Baby “Must (Bogus) Have” Lists

We get pregnant and then head straight for the baby checklists, but how much of it is bull, and how much do you really need? There are many things that no one tells you before they happen in this game, but there are a few things about those checklists that you should know. Here is one taken from a popular Australian Baby Chain.

 

 

 

Car SAFETY
Convertible Car seat (0 to Approx 4years)

• Even some of the top brands do not come with all the pieces you need to fit them to your car!  2 weeks of trying to fit it, we co back to the store feeling like idiots and they say “Oh no, you need to buy one of these clip things separately to make it fit. They all need one.” “Do any of them come with this clip?” I ask. “No…” “Brilliant…”
• This will be the most annoying thing that you buy. Getting squirmy baby in and out of this thing with the strap going across each side to the back of the car is a nightmare, every time.
• Get a colour that won’t stain with chuck.

Baby On Board stickers

• Personally I find these a little offensive. As a non parent, I always felt like saying, well I was going to ram raid you off the road but, well gee, if there is a baby in there then I won’t.
• If you have one of these asking me to be careful around your baby on board car, please, do me the courtesy of being able to follow the road rules yourself. Yes this does include not doing half the speed limit in the fast lane, not driving in the middle of two lanes, not breaking up hills etc.

Capsule Sun Hood & Window Sun Shades X 4

• I’m listing these two together because my point is the same. YOU CAN NOT SEE OUT OF THESE! Maybe the back one, but the side ones on the windows? Catch one of these things on an angle and you might as well be looking at your blind spot through a black wall.

Furniture for NURSERY

Cot

• Leave a whole day to try and put this one together. There will be fights. The movie cliche about pieces everywhere, pregnant wife standing there and pointing, sweating husband on the floor surrounded by tools and getting frustrated… it didn’t originate in the magical made up world of Disney.

Chest of Drawers

• Do yourself a favor, buy the same set of drawers from a store that doesn’t display the word “baby” and pay literally half as much for the same thing. They bank on our sentimental side buying our baby things from a baby store. I say laugh all the way to ikea.

Cot Halo Stand & Ring

• Again,  turns out, you can get this and a mozzie net for it at the hardware store for half the price.

Glider Rocking Chair
(Great for feeding)

• A few things on this one, space sucker for a start. Consider that a lot of babies are fussy and sometimes, at 2am, you don’t want to sit in a dark room all alone while your baby cries as you try and feed him. Invest in a really comfortable lounge chair instead, get up and feed your baby while watching Grey’s Anatomy or something. You will be calmer which means baby will be calmer.

Ottoman for resting those tired feet

• And when does this supposed resting take place?

Home SAFETY

Child-proof power Outlet Plugs / Cupboard Door Locks / Door Barrier / VCR Lock  / Stairway Gate / Refrigerator Latch / Stove Guard / Corner Cushions

• It is expensive setting up for baby. For now, forget all the things they list that you will not need for about six months after birth! There will be time for all that when you can attack this side of things without the burden of paying off the 2 grand in baby furniture your about to spend.

Monitor

• This one you will need to have, even if you don’t use it, but my tip, get one that plugs into a power point. So many run on batteries alone now and there is nothing good about that.

Other ESSENTIALS

Hand / Battery Breast Pump

• This actually is a must have. Even if you are with your baby, get your milk supply running with some extra help while your baby is little.

Microwave or Electric steriliser’s

• Microwave. Last thing you need is another appliance that needs storing.

6 -Feeding Bottles

• Important to use every now and again from birth onwards, just so baby doesn’t look at you with a big WTF grin when it comes time to bottle feed.

Bibs

Training mugs / Soft Spoons / Suction Toys for High Chair trays / Potty

•  Again, consider how long it will be until you NEED these things. There will no doubt be an occasion where someone needs to buy you a present between here and then, don’t exhaust all their options. In your huge list of newborn things, why att a potty they may need in two years to the mix?

Lamp

• Lamp? An essential? As long as there is a light in baby’s room, thats all you need. A lamp is another way to get us to spend $120 on a $30 thing just because it is a baby store.

Night Lights

• For when baby is taking herself to the toilet in the middle of the night?

