S**t you probably don’t need but might buy anyway and that’s OK.
As I mentioned in my “must haves” post, I like to think that I did a pretty good job, overall, of not purchasing/requesting too many baby items that we really didn’t need. Even still, there are a few things that we ended up with that haven’t gotten the use that I expected (and one item that we just avoided completely). I know these lists are often called “Newborn Regrets,” but I wouldn’t say that I regret anything on this list. My type-A self would far rather be over-prepared with anything I might need and not use something than find myself missing something that I really do need. That’s probably why I packed literally 100 hair ties in my hospital bag. Just gotta be ready for anything. I used the one I wore on my wrist on the way there. In any case, here’s the list.
Too many extra swaddle blankets. Don’t get me wrong, lightweight swaddle blankets are good for lots of stuff: putting down under a baby who will otherwise spit up on the floor/bed/couch, shielding the sun, covering up exposed boobs while nursing (if you care/want to), etc. They have ton of uses, so I’m not discounting that. What I am suggesting is that you might not need every single pattern that aden + anais, Copper Pearl, or Clementine Kids has to offer. Know that while creating those links, I had to work pretty hard not to go shopping. It’s tough – babies are cute! Swaddle blankets are cute! There is a pattern for every occasion! I have learned, though, that more blankets just means more things to store and wash and more decisions to make. Get a couple you love, use them until they’re worn out or too stained, then treat yourself to another. Just don’t buy them all at once.
Along the same lines, SwaddleMe swaddles. Just buy the Ollie Swaddle, truly. It’s worth the extra cost, and I’ll tell you why. While the SwaddleMe ones work okay, they involve wrangling baby’s legs into a pouch (no small feat in itself) and then securing the Velcro. More importantly, they’re sized, and as any person who has ever had a child will tell you, newborns grow really fast. I am thankful that we ended up adopting the Ollie so quickly, because I would have found it particularly frustrating to feel like I continuously needed to be purchasing bigger sizes of something so key to baby’s sleep routine.
A baby bath. This is a controversial one, even for me. I fully understand that this is a necessity for a lot of people, but I’m including it here because it’s something that is currently taking up a chunk of space in our house and which we have used exactly twice. I also don’t ever remember seeing one around the house when my sister was a baby, but I was only (almost) four so I could be wrong – Mom, let me know. The couple of times we did give E a bath, she hated it, and the hassle of getting the thing filled up, scrunching ourselves onto the floor in the bathroom, and hoping she wouldn’t poop in the bathwater just felt like a lot.
The sink is a no-cost alternative to the baby bath, at least until your newborn gets too big, but for us the solution was even easier – the shower. On the night we were going to give her her third bath, I decided, “Screw this, I’m taking her in the shower.” Turns out, she loooooves the shower. Some of her most reliable early gummy smiles were while the water ran over her, and the shower has become a staple of our bedtime routine (I know, I know, dry skin – we lotion her up really good after). I am convinced it’s part of the reason she sleeps so well – every once in a while we opt to skip the shower part of the routine, and I usually regret it. No one ever told me that the baby bath wasn’t an absolute necessity, so here’s me telling you: there are other options.
A swing. This one is on me. I didn’t register for a swing, didn’t think I needed one. Then, all of a sudden, I hit 37 weeks and started to freak out at the possibility that my baby might want to swing in a baby swing and I wouldn’t have one and then she would cry and I would cry and we’d have to order one and what a mess. Whew. I was in the throes of a very sincere debate with myself over whether to spend the money on the swing in my Target cart when Rick turned over (it was also late at night) and told me to just buy the dang swing. So I did. My kid hates it. Sigh. At the beginning, she would cry any time we put her in the swing. At this point, she tolerates it (most of the time), but it’s got nothing on the bouncer. Ultimately, the thing takes up a lot of space and makes me shake my head at my past self every time I see it.
Finally, something that is more of an “unnecessary for now” – a high chair. I totally get it if you want to register for a high chair. It’s on the list of higher-dollar items, especially if you want a fancy convertible one. It was on my original list. Then, I realized that I didn’t really like the look of the one I had picked out. I started thinking about the amount of space it would take up (can you see there’s a trend here?), which led me to realize that it would be several months, at least, before baby E even needs to sit in a high chair. So, off the registry it came. At the moment, I’m thrilled not to have another baby-item-in-a-box to store. At least, for now.
So, there you go – the list of things that I think you can avoid. Keep in mind (with the exception of the high chair), I actually bought all of these things, so at the end of the day… buy all the swaddle blankets you want.
Hickmans at Home 