What Are the Top Baby Registry Must-Haves?

April 27, 2014

I’m a relatively new momma, and yet I’ve already been asked, “What are your top baby registry must-haves?” a number of times. I know everyone can find standard lists online, so instead of repeating those, here are some items that I didn’t see on most lists that I would recommend.

The title to this post is a little misleading, because I’m actually not going to tell you which crib you should get or what car seat you should buy. Those choices vary depending on your personal taste and living style, although I did find this book to be a very helpful starting place for research on those baby basics. Instead, this post is about baby things we didn’t know we needed until after she arrived.

1. Nosefrida Nasal Aspirator

Out with the blue bulby things, and in with this amazing little sucker! Not only do the blue bulby things accumulate lots of gunk and mold that shouldn’t be going anywhere near your baby’s respiratory system, but the Nosefrida nasal aspirator is a lot more effective at clearing up your baby’s nasal passages. It costs more, but when your baby’s nose is stuffed up and she’s having trouble sleeping, you will be glad you spent your pretty pennies on this instead of those three cups of coffee.

2. Mustela Shampoo for Newborns

When I first received this off-the-registry item, I set it aside and forgot about it. I had already gotten baby soap/shampoo, so why would we need more? Well I’ll tell you why. Because within the first week of our sweet baby’s life, we noticed that her skin was growing scaly and flaky around her eyebrows and hairline. Baby dandruff, aka cradle cap, happens to about half of all babies. We still found her adorable, but I gotta say, this is not a good look on babies. It’s not harmful, but every new momma wants her baby looking her freshest, especially when friends and family visit! The condition only worsened as we used the normal baby soap/shampoo, and it wasn’t until a several days later that I remembered that we had this special shampoo. Minutes after we started applying it, the scales began to recede and within a few days they were gone. Yes, it’s superficial, but I’m very glad that this cradle-cap-attacking shampoo exists!

3. Desitin Creamy Diaper Rash Cream

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We had the Butt Paste and the A & D Diaper Rash Ointment, but once diaper rash hit, neither of those were fixing the problem. Our doctor said anything with zinc oxide would do, but again, the Butt Paste with “Zinc Oxide (16%)” wasn’t doing the trick. It wasn’t until a friend recommended Desitin (Zinc Oxide 10%) that we saw immediate results, and soon our baby’s rash disappeared. Hooray!

4. Lanolin

First let me say that I hope you never need this product. Some lucky people don’t. Its purpose is to prevent and ease discomfort caused by sore/cracked nipples during breastfeeding. Yeah. That that’s a thing. Having said that, I really wish I’d used it starting from my first nursing session. Despite watching several videos and reading a book on breastfeeding (and a couple books’ worth of research online), we still managed to get our first few latches wrong, which was enough to make me incredibly miserable the first couple of months.

If you are just starting breastfeeding, you should apply a small amount of this onto your nipple (not your areola) right before and after each nursing session. The hospital might provide you with 1-2 small tubes, which seems to be enough for most people. Unfortunately the nurse only offered me one after the damage had been done. Eventually, I used it up and had to buy more.

5. Vitamin D Supplement

TL;DR: Di-vi-sol bad. Carlson good.

If you are breastfeeding, your doctor will probably recommend that you give your baby a daily dose of vitamin D supplement. Most stores seem to carry the 50mL “Di-vi-sol” bottles that require you to use a dropper to give 1mL to your baby. This requires a parent to 1) measure out the correct dose in the dropper, 2) get your baby to suck on it, 3) watch half of it dribble out of her mouth, 4) wonder if all your baby’s gas problems (i.e. crying from discomfort!) are because of the vitamin D supplement and 5) wonder how often you should be washing that dropper. A quick search on Amazon revealed that many parents actually hate this form of droppered-vitamin D supplement, blame their baby’s gas troubles on it, dislike the fact that the first ingredient listed is glycerol (sugar), loathe the added flavors and colorings (why would a baby care about color?!), and instead recommend these drops by Carlson. After I purchased these, not only did I notice my baby’s inconsolable gas-cries diminish, but I only needed to give her one single drop (instead of 1mL) of it a day, which she doesn’t even notice when I drip it into her mouth! Furthermore, ONE bottle of the Carlson drops (~$10 each) is enough for a year, vs. the SEVEN bottles of Di-vi-sol (~$10 each) you’d need. No contest.

Note: These Ddrops seem similar, but at $64 for a year’s supply, I’m sticking with Carlson.

6. HALO SleepSack

In your new-parenting classes, they will probably teach you how to swaddle a baby with a blanket. If you’re like us, you might even watch a few videos on it. It’s pretty neat to watch a simple blanket transform your baby into a cozy bundle of tucked-in comfort. But honestly, when you have a little one kicking and screaming, the last thing you want to do is nag (or be nagged by) your spouse about how tight or what angle or how much of a triangle to fold and whatnot. And when you’re doing it all alone, it can get pretty frustrating trying to tuck those arms in and “snug it” just right. Even more frustrating is tucking the last corner in and patting yourself on the back for a job-well-done… only to hear your baby offer another spluttering poop in her diaper (which happens 4+ times a day the first week!). You are not supposed to leave babies stewing in their poop, no matter how proud you are of your excellent, snug swaddle. So you have to undo the whole thing, watch your baby work up her cries again, change the diaper, and do it all over again. No, thank you. I will use my Aden and Anais splurge for something else.