Rattles And Soft Toys

Scissors / Baby Clippers

Carry

Going OUT

Fully Reclinable Pram / Stroller
(from birth)

• Make sure it fits in your car and that you can get it up and down with one hand. Yes, it does make a difference.

Portable cot / Playpen

• In some lists this item is ranked number one in the must haves. I beg to differ. They weight a ton, they are big and bulky and even folded up hardly fit in the car. Until your baby is crawling around you need two things to go to someones house, a portable sleeper ($60) and a change mat. Do not spend 200 on a huge, heavy thing you will not use, especially since with a newborn, how much travelling to social events are you doing anyway!

Mosquito Net

Rain Cover

Wool Liner

• In Australia, you have to be joking. Our idea of winter is 20 degrees C.

Bottle / Carrier Warmer

• There are not many places that do not have a microwave or a kettle to heat something up for you. Save you 100 bucks on this one, especially since most need a power point or car. I can find you ten microwaves in the shopping centre before I can find you a public power point or make it back to my car for the car adapter.

Cuddle Bag

• Cute name makes unnecessary made up things expensive.

Pram Blanket

• Or just a regular blanket?

Pram Toys

Back Pack

• Don’t tell me you don’t have a backpack. The one that matches your stroller from the baby store is not worth what you will pay for it, and after if put it away it will never get used till one day you go on a cleaning rampage and put it on ebay.

Nappy Bag

Sun Shade Cloth

Portable Change Mat

Manchester for NURSERY

Cot:

Pillows

• Pillows?

Mattress
(inner spring or block foam)

Mattress Protector – 2

Sheet Sets – 3

Winter Blankets – 2

Summer Blankets – 2

Piece quilt set – 3

Tetra Snuggle bed

Nappy Stacker

• What you will do is giv up on this and just use them out of the box. No matter how cute you have the nursery looking before baby comes, start using ten nappies a day and suddenly re-stacking the stacker is just a waste of time.

Mobiles for visual stimulation

Bath TIME, Change TIME

Change Table station

• Station? Get a table of the nursery and then one of those splash proof molded change mats for the bathroom ($20 from Big W)

Change Table

Bath and Stand

• Get a cheap bath with a plug in the bottom and put it in YOUR bath. No stand needed, you will only need to find somewhere to store it. Before too long you will give up on the bath all together and either bath them while holding them or just take them in the shower.

Face Washers x 6

• Spend $3 on a bag of cotton balls instead.

Hungry Baby NEEDS

High Chair(from approx 6 months) / High Chair insert / Portable High Chair

• Saves yourself the space, time and money. Do this a month before you need it, not 9 months before you need it.

EXERCISES

Jolly Jumper / Baby Swing / Rocker Carry Chair / Baby Walker / Bouncer / Activity Gym

• If you went and bought all these right now you’d be parting with $700 and half your lounge room. Instead, try buying just one, most likely a vibration bouncer with activity bar and just learn what your baby likes. Over the first 2 months you don’t need much else at all and then you can buy things that you know your baby will enjoy, not storing half the baby store that your baby never liked.

Really Truly.

There are so many things no one tells you about becoming a parent, but even more common are the things they DO tell you but you can’t comprehend. Lily is 9 weeks old in about 7 hours and there hasn’t been a moment in that time where I didn’t feel amazed and wondrous being a part of her world.

You go through stages with them on a daily basis.. There are times when you need them, when they need you, when you need to be away from them, and when you just don’t know what either of you need or want and just have to keep guessing till you get it right. Even when I need to be away from her for even a few minutes, I still end up lingering near her door. I still have this inner need to be close to her, to watch her and just be there.

When I need someone else to take care of her and my husband takes her (at this point I now have my first chance in the day to do anything I want or need to do, have a shower or just even check my mail) if I had a dollar for every time that the most pressing thing I can think of to do is to watch her with him, I’d have a lot of dollars.

How silly is that?

You hear about mothers becoming attached to their children and then having trouble letting them go. It’s not so much that, although I can certainly see how that could happen if you don’t take early precautions. It’s more that my priorities have changed so much that even when I have a chance to, I just get so much out of being near her and watching her that nothing else compares.

It’s overwhelming. How did I exist before her?

Dinner for Breakfast.

