Baby stuff: A review

There are a few things I wish I would have known about babies and motherhood and all that before having to go through this lovely trial and error process known as parenting. There’s plenty more I still wish I knew! I wouldn’t say that Emily is necessarily is a super difficult baby, but she certainly isn’t an easy, even-tempered one either! I’m not claiming to be an expert by any means, but I just wanted to share a few things that have really helped me. Many of my friends have recently had kids or are about to, so hopefully this might help.

Books

Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child by Marc Weissbluth.  Although Emily and I have not yet mastered the entire sleep schedule yet, she is sleeping 12-14 hours straight through the night and has been since she was 3 months. Before that, she was only getting up once in the night and would go straight back to sleep. Now, we’ve just got to work on her daytime naps. But this book goes week by week and month by month on how to sleep train your child. 

I Am A Mother by Jane Clayson Johnson. A co-worker gave this to me when I quit my full-time job. I loved it! It has helped me deal with the overwhelmingness of becoming a stay-at-home mom.

Mothering With Spiritual Power by Debra Woods. Also helped with the overwhelmingness of motherhood in general.

Products

There were tons of things that people told me I needed and also tons of stuff people told me not to bother with. Here are some of my favorites…

Burrito Blanket. I got this swaddle blanket from this website: http://www.bbsleepsolutions.com and it is amazing! But the most amazing part is that it comes with a DVD that tells you how to properly swaddle and soothe a baby and teach her to self soothe. Emily has pretty much been able to do that since she was a few weeks old, and I’m attributing it to the blanket and DVD.

Playtex Ventaire Bottles. Emily hated bottles at first. We tried a few different kinds, and she loves this kind. It helps keep the air bubbles out of her tummy. The only downside is that they are a pain to clean.

Gripe Water. Helps with gas and hiccups.

Dark Curtains. Emily has been napping much better since we put dark curtains in her room to make it darker during her naptime. Her room was so bright! (OK, so I still need to make actual curtains. Right now we just have blankets up over the windows.)

BOB stroller. I LOVE this stroller. Yeah, it was expensive, but SO worth it. It’s easy to run with and awesome for everything else.

Changing Table. I wasn’t initially going to get one of these. I was just going to change her on the floor. But I’m glad I got one. It’s fantastic.

A few things that I didn’t really love were: a bouncy seat (she hated it!), one of those baby carrier things that wraps around you (too much of a pain to get her in and out of), a snowsuit (again, too much of a pain….a blanket works just fine),  Boppy (I just didn't like it), overalls (too much of a pain to change her).

Some things I wish we would have done: Started the Healthy Sleep Habits method sooner, waited a little longer to start her on solids, started the burrito blanket from Day 1.

Anyway…feel free to add to this list!