Hi. I'm Jessica, and I'm (trying to be?) a low-maintenance mom. My daughter, Beatrix (Bea for short) is a toddler now, so I'm looking back to the things I wish someone had told me when I was pregnant. I would have saved a lot of money and worry over having everything I thought I needed.
To me, a low-maintenance mom is a mom who doesn't want or need a lot of "stuff." I chose to include the products below because I actually purchased and used them, and I want to share what I couldn't live without for the first few months. FYI, I'm an Infant/Toddler Specialist, meaning I coach infant and toddler teachers on every aspect of infant and toddler care, with the goal of improving the quality of care provided to infants and toddlers. I tell you that only so you know that I have the best interest of my daughter (and all children) at heart, and I want to share with you what I've learned from years of working with infants and toddlers and from my own experiences as a first-time mom.
Here's my list:
1. A safe place to sleep.
Whether it's a bassinet, pack-and-play, or crib, the safest way for baby to sleep is to follow the ABCs: Alone in his or her own sleep surface (according to the AAP, room-sharing is safest), on his or her Back, in a Crib (or other firm sleep surface with no soft items like blankets, stuffed animals, or bumpers). We had the exact bassinet seen above, but we bought it secondhand from a lady in the neighborhood who bought it for her grandson who never even slept in it. If I were to buy a new bassinet, I think I'd prefer something a little less frilly, like this one from Fisher-Price:
Bea slept in her bassinet beside our bed until she was too long for it at 5.5 months old. I hated having her just across the hall from our room, but I was terrified of cosleeping. A friend's daughter died in her sleep due to unsafe sleeping conditions while at a home child care, so it hits very close to home for me. Now as a toddler, my daughter ends up in our bed more often than not, but at nearly 18 months she's more than able to move her whole body (although I still sometimes wake up and check to see if she's still breathing).
2. A sleep sack.
Sleep sacks are my JAM. Although we have 847 adorable baby blankets, we really only use the sleep sacks at night. Now that she's older I will cover her with a quilt if it's chilly in her room, but mostly we stick to a sleep sack only. These are my faves:
HALO - I love this one for the winter time. It's soft and fleecy, and was perfect for when my daughter was a newborn and I was constantly afraid of her getting cold (lol we live in the South so it almost never gets below freezing...).
Aden + Anais - These have been my favorite since my daughter grew out of the fleecy HALO sleep sack. There are two different weights (the floral one is a little heavier). They're made of the same amazingly soft, light, and somehow still warm(?) muslin as the blankets that literally everyone loves. They zip up and keep her warm without making her sweat so I'm sold.
3. A baby wrap.
Seriously, do yourself and your baby the biggest favor ever and get a good baby wrap. I had a hand-me-down baby wrap from my cousin (I can't even remember the brand now and I've passed it on to my cousin {the sister of the cousin who gave it to me, why you needed to know that I'm not sure...}, but the brand shouldn't matter much). For our next baby, I want to get this Solly baby wrap by Rifle Paper Co. because HELLO IT'S GORGEOUS.
Now that Bea's older I have a Tula Toddler and I am obsessed. with. it. I don't have one single complaint about it. The other, less expensive carriers I had before (one was a hand-me-down from my cousin and the other I bought) didn't support her legs/hips enough and they were super cumbersome to put on. This one snaps around my hips and behind my neck shoulders and that's it. Two quick clicks and we are ready to go. It's super comfortable for both of us, and Bea can sleep in it with the attached hood thing that clips onto the shoulder straps. Love it. Pro-tip: Ask for it for Christmas or your birthday. I sent my dad a link to it and said he could buy it for my Christmas AND birthday presents - that's how bad I wanted it! Mine is a chambray color with white splotches on it, but I guess they change the colors every year. The one below is close enough to the one I have. It's super cute and neutral enough to go with anything.
4. A security-enabled webcam with an app. Not a video baby monitor.
I think this is the most high-maintenance item on the list. With an audio monitor (the cheapest option), I know when Bea starts making noise (I mean our house is tiny so I can honestly hear her crying from any room...), but I have to open the door and risk actually waking her up to check on her. With the webcam I can just look at my phone and see that she's still laying down or she's standing up and I know I need to go lay her back down. Video baby monitors are a total ripoff in my opinion. I compared every video baby monitor in the world, and they all sucked compared to a decent webcam with night vision. Ours is 1080p and I swear I could see a spider fart with it. It switches to night vision automatically, has two passwords for security verification, and an app so I can sleep-stalk her even if I'm not there (which I do when I'm traveling for work or at choir practice because I'm a crazy person).
