My Must-Have Items for Baby #2

I understand my experience with preparing for a second baby (or any baby) is unusual. While most women spend about 9 months anticipating the arrival of their new baby, I only had about 19 hours to prepare for my daughter when she was born two years ago.

I am an adoptive mom and at this point two years ago we had just recently hired an adoption attorney and were starting to submit our profile to expectant mothers. Emotionally, wasn’t in a space where I could have baby stuff in our house without a baby coming.We received a call on October 16th that we had been matched and our daughter was to be born sometime that weekend. Our family and friends rallied and soon we had just about everything we could ever need for a baby delivered to our door. Literally up until the day before my daughter was born, we didn’t own a single baby item.

We are once again the process of adoption but this time we were matched at about 28 weeks. Immediately upon matching, family and friends started asking what they could do to help of if we needed anything. Based on my prior experience it felt foreign because what could I possibly need help with when I had a whole 12 weeks to prepare?!

I would argue that babies don’t need a lot in general but for our second baby, there really wasn't much we needed at all based on saving stuff from when our daughter was a baby and also making strategic choices when she was born to get things like a stroller that could easily convert to a double stroller. That being said, here is my list of things I made sure we have ready for baby #2.

I can’t emphasize enough how much we used a baby brew with our daughter. We are people who love to be out and this mobile bottle warmer allowed us to continue to do that while bringing our infant daughter everywhere. Some babies are fine with room temperature formula, our daughter was not that way and wanted her bottles warm. The Baby Brew is rechargeable and acts like a hot plate for bottles. We would warm bottles up on car rides, at Disneyland, in airplanes - you name it. We loved the baby brew and I recommend it to everyone. Ours ended up dying the last week that our daughter was taking bottles regularly and I have never been happier to repurchase an item because the baby brew is worth every penny.

We knew when my daughter was born that we wanted to have at least one more which made it feel important to get a stroller that could easily convert to being a double. I LOVE my Vista by Uppa Baby! For the first few months we are planning on having the baby sit in either her carseat or the bassinet that came with the stroller but once she can sit up on her own she will need her own chair and it’s so nice to get a second Rumble Seat and easily convert our stroller into a two seater!

I didn’t understand the lore of the Wubbanub pacifier until my daughter was a newborn and she had a hard time keeping a pacifier in her mouth. The pacifier would inevitably pop out and she would scream until we put it back. The Wubbanub has just enough weight to help it stay in place and not easily fall off the babies mouth. Let’s just say the new baby already owns four of these. For the entirety of my daughters life she has had one of these clipped to her carseat and one clipped to her sleep sack so she has one at all times.

A noise machine is an absolute must and pre-parenthood, I had heard other people say great things about The Hatch. The Hatch has a variety of sounds and also has a light that can be adjusted to different brightness and colors. I have heard of some parents using it when their kids get older as a visual que for when they can get out of bed (by changing the colors from red to green). I really like the variety of sounds as I don’t really like “gray” or “brown” noise. I personally am much more soothed by the sound of rain or other nature sounds and I like the ones included in the hatch. Our girls will have their own rooms and so I wanted to make sure they each had their own hatch sound machine.

As noted in my “Family Outfits” story, I went a little nuts trying to find the perfect outfit for this baby. Well before I knew this baby existed, I bought my older daughter a darling blue dress with family photos in mind. Fast forward several months and me searching the internet high and low for an outfit for baby sister that would feel special and match older sister without it being so blue that everyone is congratulating us on our new baby boy. Enter this gorgeous onesie I found on Maisonette which is almost exactly the outfit that we brought Eloise home in except Eloises was pink and this one is all white. It is so soft and

Our house is 912 square feet which definitely creates a need to be efficient with our space and the things we bring into our home. We have used the Inglesina clip on high chair for our older daughter since she was about six months old and we love it. Honestly, even if we didn't have a small space, I think this would still be my preferred high chair. I love that it allows babies to eat AT the table with us. It’s easily to clean and has held up really well.