When I first got pregnant, my Mother in Law told me that when she first had my husband, she used to set the table for dinner first chance she had in the morning.

Before you have your babies, people tell you these things, but somehow, they just don’t sink in. It’s not that you don’t believe them or that you think you’ll be better, or even that it’s all an exaggeration. It just doesn’t make it through to scare you as much as it should.
They say you’ll never have time for sex and not have time to miss it much. They say you’ll have no time to yourself. They show us the stereotype image of a first time mum looking tired and haggard, spit-up on clothes, messy unwashed hair, unchanged out of track pants for days… Somehow, this also doesn’t scare us the way it should.

But right now I find myself sitting here, 5:30am, expressing because my morning milk supply is so strong it hurts, husband’s bathrobe with unwashed hair, baby throw up on my neck, thinking about what I am going to make for dinner, and writing my to- do list for the day. And if I have time before the baby wakes up again, I will fantasize about getting even one thing on that list actually done this week. The worst part? They told me this would happen! But, it just didn’t sink in… After being cleaned up completely yesterday, in about 18 hours or so, our house once again, looks like a bomb site. How does this happen every single day?

So I understand if you can’t, but if you can, take my advice..

- You WILL look like the stereotype mum and dad so do yourself a favor and go and invest in some classy looking track pants now because you WILL live in them and when you start with trackies that are close to ten years old you’re not giving yourself a head start.

- You WON’T have enough time for your pets. No matter how much you love them and convince yourself before hand that you will make the extra effort and still be able to take them out all the time.. nope. Believe it now and save yourself the surprise. I say surprise instead of guilt because the guilt will come either way. It’s not that you won’t be able to walk them once a week or so, it’s just that the pats and talks you had with them all day long beforehand, those are what will be missing.

- Even if you had time to drink it, you won’t have time to make coffee. Or tea or anything else. In fact, you may find yourself drinking out of the original packaging more than ever although the baby books say drinking directly from the tap is bad for hygiene. So if you can, try and shop for drinks that you don’t need a glass for.. juice boxes, cans.. even small bottles of water.. Everything helps.

- You won’t have time to make any food. Ok, this one is tricky.. Make and eat are two completely different things. Making food is very tough with a baby.. Even a sandwich is very hard to get together.. Where the problem here is, that a packet of chips on the other hand, is very easy to eat with a baby. It’s very tempting to fill your cupboard with the kinds of things that you can pop the bag and snack away. This isn’t a positive nod to your already unstable sense of post pregnancy body image.

Important Note: So the aim is one handed foods that aren’t going to make you cry later on.

I made a huge mistake early on, I convinced myself I was going to be good and filled my fridge with good things, healthy sandwich things for lunch, yogurt, vegetables, salad.. etc. Two days later I ended up with a packet of Doritos from the servo because it was easier to drive down with the baby and buy them AND eat them, than it was to make and consume any of the healthy things I had bought.

Come to grips with these things before the birth.

Now the baby is calling.. then I have laundry, dishes, feeding, working and if we had time to eat at the table for dinner, I’d be setting that now too.

Babies Are Expensive.. But Do You Know Why?

Everyone will always tell you babies are expensive. From the moment they are conceived, it’s one thing after another. But one thing they don’t tell you to factor in, the reason you may go broke, the straw and the source of resentment?..

…Batteries.

No one tells you this. When you are scrimping and saving to buy that swing before the baby comes, or the mobile after she arrives, or the breast pump or the monitor or anything else you buy it’s safe to say you can factor in another 15 or 20 bucks in batteries that are never included. Since the companies hate to include a wall plug attachment for power, most of the time you stuck being a battery companies bitch with their over priced, not long lasting bulk packaged product.

They are in bed with the baby companies, in cahoots to make sure that you need 3 x DD’s that only come in a package of 2 and 4 (meaning when you replace them in two weeks you have to buy another pack to make up three.. and again the time after) as well as 1 AA (sold in fours) and 1 AAA (sold in fours as well.)

So if your buying a few toys in one go, go ahead and tack on another 20% to the price before you go and buy because that is your battery tax. It’s stuff like this that makes you think you could make your own baby swing.. with lights.. and sounds.. and movement.. and… damn it here, just take my whole wallet.