I remember being pregnant and sitting at my parents' house with my sister and my sister-in-law going over both of my baby registries on my laptop. BabiesRus gave me this little checklist with about 5 million items on it that I ABSOLUTELY WOULD DIE WITHOUT! We all sat and laughed at some of the stupid stuff the registry was suggesting I buy. (Like 2 different diaper bags and 2 different types of strollers?) Nice try trying to capitalize of naive moms-to-be BabiesRus. A-Holes. Sometimes when I am browsing someone else's baby registry, I find myself laughing at some of the frivolous crap on there....but I also understand that they are probably in the same position I was in and just don't know any better. It happens to all of us. We are all naive until we aren't. But anyway...as we are all still learning and growing as parents, I thought I would share a list of 10 things that I am glad I DID have for my child when he graced us with his wonderful little presence. These 10 things made bringing a newborn home that much easier and I am hoping if and when I DO lose my mind and decide to have another baby, I will be THAT much more prepared:
10. A Dishwasher Caddy
So I made it KNOWN that I was going to breastfeed my kid as long as I could because that's what good mothers do and I was going to be supermom!!! Well that lasted about a month. Without getting into the gory details, it just wasn't working for myself OR Brady. I will leave it at that. I decided I would pump instead and we would also supplement with formula. This way Daddy could also join in on the feeding fun and give me a break. Pumping ended up becoming a chore that took waaay too long. There was no way I was going to be able to go back to work and take enough time away from my desk to pump. Also, switching between formula and milk was beginning to upset Brady's stomach, so the easiest decision I have ever made was to put him on formula completely. (I still catch myself growing envious of mom's who lasted longer than I did, but ya know? My son is still healthy regardless so who cares?) So frequently feeding an infant who is only bottle-fed leads to some serious dirty bottle build up. Steve and I went on a bottle run one time and I think we came back with like...22 bottles because we were just sick of constantly washing them to reuse. We wanted to be able to put them in the dishwasher and just run them with the rest of the dishes when it was full. These caddies are great because they protect the nipples from becoming ruined while washing. We actually still use this for sippy cups! What a wonderful and cheap investment!
9. Moby Wrap or Baby Bjorn (or Both)
Either of these are wonderful for when your baby is still fairly small. (Moby wrap shown above) It basically allows you to still be pregnant with your baby while not actually being pregnant. (aka: hold them and still have full use of both hands) You can clean, eat, apply make up, throw your beer at the tv, ect...all the while your baby is still snug and cozy up against you and most of all...content. I ate Thanksgiving dinner with Brady strapped to me in the Bjorn because he did not want to be put down that day. Steve even wore Brady in the Moby a couple times and let me tell you...he is an ADORABLE pregnant man!
8. Jumperoo
Brady eventually outgrew the Moby and the Bjorn and became more active, as babies tend to do. We went from bouncy seat, to bumbo seat, to exersaucer, to whatever stupid-named baby product we could fit him in next and keep him entertained. He would last about 10 minutes and get bored and cry to be picked up. It got frustrating after a while because as much as we loved holding our baby, we needed to get other things done. His sleep time was also getting shorter, thus so was our "clean the house" time. We finally inherited this colorful little contraption from Steve's sister and wow!! The first time I put Brady in I watched him in amazement. The kid jumped and jumped and jumped and I cracked up watching this tiny little body bounce up and down and a pretty intense rate. I even texted Steve's sister and asked her if he was going to give himself shaken baby syndrome! (She said he wouldn't) I think Brady averaged 45 minutes at a time in this. Sometimes longer!! He couldn't get enough of it and frankly, sometimes, neither could we. I also believed it helped him build his little leg muscles quite a bit and he walked at 10 months old! I 100% recommend this product and just in case we do ever decide to go for Miller baby # 2, it is still in our basement!
7. Similac On-The-Go
Sometimes, I look back on some of the stuff we did, and wonder why we were so dumb. When we would venture out with Brady for long periods of time, we would actually bring formula, bottles, our own clean bottled water, and pray that wherever we were going had an accessible microwave. Then when I learned that the hospital wasn't hoarding these and you can get them at Walmart, I felt stupid. Open the bottle, pop a nipple on, and you are done. We're stupid.
6. Gas Drops
Babies have sensitive stomachs and they get gassy. This makes their stomachs hurt. This makes them unhappy. This will also make YOU unhappy. Ours went through a 2 week period where he was unhappy. So were we. Turns out his lil' belly was full of gas bubbles. These gas drops helped quite a bit! They help to bring the gas OUT of the baby. Whichever exit it comes out...well...that's a fun little guessing game! But the fussiness will hopefully subside along with the gassiness. I am not saying this is the cure to all baby fussiness. There could be a thousand reasons. But this may be a good start!