This camera is way better than any baby monitor I looked at, both on Amazon and in-person at Buy Buy Baby and Target (yes, even better than the $200+ ones, because HELLO IT'S LESS THAN $80 AND YOU CAN SEE SPIDERS FARTING WITH IT). It also has audio and you can record with it if you buy a memory card, so after your kids go to college you can use it as a security camera (yes I said after they go to college...I'm not crazy, you are!). Bottom line, just buy it and thank me later for saving you money.
5. Baby blankets.
You'll get at least 500 of them from friends and family so honestly don't even bother buying any. They're just going to get every imaginable bodily fluid on them anyway. If you insist on buying blankets (I get it, I really do), then I'll recommend my favorite one from an Etsy seller called Charley Charles Shop. It's muslin and super cute with tiny pom poms around the edge. ADORBS. I love the muslin blankets for swaddling, but for tummy time we used a quilt that my mom made me when I was a baby (#80sstyle). Speaking of tummy time...
6. Baby entertainment, e.g., some kind of activity mat/baby gym, toys, and books.
Bea freaking LOVED her baby gym. We have this one from Fisher-Price, and even after she outgrew the mat she still loved all the little toys that came with it. I am OBSESSED with children's books, so I started hoarding them way before I got pregnant. I'm pretty sure I was hoarding baby books before we even got married. Yes, I'm crazy. Some of our favorites include LITERALLY every Eric Carle book ever written, all of Ezra Jack Keats' books, On the Night You Were Born (which will make you ugly cry every single time you read it for the first year of your baby's life), probably 10 of the Usborne "That's not my..." books, and many others, of which there are too many to list in this post. I'll do a separate post on children's books.
Bea's favorite toys were the ones on her baby gym, and this Estella octopus rattle. Mr. Octopus was Bea's favorite thing in the whole world until we lost him one day while on a walk at the park. She didn't seem to miss him too much after all those months of being obsessed with him, but she was a baby at the time so as long as there was boob milk flowing and lots of snuggles she kind of didn't care much about anything else.
Here's the thing about baby entertainment: Do tummy time, even if they don't like it. I was a total wimp and let her play on her back because she hated tummy time, and she started getting a flat spot on the back of her head. Luckily, it was mild and I noticed it right away, so I started doing tummy time or letting her sit up while supported by a boppy pillow and her head got nice and round again. Speaking of boppies...
7. At least two Boppy pillows.
"One is enough," you say. "LIESSSSSS!" I exclaim, like an insane person. We only had one Boppy at first, and it was a pain in the ass lugging it and Bea from room to room (yes, even in our tiny-ass house). Life was soooo much easier once we got a second one that I kept in our bedroom and then moved to her room once she started sleeping in her crib. It was a must for breastfeeding, playing, etc. Just register for two and if anyone asks why you need two, you can tell them that a stranger on the internet said so. That should shut them up.
You will also need a cute cover for your scantily clad Boppy pillow. Make sure it's something washable, since it will get every bodily fluid imaginable on it, much like everything else in your house once you have a baby. I have the one below from the Etsy shop LouLouMade and I love it.
8. A kick-ass breast pump and bottles.
If you breastfeed and plan to leave your kid for any amount of time at all, you'll need both of these things. I got the Spectra S2 and I LOVE IT. It's a closed system, meaning no milk goes into the machine itself, so in theory if you wanted to loan it to someone you could, and they could just buy the accessories. Aside from that I love it because it has like 50 different settings (hyperbole) so you can adjust the force of boob-sucking, the speed, etc. It's very lightweight and has a night light, which I didn't figure out until I stopped pumping, but now I know for future babies. Not that I would have used it? Because I usually pumped in the daytime? But just in case you need to pump under cover of darkness, you can.
As for the bottles, I went with glass because when I was pregnant I went to this Eco-Friendly Child Care training (BAD IDEA because it made me paranoid that I was poisoning my unborn child with fumes and VOCs and off-gassing and lead and asbestos just by breathing the air), and the trainer scared me with all of the BPA and whatever other stuff is in plastic bottles. I would do it again, we liked the glass bottles. Pro-tip: If you're breastfeeding get the preemie nipples - they have tiny holes so that it's more like breastfeeding. I could do a whole separate post on breastfeeding, which I will, but not now.
9. Cloth diapers.
OK, this may sound high-maintenance, but it really isn't. Cloth diapering is so easy nowadays and it is SO CHEAP compared to disposable diapers! Plus it's better for the environment. I registered for cloth diapers and I bought a few used from someone I know, so we didn't have to pay full-price for any of our diapers. They are expensive up-front, but you save tons of money over the next 5? years or however long you have babies in diapers. We've moved to disposables at night because my daughter is a heavy night wetter, so she soaks through cloth diapers, even with several inserts inside. We also do disposables when we travel, because I'm pretty sure the hotels we use don't have washers and dryers for guests to use. And if they did they probably wouldn't want us to wash poop diapers in them. Just hazarding a guess...
