7 newborn Must-Haves that'll transform your first weeks home
Bringing home a newborn is equal parts amazing and terrifying. While car seats comes with a thick manual, somehow a baby goes home with little more than a warm hat!
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We do our prep by poring over registry checklists filled with ‘must-haves’: strollers, bottles, etc. But if you ask any parent who’s been there, they’ll recommend a few off-checklist items that, if they could do it over again, they wish they’d registered for to make their time home with baby more magical. A few of the most common:
- Homecooked meals - Oh, those constant baby feeds. Keep your own strength up by registering for meals, so you can power through those 2AM feedings.
- Help with pets - It might be harder to get out of the house with a new baby in tow. Your furbaby will appreciate daily dog walks from friends, or through a service.
- A postpartum doula - In a nutshell, a postpartum doula’s main goal is to ease your transition into parenthood with baby-rearing advice, emotional and physical support, and easy access to resources (e.g. lactation consultants). She may even do a bit of light cleaning and cooking, too.
- Hand-me-downs - One new outfit for baby is great...five previously-loved outfits are equally fantastic. Registering for them sends the message that, yes, you’d definitely take baby gear friends are no longer using off their hands.
- A new family/newborn photography session - Those tiny newborn features seem to disappear in a matter of weeks. Be prepared, and register for funds toward booking your favorite photographer.
- More (and more…and then some more) storage - There’s nothing more frustrating than not being able to capture as many of baby’s first moments because you ran out of memory. Whether in the form of an external hard drive, a smartphone with higher capacity, or a subscription to cloud storage, it’s a must-have.
- More time home before returning to work - Extending time at home by burning through paid/unpaid vacation isn’t always financially viable. Registering for a parental leave cash fund gives you more time to spend with your baby without having to worry about the income gap.
The big question: how can you actually add these gifts to your baby registry? Where traditional registries only let you add physical gifts, Babylist is a free registry that lets you add anything from any store on the web (think: Amazon, Target, Etsy) in addition to help, favors, and cash funds, too.
Ultimately, seeking the gear and support you need will set you off right. Think about those little things that don't just support baby, but will aid you as well, and add them to your Babylist!
ABOUT BABYLIST:
In 2011, Natalie Gordon was pregnant with her first son and trying to create her baby registry. Though she knew exactly what she wanted—frozen meals, pet-sitting for her German Shepard and an eco-friendly diaper service—there wasn’t an online registry that fit the bill. So she built and launched Babylist (just two weeks before Max was born!).
Today, Babylist’s mission is to make the journey to parenthood easier and less overwhelming. Parents love being able to add any item from any store to their registry, alongside meaningful gifts they can’t buy in stores. We think you will, too!