5. Video Monitor
I think I can sympathize with most new parents in the fact that one of the scariest and most difficult nights is the night you first put your baby in his or her own room. Everyone does it at a different time and there is no right or wrong time to do it in my opinion. We waited as long as we could because everything freaked us out. Brady finally got too big for his swing and bassinet and we moved him at 6 months. (Don't judge me. 6 months is when the risk of SIDS reduces tremendously and I am super paranoid) Although it seemed like we checked on him every 10 minutes to make sure he was still breathing, we were able to relax and have a much better peace of mind. Truth be told, I still use it. Our room is on the opposite side of the house from Brady and the way our house is designed (it's kind of a weird design), we cannot hear jack from the 2nd floor when we are on the first floor of our house and vice versa. If he needs us, we can be there instantly. It also picks up EVERYTHING, which is nice because I have a partial hearing loss in one ear. This thing works so well, that we can hear him sucking on his paci at night. The video part is great too if you are teaching your baby to put themselves to sleep and "cry it out" so to speak. That is something that is very hard to do because the first thing you want to do is run in their room and make sure a scary monster isn't trying to steal them. This is a great way to calm that fear. It is also a good spying tool too when your kid is a teenager. HAHA! KIDDING....kind of.
4. Swing
Let me tell you something about newborns and bassinets. They don't always like each other. The pediatrician at the hospital may as well have just slapped me in the face when I asked about letting him sleep in a swing instead of the bassinet after a rough night at the hospital following Brady's birth. He ALWAYS broke out of the swaddle no matter how hard we tried to keep him in there and he would wake up after 3 or 4 minutes of bassinet time. After my apparent stupid suggestion, the pediatrician, (who was about 109 years old) said "No! Why would you put him in a swing? He does not need to be put in a swing". This woman was lucky I was recovering from a c-section and didn't jump out of my bed and slap her. I didn't slap her, but I also didn't take her advice and we set the swing up as soon as he got home and Brady slept MUCH better! We even tried to move him to the bassinet, but every time we did, he would wake up. Then it was "no sleep for anyone". Brady ended up sleeping in a swing for the first 5 months of his life. He kept his swaddle much better and the motion of the swing soothed him. He did NOT die and he did NOT develop any sort of complex from this. (That old hag can suck it and if you agree with her then so can you). Brady now sleeps wonderfully in a crib. There just ended up being one night where he was not happy in the swing. So we put him in the bassinet and he slept. Just like that. This won't hold true for everyone, but it is a prime example of following your baby's lead and figuring out what works best for you. So if your baby is having a hard time with the bassinet and you don't want to co-sleep (which I did as well sometimes, although old lady river would probably have a coronary if she knew), this may be a good option.
3. The Miracle Blanket
Unless you are super-human, mastering a swaddle is like mastering Chinese. (Or at least it was for me) I only know 1 single person in the world who was able to swaddle my son to where he could not break out of it...my brother-in-law Jorge. He is some kind of sorcerer. But only problem is he lives in the Washington DC area so he was not as my disposal. My sister suggested the miracle blanket and let me tell you, it WAS a miracle. This kept Brady tightly wrapped without having to rubix-cube him into an ordinary hospital blanket. Turning him into a burrito, combined with the swing gave us so solid sleep stretches! Say that 3 times fast!
2. She Needs No Introduction
Now here is a high-tech modern advancement! A friggin' DOG TOY that costs $22!!! I registered for this stupid thing because my sister told me I needed to. I ended up getting 2. Its friggin' awesome. NO attention was paid to any other sort of teething toy. We brought her EVERYWHERE with us. It provided quite a bit of teething relief for Brady and I am actually glad to say we have an unopened one waiting in the wings. So Thank you ToysRUs for selling this stupid product....that actually turned out to be not so stupid...
and finally....my FAVORITE...
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wait for it....
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1. A MECHANICAL Nasal Aspirator
This needs to win some sort of award for BEST invention ever!!! Let me tell you something about those bulb syringes they give you at the hospital. THEY SUCK! And not literally! They suck so much because they suck so little!
So parents, no matter how much you try to shelter your baby, you cannot face the inevitable. They are going to get sick. They are born with very weak immune systems and it will happen. Especially if they are in daycare like my son. Yeah, we pretty much threw him to the wolves on that one. (Sorry Brady)
At some point, there will be coughs, infections, viruses and most of all, snotty noses that make breathing a whole heck of a lot harder since babies can't blow their noses. Well never fear!!! The mechanical nasal aspirator will fix that for you! Particularly the one shown above. I must warn you, your child probably will not like it. It plays music to try and help soothe the child, but yeah right. It does no such thing. However, it IS nice to have a jaunty tune to torture your child to. (Joking) The best way to use it is to put the child on the changing table, one of you holding their head and limbs so they can't flail, and the other person to use the aspirator in one nostril while plugging the other one to create a suction. Yes. I know. This sounds horrible and I sound like I have no heart. But I do because I promise, it pulls on my heart strings STILL when I use this on my 2 year old. But DAMN!!! (Disclaimer: Gross) There is this little cup that catches all the snot that gets sucked out and we have FILLED it up before! WADS and WADS of snot no longer obstructing his or her breathing! Its fascinating. But in all seriousness, I am sorry if it makes you barf, but it REALLY WORKS!!
OK so if you take anything from this, even one minuscule product that you never thought about using, then my work here is done. I hope you have found it informative and helpful. I am going to go buy some stock in Graco now.
Meghan
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