So, here's how it works: She wears cloth diapers all day. When she poops, we throw the wipes away (I have cloth wipes, but I guess I'm not that concerned about the environment lol jk. It just seems like way more work when there's a wipe solution involved that I would have to make and store somewhere.), and then we use a diaper sprayer to blast the poop off the diaper with the force of a fire hose. I kid, but only slightly. I think that's just our water pressure though. You barely have to turn on the faucet and the pressure goes from light trickle to Niagara Falls within a couple of millimeters. We have this Charlie Banana one, and I like it. I just have to flush the toilet, then start spraying, otherwise there's a light spray of poop water, and I'm not a fan of that.
10. Diaper bag.
If you leave the house, you need one. I have a super low-maintenance friend who doesn't even use a real diaper bag, just some old tote bag she throws everything in like a caveperson. I kid, but seriously, I need some pockets and zippers. I'm not some kind of savage (jk I kind of am though). My only complaint about our diaper bag is that with four cloth diapers in it (that's how many I like to keep on hand while we're out), there isn't a whole lot of room for the other stuff I like to carry, but I like to carry a lot of crap. Here's what's in the diaper bag now: Four cloth diapers, one burp cloth (idk why I still have that in there...just in case I need to mop something up and there are no paper towels or napkins nearby I guess?), five board books, an assortment of small toys, two plastic containers of snacks (usually Goldfish, a Halo/Cutie orange or a banana, and some blueberry Belvita), two clean outfits, a wet bag for dirty cloth diapers (you have to buy this separately, and you could use grocery bags if you wanted, but I like matching things so take that as you will), extra paci, sunscreen, and my small-ish clutch with my wallet and other crap in it. So get a bigger bag than you think you need. I'm sure you'll find all kinds of crap to put inside it.
This is the matching wet bag:
11. A car seat.
A must-have unless you live somewhere with super-accessible public transportation or you can walk everywhere. I was gifted the Peg Perego Primo Viaggio by a friend whose son outgrew it. I only took a secondhand car seat because I knew the person and I could verify that it hadn't been in an accident, and it was well within the expiration date. Bea outgrew it at about 8-9 months, and I passed it on to another friend. If you're okay with getting a secondhand car seat from a friend then I highly recommend this option. If not, read on...
When Bea outgrew her bucket seat, we got the Graco Extend2Fit. They say it's rated for newborns all the way up to forward-facing and 65 pounds. For our next baby I might skip the bucket car seat unless I can get a secondhand one from a friend. On the one hand, I like being able to take the whole seat out if baby is sleeping, but do I like it more than the money I would save by not buying a bucket seat? The jury's still out on that one. I like our car seat except for one thing - the straps. I was spoiled by the Peg Perego's ease of use and comfy strap cushions. For a middle-of-the-road car seat you can't beat the Graco. Just buy some Aden + Anais strap cushions.
These are the necessities that got us through the first six months or so. I didn't include a stroller because for the first 4-5 months I used a baby wrap everywhere we went. I also didn't include a whole lot of baby toys, because they don't need a lot. Have a few toys (true toys, not things that blink lights and play music at them, if I want my baby to have a seizure I'll put on the strobe and rave music, thank you very much. I kid, sort of...) for them to mouth and experience different textures, but you don't need to go crazy at this point. I'll do a separate post on toys for each age and come back and link it here.
I also didn't include any baby containers like a bouncy seat, swing, etc. because we didn't use them. If Bea was awake she was on the floor or in someone's lap, and if she was asleep she was in our arms or in her bassinet (but mostly in our arms). Our house is tiny, so we don't have room for a lot of "equipment." I TOTALLY understand that moms need to be able to shower, pee, eat, etc. I just didn't have a need for it because Nick stayed home with Bea so he was always around to hang out with her when I needed to do those things. Our situation was also a little different because Bea was a late crawler, so for the longest time we knew that we could leave her happily playing on the floor and she'd still be in roughly the same location when we got back. If one of us was home alone we just took quick showers and talked to her from the bathroom (again, tiny house). YMMV.
The best thing to do with your baby, at any age, is interact with them. Watch your baby and respond to his or her attempts to communicate, whether that's through eye contact, body movements, or noises they make. The Harvard Center on the Developing Child has an amazing series of very brief (less than two minutes each!) videos that explain how important interactions are for early brain development. Briefly, when you respond positively to your child and have back-and-forth interactions (called Serve and Return interactions by the Harvard folks), you are LITERALLY building their brain architecture. The importance of this can't be overstated: There is no substitute for the positive, loving interactions between a child and his or her primary caregivers (this can be parents, grandparents, and even child care teachers). Go watch the videos and let me know what you think of them in the comments.
What are your newborn must-haves? I'd love to hear!
xoxo,
Jessica
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