Image by thesteeds via Flickr
Well, now that Ive had two babies, I’m starting to get an idea of what I really use everyday. I’m finding that even though I had gone pretty minimal the first time, I still had things that I really didn’t use much. With that said, here are my newborn baby Top 10 Essentials:
1. Cloth Diapers. With my first, I used Mother Ease sized diapers. We love those with one exception — the smalls did not go on our petite little one for 3 MONTHS! This time around, I bought some BumGenius X-small AIO’s (which were SUPER hard to find – BTW!). Sooooooo glad I bought those!
2. Cloth wipes. As long as you have to wash the diapers, you may as well have the wipes, too, and save yourself a trip to the garbage for the wipe. I have used both ImseVimse cloth wipes and regular baby washcloths. I put a few drops of lavender or tea tree oil and a few drops of Dr. Bronner’s to 2 cups of water in a used wipes container. They work way better than commercial wipes anyway.
3. A changing pad. Not the big poofy ones that go on a changing table, but small ones to fit in your diaper bag or purse. I loved these fuzzy ones from Target, myself. I even use them on the bed/floor at home.
4. Co-Sleeper. I’m not going to get into a debate about whether this is safe or not. Obviously, if I’m doing it, I believe it is safe and have fully researched it. We have a king-sized bed and opted to go for the Humanity Family Bed Co-Sleeper. I adore it! We’ve taken it everywhere (including several months in FL), and it’s still as new as the day we bought it! It absorbs spit-up and whatever other bodily fluids might show up. It’s super thick and comfy!
5. Slings. When I had Lil’ Bit, I mostly used a ring sling & my SIL bought me a great Mai Tae sling that worked great when she got older. This time around I have added a Moby Wrap to my arsenal — it just seems to be the most comfortable for super little babies.
6. Blanket(s). I have a few light thermal blankets (4 & that seems like a lot) and some nice warm fuzzy ones (3 of those seems perfect).
7. Sleepers & bodysuits. These are all I care to dress them in for the first 3 months or so. I tend to have winter babies and so I always layer a small Gerber onesie underneath a sleeper. You can even get fancy sleepers so even church is okay–look at those “shoes.” How cute!
8. An exercise ball. They even make special ones now. I just use a regular one. I’ve not met a baby yet who couldn’t be subdued by one of these.
9. Nursing bra(s). For goodness sake, get a good one and get the right size. With everything else that’s out of place, keep those looking good. After all, they are at least 3 sizes bigger!
10. Burp cloths. I used to like to use receiving blankets to hold the huge spit ups that get EVERYWHERE when we are home…With the second I realized I never kept them on. So my favs are Gerber Terry Burp Cloths.
What are your baby must have’s?
This post is being linked to Top Ten Tuesday @ Oh Amanda.
. I’m also fairly good at keeping pretty well covered. While I have a few items of nursing clothing now, in the beginning I tried to get by with normal clothing. It worked okay and certain dresses would allow me to nurse, but would expose a little more than I prefer (i.e. The whole breast). The BabyBond(TM) Couture is the perfect solution to the problem!
r Books
. This is a cute little story about how misunderstandings can lead people to do mean things. A bunch of little fish get scared when the big whale comes to hang out there. They are afraid of him and tell him to go away and he ends up scaring them and driving away the fish. Come to find out that the whale thought they were pretty and the fish were just plain mean. They ended up living together happily ever after. The sparkley, shimmery fish are a nice plus, too.
. This one was my favorite of the Tuff Books we were sent. The animals of the forest heard this noise and everyone went to investigate. It was a baby owl howling. Everyone tried to help it to stop and some of the “older” animals tried to shame it into stopping. Finally the mother owl came and eventually the baby stopped crying. So what were the tears over. She couldn’t remember. LOL! I feel like that sometimes so I love this one 
was the next book we received. This one is about two little chicks who are playing at the playground with all sorts of other little animals. They all try to get the little chicks to play with them and always get the same answer — “Oh no. Little chicks can’t do THAT!” Until they get to the slide and frogs and mice who are just as small as them convince them to try it. They play happily ever after 
. Mama can’t sleep because she is worried about something so she gets up to do something useful. And of course, dad can’t sleep since mom’s up and through the course of the night EVERYONE in the house gets up. Eventually, they all crawl into bed and go back to sleep.
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