Christina's Favorites for a newborn

Since I'm currently on vacation with my family in Atlanta, I'm ready to write a post on traveling (by car) with a toddler. Boy, have we learned a lot! I think a traveling post will be in the near future now that we've done traveling at every stage from newborn to toddler, by car and plane. But I'll save my thoughts on that for another day.

Also - what about that woman in Russia delivering (by c-section I might add) her 12th child at 17lbs, 1oz??? Wow. Will weighed 17 lbs around 9 months old. He is just now 20lbs. Whew! Click here to read a story about this!

Now on to the real reason for my post this morning...my favorite newborn products. Many of these have already been mentioned, but I simply couldn't neglect them on my list because they are that good!! Here it goes (in no particular order):

1. Nursing tank AND bra. My favorite bra brands are Medela, but they are difficult to find an on the expensive side. They were the only ones that I ever really liked. The nursing tank came in handy when nursing on our long flight overseas when Will was 6 months old. It was December and FREEZING in Europe. I was able to wear that under my clothes and never expose my belly. Great for traveling...

2. Baby Carrier/sling - my favorites include a Leah original pocket sling, the Ergo and a ring sling. We used them all. The one I did NOT like was the Baby Bjorn. Everyone I knew recommended this to us so we registered for it. Well, I had a small baby (3lbs at birth) and by the time he was 10lbs, I hated that thing! Much preferred the slings or ergo (which I didn't get until he was maybe 10 months old.

3. Lansinoh breast pads. Not exactly ecologically friendly because they are disposable and when you need them for 9 months, you use a LOT. However, I tried many reusable cotton/hemp kinds plus other disposables and none of them worked for me! Lansinoh ones are sold at Walmart and Target. Lily Padz also didn't work for me. I always leaked out of those. I just got a HUGE box of like 400 from someone on Craigslist. Already preparing for #2...

4. Swing. We had a full size Fisher Price papasan swing and a Fisher Price Aquarium Take-a-long swing. At first, Will was way too small for the take-a-long. The papasan was the perfect size and Will loved it. Perfect for calming him while swaddled. Later the aquarium swing was very entertaining to him with the lights and music.

5. Swaddle blanket. Kiddopotamus was our favorite.

6. Snugrider stroller frame for the Graco Snugride carseat. (I think there are a couple of brands of this product.) Basically, its a simple and lightweight stroller frame to snap the carseat into. This was in place of getting a HUGE travel system stroller. It was great b/c it was lightweight and small. Once he was able to sit in his regular lightweight stroller, we used that. But this was by far our favorite in the beginning. Much more economical than a huge and expensive travel system because this is only around $60.

7. Mylicon gas drops. Now, I must say that I'm not convinced these actually work for their intended purpose. They are to reduce gas in infants. Our doctor actually questioned how well they work as well. However, I can say that for us they were GREAT at calming him when he was fussy (whether from gas or reflux or whatever...). I think the taste distracted him more than anything else. :)

8. Pack n' play with changing table and bassinet attachment.

That's all I can think of...although I'm sure there were more. Fifteen months is a long time and currently we are dependent on items like sippy cups and snack traps. :)