Favorite Baby Products

When I first got pregnant with Isabella I was overwhelmed by all of the baby items on the market. There were swings, and bouncers, jungle gyms and floor mats. How did you know which one to buy? Which opinion do you listen to – the woman who says her kids never used anything and it wasn’t worth the money or the woman who said her kid cried day and night unless they were in a swing? There are more options and research out there than you know what to do with.

I was personally overwhelmed because I didn’t want to waste money and I knew that, at that time, baby products as a whole didn’t have a high resale value. I didn’t want to buy an item for $100 and only get $10 with it when I sold it even if my child did not use it. I knew that we needed some items like a crib, a stroller and a car seat but the rest was up in the air.

Luckily Corry and I are not picky parents at all when it comes to some of the baby gear. I didn’t care if all of our items matched or were even gender specific. I knew that we were going to have another child after Isabella and so I didn’t want to have to repurchase a whole new set of items if the second baby ended up being male. We are also very lucky that we live in a rather large metropolis that participates very heavily in the consignment sale scene. We bought a lot of different items, including clothing at consignment sales.

Below is a list of my favorite baby products, where we bought them and some general ideas about each one of them. I am definitely not saying that this is an end all be all list of the items that you need for a baby – this is just a list of items that worked well for us and our opinions on each one. I will touch on baby toys, nursery furniture, and baby fashion in separate blogs.

Moby wrap
Ahh the Moby wrap. There is nothing else like the feeling that you first get when you open up the fabric pouch for the Moby and like 9 million feet of fabric rolls out onto the floor. For me, it was sheer panic. How am I ever going to figure this thing out? What if I can’t figure out how to tie this wrap correctly? Luckily with the help of thousands of videos on YouTube I was able to get it tied on correctly.

Our kids loved the Moby wrap. Well, Isabella loved it. Silas tolerated it for a few months but didn’t care for it nearly as much as Isabella. She would sleep in it our entire shopping trips in the store. I started wearing her in the wrap after the ‘stranger putting her finger in Isabella’s mouth thing’ see post HERE. She got more attention when I wore her than she ever got in her car seat but I had total control over how much access people had. I quickly realized that people were a lot less likely to touch your baby if you were wearing them than if they were just hanging out in a car seat. Silas was a much larger baby and so I wasn’t able to carry him in it for as long and he has always been headstrong so carrying him in a wrap has always been a battle of wills. He prefers the Ergo. Well, now he prefers to walk, but he used to prefer the Ergo.

Swing
Our sister bought us our swing for Isabella. We put her in it for the first time when she was about a month or so old and she seemed kind of ‘eh’ about it. She didn’t particularly hate it or love it. She would sleep in it sometimes but it definitely wasn’t guaranteed to make her go to sleep like some babies. She learned to love it a lot more once Silas got here. She was WAY too big for it at that point and I think that she just wanted in it because there was a new baby in it. She did the same thing with the bouncer and the Moses basket.

We used the same swing for Silas and Addison but they much preferred the swings that moved side to side instead of just front to back. They would sleep for hours in the swings everyday and for awhile that was the only way that we could get Silas to sleep at night was to put him in the swing.

I would definitely recommend a good swing that you can plug into the wall because constantly having to load batteries into a swing gets annoying. I wish that we could just go back to the old school crank style swings, but the newer ones are nice that have music. Isabella liked the music to calm her down but Silas hated it. To each his own, I suppose.

Mobile
Mobiles are expensive for what they are. I mean, realistically it’s a music box with a plastic arm with a few small stuffed toys attached to it. We bought one from either a consignment sale or craigslist; I can’t recall. Isabella never cared for the moving parts, but she has LOVED the music box part and still uses it everyday to put herself to sleep. Silas and Addison absolutely loved the moving parts especially during diaper changes when it was difficult to keep them entertained. It didn’t really matter which model it was; this was definitely a good buy, as long as you can get one used.

Car Seat
We have used several car seats since Isabella was born. When we were pregnant with her we decided to use the Chicco stroller and car seat travel system. It had a nice material that wiped off easily and wasn’t particularly heavy without an infant inside. The stroller folded down easily and had lots of space for accessories, purses, diaper bags, etc. It was heavily used by us and has been heavily used by sister for Addison since she was born and still is in very good condition. The convertible car seat that we got after we stopped using the infant carrier was good for the time. It wasn’t my favorite because it had such high sides and was difficult to get Isabella in and out of it without banging either her head or her legs on either the seat or the top of the car. We were in a minor car accident when Isabella was a few months old, so we got a new seat. We decided to go with the Sunshine Kids Radian XTSL. We absolutely adore this seat. I will touch on our car seat requirements in another video, but I will say that a higher rear facing weight was definitely one of our top requirements. The Sunshine Kids car seat can rear face up to 45lbs. It has a seat cover that easily comes off and cleans nicely. It also allows for three car seats to fit in a standard car backseat. We loved it so much that we bought another one for Silas. Now the brand is Diono but it’s the same basic seat. It is expensive but there are deals to be found out there and when it comes down to it, this is one thing that is totally worth spending the money on. What is more important that your child’s safety?

Stroller
Corry made it clear from the beginning that he wasn’t a fan of double strollers. Either they were too wide to be able to fit through most doors or aisles, or they were so long it was like driving a limo. I first heard about the Britax B-Ready on YouTube and thought that it looked neat. I figured that I could never get Corry to go for it for two reasons: 1) because it is a bit expensive ($499.00 for just the stroller without any accessories and without the second seat, and 2) because of the odd look to the stroller itself.

I took him by BuyBuyBaby one day when we were pregnant with Silas and he fell in love with it. He didn’t care for the cost but we found out that Britax runs a semi-annual sale that allows you to buy a stroller and get a second item for free. We knew that we would need a new infant seat so we decided to go for it.

We absolutely love this stroller. We get comments and compliments on our stroller every time we go out in public. It folds down the same size as our singleton stroller. It is heavy with both seats, but that is expected with a double stroller. A lot of people think that the lower seat is disadvantaged because they wouldn’t be able to see, but we find it to be totally the opposite. Isabella loves being in the bottom seat because she can easily get in and out of it with little help and she can still interact with her environment.

Muslin Blankets
When I first saw these blankets, I thought that it was just a gimmick. They are marketed as having the ability to better regulate baby’s temperature because there is breathability with the fabric. My husband flipped out because of the cost of the blankets. They are about $30-$40 for four blankets which seems crazy but they are awesome. It is easy to swaddle your babies with these blankets and they are super soft which is helpful with young babies. Silas still sleeps with one of these blankets as a ‘blankie’ every day. He would carry it around like Linus everywhere if we would allow him.


This is our basic list of our favorite baby items. We love all of these items and still use some of them even today. What are your favorite baby items?

-Sara