Sunday, September 20, 2015

Mommy Hacks

Happy Sunday!

Baby is napping and I wanted to share a couple of mommy hacks I've come up with.

Now I may not have invented these. I'm sure somewhere there's a mommy of five kids who discovered these tricks with her first kid and has been doing them for years...but in the story of me...I came up with them all on my own!

First of all...as a first time mommy, before baby came I had a whole list of must haves. Obvious things: crib, carseat, baby monitor. Like to haves: diaper pail, swing, cute diaper bag. And (as I later found out) not really necessaries; white noise make (phone app is way better!), cute wipe case (the big box of individual wipe packs is less expensive then the big box of two large packages from which you can refill) and 537 bottles of Johnson & Johnson lotion and body wash (you'll end up with an eczema baby who cannot use any of these products and have to give them to your sister-in-law).

I vaguely remember somewhere in this list of things, at some point, thinking I needed to get one of those cute little doo-doo bag holders that clip onto your diaper bag. You know, that holds the little scented trash bags to put dirty diapers in when out and about. I'm pretty sure as soon as this thought occurred to me, I forgot it, because once baby got here I had no doo-doo bags.

The need for this item did not occur to me again until our first doctor visit with Ro-Ro. We're getting ready for his weigh in and have to remove his wet diaper...except it wasn't just wet. No problem here, I've been changing baby diapers since I was ten. I whip it off, get him cleaned up, and the nurse sweetly says, "Let me get you a bag for that." Me (with my sleep deprivation, sore, stitched up lady parts, huge leaky breasts, and post-partum emotions) is thinking, "Um...the only thing he's pooping is breast milk...it does not stink...why the need for a bag?" and then the whole doctors office...sanitary needs clicks with my poor new mommy brain. I smile sweetly (well I thought it was sweetly, it probably came out as more of a lopsided grimace) and thanked her as I bagged my 4 day old baby's diaper and mentally berated myself for being such an ill prepared, failure of a mommy (post-partum emotions, remember?)

This was nothing compared to the mental beatdown I delivered to myself 3 days later at  a lactation consultation in the same office, when I forgot diapers completely and had to ask the wonderfully nice nurse practitioner if there were any available. After these experiences I vowed I'd be better prepared, then holed up at home for 4 weeks.

So after my 4 week recuperation I found diaper sacks at Wal-Mart. A little, inconvenient zip lock bag of 50 diaper sacks. I decided this would suffice until I could find one of those cute little diaper bag attachments. After going through my 50 sacks I did find the attachment. I did not realize that refills for this

are $6 for two. Two of these


That are maybe 30 diaper sacks, each. So finally...after all that back story...doggie doo-doo bag refills work JUST THE SAME. And are way cheaper.


This pack of 6 refills, from TJ Maxx, cost $3.99 and were super easy to install:


And...voila


They fit, they're scented...and work just the same!

Second mommy hack: Ro-Ro is constantly dropping his teethers when we're out and about. All that's needed to remedy this is a bead necklace.


(on the left is one of Ro-Ro's favorite teethers) Simply loop the beads onto the teether:


Then loop the other end of the beads on your wrist:


Now while you're holding baby, during church, walking around the store, etc. when they drop the toy it doesn't hit the floor.

A couple of precautions. DO NOT leave the baby unattended with the beads, um yeah, choking hazard. I only use this method when Ro-Ro is being held and supervised. DO NOT loop the beads on your baby, ONLY on you.

The beads also come in handy if you forgot a pacifier clip (once again, attached to you, NOT your baby) because 4 months into this whole mommy thing and I'm still not always prepared ;)

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