There is A LOT that happens in the first 3-months of baby being in the world, when people tell you things go by fast, they are completely right. Honestly, the speed and changes happen faster than lightning. That is, unless your baby is crying or you’re in the middle of a 2am feed, sloths can cross the Brooklyn Bridge faster.
Sharing a few of our survival methods and some of the products that helped ease the days and nights of the fourth trimester. If you read this post on newborn and new mom essentials, you will see some repeats, but there are a few other things we ended up loving once our little one got just a touch older.
For baby entertainment:
- A pack and Play with upper level paired with this mobile. The pack and play was my moms suggestion, and let’s just say, it saves my life everyday. I kept thinking of it as just a travel tool, but honestly, bust it out ASAP. This was the only spot our little one would hang out by himself for a few minutes in the beginning. We have it in-between our kitchen and living room so he can hang out with us, but not be in our arms. Giving us time to put dishes away, make lunch, fold some clothes etc. At the start, it was just very short stretches, but once I purchased this mobile to go on it (shoved through a little opening in the corner of the pack and play) those stretches became 10, 15, maybe even 20 minutes of him happily looking at his mobile and toys. We still use this at 3+ months and we take the mat out and put it on the ground when it’s tummy time.
- This baby swing and this bouncer are both used everyday on high rotation. We switch between the swing, the pack and play and the bouncer when we are trying to get things done around the house. We keep him in the same room as us so he isn’t alone, but again, we don’t have to hold him the entire time.
- Baby carrier. For when we do need to carry him because he is just being fussy and nothing else will do, we pop on the baby carrier and simply take him with us, either for a walk or again to do some chores around the house or even just to sit on the deck and give our arms a bit of a break.
- One random object that saved us countless times was a giant black, white and red poster at my moms that hangs on the wall. When Harrison would be very fussy (especially around 6-8 weeks, which was brutal) it felt like he was only happy if he was being held and looking at his favorite poster. I found some reproductions of the poster she has, it’s a Bally Ad from the 80’s that ran in France. I would highly recommend having some large black and white graphic poster with simple shapes.
For baby sleep:
- Taking Cara Babies this is the sleep training method that we’ve been using and I’d say overall we’ve been doing great. Around 3 months old, Harrison would go to bed around 7:30pm, wake around 4am for a snack and then go back down until about 7am. It was not always perfect and there were (and are) good nights and bad, but it helped us get those longer stretches and gave us goals to work towards.
- Moms on Call Schedules. While we did not read the moms on call books, I really like having their app. It gives you age appropriate schedules. We began using around 9 weeks old and at first they were a challenge for us to follow but after a bit of practicing they’ve really helped us and also helped Harrison! He was often wanting to eat at or before 2 hours even at 9 weeks, but then would spit up A LOT, stretching him slowly to about 3 hours (give or take a bit) in between each feeding has allowed him to actually digest his food and then be able to have a better feed come time. Or at least, that’s what it seems like. The schedule isn’t much different than what is suggested by Taking Cara Babies, but I like having it on my phone to refer to and the app also provides some little helpful tips.
- When we brought Harrison home we used regular swaddle blankets, he quickly was able to break out of them. So around 2 weeks old we switched to these swaddles, which were great. He began sometimes breaking out of these around 6 weeks old and just generally being a little fussy going into them. I tried several times to transition him to this arms up swaddle as he seemed to like sleeping with his arms up when he was in his stroller on walks. He didn’t take to them immediately, but right as I was about to give up on them, he slept his longest stretch he had ever done while in it. We put away all of the other swaddles and he was arms up from then on out- about 7 weeks old. We recently switched him to this sleep sack and I credit an easy transition to having done the arms up swaddle which gave him a bit more freedom to move, while still helping to “contain” him a bit.
For mom:
- Let’s talk nursing bras. For the first two months I lived in the simple pull to the side bras, these are my favorite and the ones I still sleep in/night nurse with. However, once I started (sometimes) wearing real clothes I wanted some clip down ones that were actually attractive, thus far, these are the only ones I’ve found that don’t make me feel like a grandma.
- Sweat pants and leggings with pockets. Any that you find comfortable will do, but you will want to have pockets. You’ll almost always want to have your phone with you so you can refer to your tracker app (see this post for the on we love) and there’s a good chance there will be several other things you need to carry along with baby.
- Towards the end of my “fourth trimester” these nursing camis also became a favorite. I layer them under a button up shirt when I want to look a little more put together.
Shop the post here:
You can also now shop all of my baby essentials here. I will be adding to this list regularly, these are products that we use constantly and are our absolute favorites.
