The first in this series is going to be on the first three months and what we didn't use or what I used and returned. I have zero shame. Babies are expensive and if I can put that money toward something else they'll use for 6 weeks instead of holding on to something they used for 6 hours, I'm doing it. I'm going to link products to Target because Babies R Us doesn't exist anymore and, frankly, who doesn't love Target? Don't worry, I'll link them for the list of products I love as well.
The bottle warmer. We got the Avent Fast Bottle Warmer seen here. Bottle warmers, in theory, are great. Our baby didn't really care whether her bottle was warm or cold, she just wanted to eat so that she could get back to her adorable screaming. Some babies will take a cold bottle, some babies will only take a warmed bottle. The underlying theme of babies is that every one is different. Back to the warmer. You know what was misleading about this warmer? The fact that it claims to be fast. There is nothing fast about this warmer. The box says that you can heat a bottle up in 3 minutes. First of all, that's false - unless you're using room temperature water that has never seen the inside of a fridge, you cannot heat a bottle up in three minutes. Second of all, even if this were true, do you know how long 3 minutes feels when you have a screaming baby? Three seconds feels like an eternity trapped in hell - 3 minutes is the equivalent to 30 years. THIS IS NOT FAST. It was clearly a childless man who developed the marketing for this product. If you do want a bottle warmer, or your baby refuses a cold bottle, I would recommend being proactive on warming to cut down on the crying time. If it's the middle of the night, I sometimes would fill the water up a little more and leave it on to cut down on the heating time (tbh it's debatable as to whether this helped), but you may end up finding yourself cursing the bottle warmer and trying to convince your baby that cold milk is in right now.
Keeping in trend with the bottle category, we'll move next to the bottle sterilizer. I somehow ended up with two microwave bottle sterilizers, despite only registering for one. This is a theme of showers, whether baby or wedding - people will buy whatever the hell they want to buy, whether it's on your registry or not. The sterilizer I ended up keeping (albeit for a short period of time) was this Phillips Avent one. Listen, this was fine. I'm pretty sure the instructions say that you're supposed to wash the bottles thoroughly before putting them in the sterilizer but to me that's like putting clean dishes in the dishwasher. I rinsed the bottles and made sure there wasn't any milk stuck in the bottle or nipple, but then they went into this and got all steamed up in the microwave. It worked, but I didn't really see the point. I boil all of my bottles the first time I get them and then wash them with hot water and free & clear dish soap. This is fine for me. I'm not a germaphobe so I don't feel the need to sterilize my bottles every day or even once a week. I let my kid chew on the edge of a table when we went out to eat a couple weeks ago. She's going to put much worse things in her mouth than a clean, yet not sterilized yesterday, bottle. If you do like the idea of zapping any and all germs and sterilizing things frequently, this works well and is easy to use. I will say that when I was pumping I loved the steam bags that I got from Babies R Us. I believe that Medela makes some - mine were just BRU store brand. But those were great and I still have 2 boxes in case I want to pop anything into the microwave to be steam cleaned.
I put a lot of things on my registry because they seemed useful to have. Things that I may not necessarily spend the money on, but if someone else is buying it - sure! One of those items is a wipe warmer. I thought that the idea of having nice warm wipes would be delightful for my baby. Sure, it's cool and warm wipes do feel delightful...but you know what? Baby didn't care whether the wipes were warm or cold. Just like she didn't care whether her bottle was warm or cold. This baby just wants shit done. I used this wipe warmer for about 3 weeks. I'm not going to lie, it kind of sucked. There was nothing to push the wipes up as you used them, so once you were about half way done with the stack, they were barely getting warm and they became a pain in the ass to get out. When the wipes were full, the ones on top were delightfully warm, though. It just wasn't worth the hassle. The store credit made me happier than the wipe warmer ever did.
Here's something that I was on the fence about and ended up getting two of. Like, consciously sought to have two. A pack n play. One was for good use - it lives at my in-laws house because they watch baby while we're at work and she needs someplace to sleep. The other one, which cost about $180, we kept at our house. Our 1100 sq ft ranch. Why we needed a pack n play at our house, is beyond me. I can't even show you which one we got because it was from BRU and they don't exist. It's a big one with a napper and changing pod. It sat in the corner of our living room, which is about 10 feet from our bedroom and the nursery, for 3 months. We did not change her in the changing pod ever. She napped in the napper maybe twice. It is now folded up in the basement and I can only hope that I'll use it as a baby jail once this kid starts moving. More than likely, I won't and it will be a complete waste of money. If you have a larger home, or even a two-story home, I can absolutely see the point in having a pack n play at your house. For us, it just didn't make sense at all.
Things I haven't used yet, or things that baby has detested the first time we've tried them:
- This carrier. Props to the parents whose babies like to be worn. My independent woman does not. She had never liked to face into your chest and has always demanded to see what is going on around her. She's a real nosy b. I keep this carrier only because it was $25 and I hope that she'll use it at some point? I mean I see a lot of people with their arms free while still carrying their child. I would like to have my arms back one day. It sounds like a nice dream.
- The Fisher Price Sit-Me-Up. Listen. I bought this because my kid wants to sit up. She wants to sit up all the time...if she could sit herself up already, she'd be the happiest kid in the world. She cannot, so she is not. You know the problem with the sit-me-up? She's just not tall enough for it so her arms sit way down under the top of it and she gets frustrated. I want her to like it, I really do. I want her to like it so much that I bought her the sit-me-up that has a tray and it's just sitting there in it's box because I don't want to open it until I know that this broad will actually use it. Again - babies.
- A humidifier. We have a humidifier built into our heating system so I'm not sure if this will be a necessity. I didn't resister for one. I like that they have humidifiers that look like owls - but I'm still on the fence.
- The Baby Einstein Sea Dreams Soother. I have a love-hate with this thing. The first time we put it up in Mady's crib, she stared at it in wonder. She actually fell asleep watching it in her crib and that's the first time I had ever seen her put herself to sleep. You know how often that's happened since? Zero times. Zero. Every now and then the fish are great for a few minutes of amazement, but then she gets sick of them and demands they be turned off. In fact, she has turned them off herself by just flinging her arms around until they hit the button on the front that stops the fish and sounds. She may be a baby genius. In short, sea dreams soother is cool if your baby likes it. Save the box.
Hopefully this helps. If it doesn't, hopefully it was entertaining. My baby girl has a strong personality and she is definitely not afraid to tell us what she does not like. We'll see what the next 3 months brings us in her distaste.
xoxo
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