What was the best gift you received as a new parent?

[FairyFavour]

Just trying to come up with something useful rather than cute clothes. It’s been a long time since I had a baby so any ideas welcome.

Definitely not buying a sleepy head or perfect prep machine.

Lol I was going to say Sleepyhead.

I'll say groegg then

Grobag and groswaddle. Ordered extra online as soon as DS had grown into them, they're so awesome!

Clothes are good too, but 6-9 months and up - we were drowning in 0-3/ 3-6 as that was the size everyone got to avoid us drowning in the smaller sizes...

I thought of groegg, but not sure if they’ve got one.

Maybe vouchers for grobag so they can choose.

Well it wasn't the Tefal frying pan mil got me...

Windy

I bought my sister a homemade stain remover bar from Saponista and a love to dream swaddle. Both of which she loved.

If they're wanting to go down the reusable nappy route then a voucher for the brand they're wanting to use might be something.

Sleeping bags and definitely clothes 6 months up.

But the best present I got was a cheese parcel with all of the cheeses I couldn't eat during the pregnancy. Seriously that was awesome.

Or any meals that are easy to heat up for the new parents.

My sister knew I was planning to breast feed so got me some 'fuel' - posh trail mix, dried fruit and (my personal favourite) M&S chocolate coated caramel popcorn. God, it was AMAZING.

I got some lovely outfits, a brilliant sling from my mum, and even a hand made baby quilt from a much loved aunt but I would have burned them all in a heartbeat at 3.30 in the morning for more of that oh-so-delicious popcorn!

A big sponge bath support was genius when dc were tiny! Hands free bathing!
Not like using the baby bath on the first day and letting the siblings help...
And ds taking the plug out on the living room floor....

I wish we’d been given a gift card for a takeaway! Getting the baby and me settled took so long that neither of us had the wherewithal to make anything

Failing that, grobags and groswaddles are fantastic for newborns.

We also had the lullaby owl from the Gro company. It has a sensor that activates when the baby starts making sounds in the night and it starts playing again. It has a mixture of white noise sounds and music with a soft night light too.

An m&s dine in for 2...

Pate, Brie, French bread and red wine (me).

Super soft Jelly cat dinosaur (DD)

My mum cooked 2 weeks worth of meals for us plus crumbles and sponge puddings, froze them and delivered them to my house. Best gift ever.

Cook vouchers from a friend - it was lovely, got a few lovely frozen meals in which was great when we’d lived off pasta for a couple of weeks

Cook (posh ready meal) voucher
A bag of medical supplies - infacol, calpol, teething gel, baby shampoo etc
A bag of cheese, champagne, salami etc

Fisher Price Rainforest playgym, she's 5 months now and we've used it more or less every day it's fab for keeping her occupied whilst I pop and hang the washing out or make a brew etc.
Not that I wasn't grateful for the gifts but we got so many clothes and some have gone away with tags still on we were overwhelmed with blankets and soft toys so I'd now never buy any of these items for a new baby.
I also got alot of Next vouchers but you're a bit limited with what you can buy for a baby from Next other than clothes and bedding so I'd have preferred Mothercare or Boots vouchers as wider range of products to choose from.
Floweres whilst lovely just created additional work for me when dealing with the culture shock of a newborn.
We did get an M&S meal deal it was 2 pizzas, 2 sides and a strawberry trifle that was a great gift in the early days of needing a quick cook easy tea.

A meal for that night and a meal for the freezer. Honestly, I cried. It was homemade nutritious food that my mum made and it meant more than all the presents we got.

With DS grobags were a god send when he was 6m+
With twins a noise machine, I was only gifted one and ended up buying another so they both had one in the car because it wasn’t loud enough sat in between them. It might depend on the baby but as soon as the ocean sounds both of them are out.

Best things for us-freezer full of cook ready meals (so fairly posh and must have cost our in laws a bit) but were indispensable on the days where we just had no energy to cook. For the baby- BIG muslins that we could use for a multitude of purposes (and still use to put down to capture rogue food). Aden and Anais (posh) also do lovely style playmats too that double up as on - the - go random use saviours! For me- my sister coming round day three. Putting my feet up, getting me cuppas and letting me be a new mum. It depends how close you are to the new mum. But id say option three of all those was what helped the most!

Honestly, the best thing I got was a dummy. I would never, ever have bought one myself, but after two days straight of screaming I decided to just try it... absolute godsend.

Back in 2003, a Baby Bjorn semi-upright lounge thing (can't remember what it was called) was amazing as DS could look around him / see me rather than be on his back all the time.

Ok, so not a gift I received but it's something I have bought in preparation for my first baby due on Monday.

I bought it on Amazon for about £13 and it's going to be exactly what I gift everyone having a baby in future.

gro.co.uk/product/gro-light/

It adapts any light fitting into a nightlight and fills the room with a lovely cool blue light so you don't startle baby in the night.

Just remembered a friend did me a toiletries gift box for me and baby and in addition to the usual baby bath/shampoo/sudocream she also but in dentinox, colief, gripe water and baby calpol all an absolute god send when your baby is suffering and you don't have to pop out to the chemist/supermarket to buy whatever you hope will cure them.

Thanks everyone. I have thought about cook vouchers, but I’m not sure how much freezer space they have.

Would love to get a jelly cat bunny, but will it just be another cuddly amongst loads?