Gift ideas for prem babies, please

[Frieda]

My neighbour has just given birth at 29 and a bit weeks and I'd like to give them something for the babe ? any ideas? Think mum will need cheering up, too, as it's obviously going to be quite stressful for her but I should imagine she's probably innundated with flowers. Can you believe it, she's been put on the maternity ward with all the new mums and their strapping full-term babies, and she can't even go to see hers without help because she's had a caesarean ? seems v insensitive to me.
Also, does anyone know where you can get prem baby clothes online?

I don't know about online but gymboree does nice prem baby clothes but when my friend had her DS at 30 wks even prem clothes were way too big for a while! If she has to stay in hospital for a while could you get her a CD or a stack of glossy mags, not all baby related as it's very boring in there.

mothercare do sizes called tiny baby - not sure how big that little one was but they seem to go down to quite small sizes.

For the mum some lovely chocolates and girly chic books - dh bought them for me when I had to stay in after mu caesarean. I found those helpful when I was in after caesarean.

I had a friend with two very prem babies - 26 and 27 weeks (both fine now). She was a bit superstitious about being given presents for the babies until she was completely confident they were going to be fine. And when they are in SCBU they don't really wear clothes (only hats!). What she appreciated was people giving things when the babies where ready to come out (and that gives you time to get something nice and maybe personalised with name and birthdate ). She also REALLY appreciated time and effort from friends - since she spent every waking hour in hospital for x months. Homemade meals cooked and delivered, errands run for her, things for her (books and magazines, the more trivial the better). Other good presents are notelets for thank you letters as she will have masses of time to get that sort of thing done.
Poor her, I hope everything goes OK.

Thanks for your thoughtful ideas, girls ? I'm just popping out magazine shopping now!

know the feeling as that was done to me but when a midwife came to chat to me when dh had gone home i just burst into tears and she promptly put me ina room of my own and then a few days later a shared room with another mum who's babe was in scbu.
books,mags,cd and photos of babe being delivered kept me going
offering lifts to the hospital when she's out to visit babe and staying with her for chats -
lol to your friend

It's not the same but I had to stay in hospital for 2 weeks because my dd had Strep B. What really REALLY helped was people bringing in completely irrelevant mags (like Cosmo - "how to improve your sex life" - um, what sex life??), books that would pass the time and LOADS of chocolate. Also, hospital food is a bit yuck and as I had a private room, my sister kept sneaking in chips and McDonalds when she came to see me, which REALLY cheered me up!

If you want to get something for the baby as well, you could get something where the size doesn't matter, like little soft toys for the baby or posh baby toiletries. If the mum's allowed to touch the baby a lot, you could get some posh baby massage oil because baby massage is supposed to help boost the immune system, which I assume would be good for a prem baby.

I forgot to add - mil bought a small bear which we were able to put into dd's humidicrib along with the tigger that my dh had bought her.

I agree about the things for home - I could have used some home cooked meals so that when dh and I got home for the hospital after visiting dd it was such a pain to then try and think about dinner.