have been lucky in that our daughter has enjoyed her sleep time from the beginning, but we also focused on making sure any night time waking was strictly change diaper, feed and get back to sleep. She’s not a perfect sleeper and has her nights of waking up at 4 am every once in awhile, but more often than not she sleeps through the night and I think that strategy helped us develop good patterns for her.

75

Hot Milk is great, I’m an E/F cup while feeding, and it’s actually hard to find ‘normal’ looking bras which do the job supportwise, while still looking attractive. Interesting to note that 2 of the 3 brands listed above are from New Zealand - who would have thought that would be the country that cares about sexy-looking mummy boobs?

76

Make sure you have a basic first-aid kit together. Babies get feverish quickly, and it’s not a good time to find a 24-hour drugstore. You’re going to want to get specifics from the pediatrician, but at minimum, you should have a thermometer, a bottle of infant Tylenol, and a bottle of Pedialyte. The sprog’s pediatrician has a handout that he gives to parents that lists what he recommends, and your baby’s pediatrician may have something similar.

And make sure you’ve got clothes around that are the next size up. The sprog outgrew his 0-3 month clothes quickly, so it was nice to have the larger onesies and sleepers handy!