There are many wearable blankets out there, and everyone swears by their own favorite. I’m sure most of them are great. We tried the Summer Infant SwaddleMe for a few days, which was definitely a step up from wrestling with swaddling blankets. Before the end of her first week of life, we moved on to the HALO SleepSack, and haven’t looked back since.

We liked the HALO SleepSack better for a few reasons:

It’s super easy to put her in, zip down, and fold the wings in for a swaddle.
She didn’t “break out of it,” which is a common complaint of blanket-swaddles and even the Swaddleme, as babies get stronger.
We felt like she had more mobility in her legs, which is supposed to be important to avoid hip problems.
We also liked that we had the option to leave her arms out, which we started doing at one month: first her right arm, then both.
For our winter newborn, the fleece option was warmer.

Other people like the Halo Sleep Sacks because you can unzip from the bottom of the sack and check diapers with less disruption (vs. un-velcroing the whole thing and totally waking baby up with Swaddleme, or loosening your entire swaddling blanket).

7. Baby Connect App

This is the first app I have ever paid for, and it was totally more than worth it. I downloaded this handy app a little before our baby arrived, and started using it the day she was born. At the most basic level, it tracks Baby’s diapers, feeds, and sleep. You can add many other options such as activities, temperature, weight, and so forth. We have been vigilant about tracking diapers, feeding information, and sleep. The information I’ve needed from this data has changed over time, and I’m really glad I used this from the beginning of her life.

The first few weeks, it was really important to track her diapers: what type (“wet” = pee, “BM” = bowel movement (aka poopy), and how many. Doctors and nurses always ask how many diapers, and plenty of websites online will tell you how many diapers you should be expecting from your 1-week, 2-week, 3-month old &etc. As the doctor visits become less frequent, this becomes the day-to-day way to reassure yourself that your baby is getting enough food when you’re breastfeeding have no other indicator. Trust me, this is one of the things you will be wondering the most: Is my baby getting enough to eat? Am I providing enough milk? Is she growing well? Well, the answer is in her output/diapers, so you’ll want to keep track!
In the first couple weeks of breastfeeding, you are supposed to nurse your baby every 2-3 hours (from start to start). It’s easy to forget when the last nursing session began, so it’s great to be able see it at a glance on this app. Also, common advice for breastfeeding mothers is to start each nursing session on the side you left off on last time. When you’re nursing 10-12 times a day, it gets to be really hard to keep track of this, so it’s nice that the app will do that for you.
Sleep is also one of the biggest things a new parent agonizes over. At first, I needed the app just to help me track the amount of sleep she was getting over a 24-hour period. Later, I needed the app’s fantastic graphs to serve as encouragement that her sleep patterns were improving overall, especially when we were in the “one step back” part of things. Even later, I needed the app to tell me how long she had been awake since her last nap, since a baby’s wake time is a great indicator of when she should be put down for her next nap. For me, wake time has become an even better indicator of when to put her down than her “sleepy signs,” which seem to change a little from week to week.

So there it is. Increasingly long explanations for things I’m glad we eventually got. Hope it helps, and if you experienced mommas have anything to add, please share in the comments below!

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One response to “What Are the Top Baby Registry Must-Haves?”

Dushenka says:

April 27, 2014 at 12:47 pm

My newborn was colicky and the three things that saved us were 1) yoga ball – we could rock her back and forth, side to side, and up and down. No other rocker could do that. 2) Moby wrap – I was given this at my baby shower and thought it might be nice. There were times when tying her to me or hubby and walking around was the only thing that soothed her. 3) sheepskin blanket. This was a gift from a friend who raises sheep. The fibers were cooling when it was hot, warming when it was cold, water/baby mess – proof and machine washable. Warm hats that don’t fall off (I had a late-winter baby) and socks that don’t cut off circulation, lots of thin, lots of thick, and lots of soft baby blankets, a tub, kimono style jammies and footed pjs were all nice and we enjoyed them, but when I had to travel with her suddenly at 8 weeks, the three things I made sure to have with me were the yoga ball, the Moby wrap, and the sheepskin – I ended up accidentally leaving the sheepskin and using 2 waterproofish blankets, but that experience highlighted how useful the sheepskin was. Since this is the first comment I make on your blog, I just have to say that I found it yesterday when a fb friend linked to your “saying sorry” post. I appreciate you articulating *what* produces a smoothly running classroom and can assure you, now that my nieces nephew and kids are in the 2-5 range, your strategies translate very well to parenting. I taught middle school math before being a parent, and other teachers frequently asked me for advice on classroom management but at the time, while I could tell them what I did or would in particular situations, I never was able to articulate _how_ it was that I came up with the ideas, other than to say, “It just occurs to me as what makes the most sense.” Reading your underlying belief that children want to be good and sometimes need a grown-up to help them get there, resonated with me. Thank you for the excellent articulation. – Dushenka