To think your Baby Registry list should be limited after #1

[Outside9]

I often receive baby registry lists as I'm in that phase of life. It shocks me how so many of my friends and relatives, who are on their 2nd or 3rd child+, have such extensive registry lists you would think it was their 1st child.

(Obviously this doesn't necessarily apply to those with big age gaps or surprise accidents).

I have one friend who is having their 2nd, (1st just turned 4) and she has everything from prams, to baby bath etc. My cousin, who about to have her 4th child in (oldest child is 5!!l ) also has something similar. When I had my 2nd, people thought it was strange when I said all I really needed was nappies and wipes. Think it will be the same 3rd time round.

Granted there are standalone items that are needed; naturally you need an additional car seat, or the bottles and changing matt are worn out. But outside of that, if you knew you always intended to have more than one child, surely you should've kept all the baby stuff?

It's Friday, so may as well kill time by getting torn apart by this section. AIBU?

I’m in my 20s, have two toddlers and lots of friends having babies. I have never heard of anyone having a registry. I don’t think this is necessarily generational, as I can’t even think of one person I’ve heard of having one except for on mumsnet!!

I did have a “baby shower” that my close friends (very kindly!) insisted on doing - it was very much not like how baby showers seem in the US though. It was just my group of friends from school who clubbed together and bought me a basket of lovely baby clothes, and we sat and had a cup of tea as I looked through it all. We didn’t invite anyone else, and I didn’t ask for any specific presents (or any presents at all!) and there certainly wasn’t any decorations or any faff like that

I find the whole concept tacky and grasping whether its first or tenth baby

My niece had a small baby shower type gathering and asked attendees to give a book they enjoyed as a child or one they had enjoyed reading with their own baby/small child. It was lovely to see them and her baby had a ready made little library - which has gone on to be enjoyed by her subsequent children.

Oh and I also don’t know anyone who had a gender reveal event where other people were invited, though I do have an old friend on Facebook who posted about one they had. But none of my friends or family have ever had one.

Interestingly I didn’t want to do one for my baby shower that friends kindly wanted to host but they insisted as everyone wanted to get something I really needed rather than tat I might not like or need

@Notagain75i was given one for an online pandemic baby shower! But it is an international couple neither living in home country so I let them off the hook and bought a book from their list

What culture are you from then, whereby you make a list of what items you want your acquaintances to buy you for your baby?
Because in my ‘culture’, they’re not a thing. My children are both of the age whereby they and their friends are having babies - they’ve never heard of this either.
Most people when attending a baby shower will buy a cute blanket, a small cuddly bear, some item of pottery with Peter Rabbit on it or a lovely book for the baby. Colleagues at work might club together and get a gift voucher.

I'm in my mid 30's, have friends with children from teens right through to about 1 month old. Haven't ever been sent a registry. Have been to two baby showers, one for an American and one other about a decade ago, but neither time had a registry.

Same as some others have said, if I worked in an office then it was common to do a whip round and get vouchers for mamas and papas or a pregnancy massage or something, but didn't do this outside of work.

Astounding how different norms can be amongst friendship circles. Mostly I have friends in London, the south east, south west and Wales...So quite a geographical range. I guess most of my mates are 34+, maybe that's the difference?

I have heard of this but only in Internet articles about CF'ers. When I had my first baby, our parents bought us big things, in laws bought us the car seat and my parents bought us cot bedding and the changing table and mat. Most other people bought us an outfit each which we were extremely grateful for, especially the ones in bigger sizes as ds1 was nearly 9lbs and born in July so he only wore vests in newborn size. With ds2 we just needed a double buggy which we bought with the sure start grant and a new mattress for the cot. Ds3 was born in winter so needed warmer clothing and a snow suit which we bought him and ds4 was born early so he needed smaller baby clothes. Ds5 had a new car seat because ds4 was still in the baby one. We didn't expect anyone to buy us anything although we were grateful to those who did. I would have been miffed to recieve a list from someone. I love going into next or asda and spending ages choosing some baby clothes for a new baby in the family.

It's never awkward to say no.
Woman up!

Well, I'm just going to repeat everyone else:
What?!
I've never heard of a baby registry or a baby wishlist. Ever.

This sounds more like it that the list would reduce with each kid!

I could genuinely name the things we've been gifted when babies arrived...2-3 packs of onesies, same with outfits, some muslins, 6 or 7 homemade blankets (which is a lot tbh, i guess a registry would have avoided this!!), a smattering of cuddly toys, and a nice teether. I'm really certain that's it. Was very grateful for all of it, never occured to me someone else might buy a car seat or pram! That must have felt wonderful. I've since gifted some of my big items to a family member as I thought we were done, turns out I was premature on that one!! Oops.

That list of gifts is interesting to me, because in the US, most baby shower attendees go for practical over sentimental. They might put a teddy bear along with something like bibs or bottles or burp cloths, but the purpose of a shower is more oriented around the things the baby needs, as opposed to things that make nice gifts but aren’t essential. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone get pottery - what do people do with it? Is it purely decorative?

I think she might mean Peter rabbit crockery which is a traditional christening gift

I got so so so many teddies and they are just gathering dust!

What a load of nonsense. Baby registry? Money grabbing more like…

Probably the sort of people who have an event whenever there's a chance of making money, they'll no doubt be having 'gender reveal £££', 'baby shower £££', etc to monetise their totally original skill in the new fangled skill of having a baby!

YANBU. Personally I think it's rude and grabby to ask people for presents at all.

Who the fuck are you hanging around with? Never heard of this

Conversely this is where I think Registry is helpful for baby #1. For my first child I had too many new born clothes she was too big for when she was born, and way too many teddy bears than she ever cared for.

It's been said already, while I was having a moan, I understand purchasing something isn't compulsory.

I'm sure it was easy enough to give baby clothes and toys to charity.

It was, just seemed excessive and wasteful.

I've never come across this before, a kind of extreme generosity? Like pp, with my first, people gave clothes or toys when they came to visit. I can't say I was inundated.
Neither of us had parents, so we bought most of it ourselves. Not a complaint, just a fact.
I think over the years I've given babygros or towels or a blanket for friends' babies.

How greedy and wasteful. I’ve always bought things my children need. Not go begging. In laws bought us a pram as they offered and that’s about it! Was able to reuse most after number 1.

I just bought what we needed, then relatives and some friends kindly gifted something that had caught their eye or appealed to them and gave it once baby arrived. Sometimes I already had it, but just said thank you - and most of it was lovely.

There was certainly no orchestrated masterplan of allocating acquisitions to others. I find that a bit unpleasant - and a slightly odd focus with a new arrival.

I always tend to think that with gifts on MN though. Within our immediate family we ask DC (and I ask DH) if there is a gift they would like, but other than that I leave it up to the giver. Otherwise it morphs from a gift to some kind of tax on the friendship I think. However, I know many on MN are in favour of explaining what they will happily receive - especially to their MIL. And woe betide the MIL who "veers" off-script ...

Ffs this is insane.

I never buy a gift for an unborn child - my DD died at 2 days old and it was hard enough having the things we’d bought for her prior to birth without other gifts to deal with too.
baby showers are nonsense IMHO, I certainly wouldn’t pay £60 for a set meal unless I wanted to go to that restaurant and could afford it anyway.
baby registry- absolutely no way.