Must have items for baby No. 2.

[Ducky1900]

Due no. 2 in January.
DS will be 2 Yr 3 months, what's the must have items that made your life easier with Newborn and toddler.
We already have most of the big purchases, and I plan to BF again.

Following with interest.

At the moment, all we’re planning on is

New car seat (first child’s car seat still in use)
Buggy board
New cot mattress
A few new baby grows
New bottle teats/dummies if needed
New breast pump if needed

Plus topping up on toiletries that we don’t use any more like Water Wipes, Bepanthan etc

Sling (something like a Close Caboo or a Moby wrap or a Kari Me for the early weeks and something like a Tula or Boba once they're a few months old. Not sure how sling libraries are operating at the moment but your local one might advise remotely)

More than one baby swing seat (somewhere safe to leave baby, one upstairs and one downstairs)

Absolutely a Baby sling and baby carrier! I started off with the caboo sling and I'm now using my ergo baby carrier. They have been an absolute life saver!!!!!
Also a decent baby swing/rocker 😊

Absolutely a Baby sling and baby carrier! I started off with the caboo sling and I'm now using my ergo baby carrier. They have been an absolute life saver!!!!!
Also a decent baby swing/rocker 😊

I have a 14 week old and a 2 year old. I joked to my husband about baby docking stations but it’s true! Just somewhere safe to plonk baby if toddler is doing something a bit silly which mine does a lot at the mo.

-Cheap bouncer on every level of the house. -I use pram where possible for downstairs sleep, can just wheel him into garden/front room/wherever toddler decides he needs to be.
-Blanket in the middle of a (large) dining table 🤣
-I used a stretchy wrap a lot to start with.

We already had most things which was fortunate as would have struggled to get clothes etc at the height of the pandemic, but I’ve been surprised by how different my 2 babies are/were in terms of sleep preferences etc. I had bought little tiny sleeping bags as i presumed he would like them as my son did and still does, got used once and then I panic bought a sleepyhead to make co-sleeping feel a bit safer (never co slept with the first) and he’s still sleeping happily in that now with no blankets 🤷‍♀️

As long as you have somewhere for baby to sleep and whatever you might need to feed them then maybe just wing it and get what you realise might help delivered as you go along.

Let the older one watch TV, it won’t kill them 😁

Also expecting no 2 with a toddler (will be 2.5 when she’s born) - thanks for starting this!

We’ve got/are getting:

• new mattress
• close caboo sling (already had ergo baby but it’s quite bulky for indoor use)
• buggy board for toddler
• present for toddler when baby is born
• some warmer clothes as baby 1 was born in spring and this one due Nov

And I’m hoping to borrow a couple more bouncers from friends so I can have more places to put her down around the house like a pp said!

@HarrietM87 can I ask what present you are getting for the toddler? This sounds like a good idea!

Sling definitely! My dc1 was a bit older at 4 but I couldn't have managed without a sling. Baby is 8 months now and still use carriers/slings a lot.

I have playmats dotted around to pop baby on while I do things or sort the older one, also use a jumperoo now he's a bit bigger.

I bf and cosleep, a bf cushion has been handy so I can have 2 hands free to play or craft when baby is feeding and napping (no sleepyhead/baby nest as they are dangerous for sleep).

MyHummy is fab, the white noise blocks out anything else happening when baby is asleep so we can be playing or getting on with whatever and not worrying about noise.

Disney+ has been amazing! As much as i don't like dc1 watching tv too much sometimes I just needed some quiet, like when baby was up a lot in the night, so we can snuggle up and watch a movie or show... dc1 thinks it's amazing.

White noise machine
Snoozee sleep trainer clock for the oldest!
Instead of having one enormous bag where everything you need ends up at the bottom, get two smaller initialled bags - one for each child.
If you didn’t get a bath seat for your first child, then make sure you definitely get one for your second! It means you have your hands free so that you can wash your baby, and your toddler at the same time.
Save yourself from traipsing up and down the stairs with both kids in tow and get a changing station for every floor of your home. Buy a really cheap changing mat and stash it underneath your sofa to keep things tidy.
If both of your kids are in rear-facing car seats you may want two car mirrors to keep an eye on what they’re both doing.
Thermos mug - the chances of you finishing a hot drink before it cools down to room temperature are slim to none.
Even if you already have a baby monitor, you’ll want to consider upgrading to a monitor that supports two cameras.

@HanPanPeg I don’t know yet! Baby not due til November so I have time. Lots of friends have recommended it to me as a nice thing to do for the older one. A doll is a good option as they can then “look after” it as you look after the new baby. DS already has a boy doll he likes but maybe I’ll get a girl one (as baby is a girl), or poss some jigsaws or something that he could do while I’m feeding?!

If anyone else has good ideas let me know!

Oh and we got dc1 a camera and a little scrapbook from baby when he was born. She adores it and is always taking photos to put in her book.

Also took dc1 to choose a gift for baby, so when she first met him she brought it along. It made meeting the new baby a bit of an event as she'd been looking after the cuddly toy for a couple of weeks.

That’s a brilliant idea @majesticallyawkward! How old was DC1? I feel like DS might be too young for a camera but it’s such a lovely idea.

She was 4 when he was born @HarrietM87 the camera we got her is fab and really easy to use, it's a kiddy zoom (kiddizoom maybe?) and the scrapbook is the 'our adventure book' from up.

A car seat that fits on my pushchair
A new moses basket
A new changing mat
A present for DS 3, and a lucky dip bag with small wrapped presents, a jar and 5 large buttons as rewards for good behaviour to win a lucky dip.

We discovered a few things with DC2 but they are partly due to us being in a house with stairs rather than a flat (as we were with DC1) and having a car.

Changing caddy in the living room with wipes, nappies and changes of clothes in to minimise trips up and down stairs.

Changing mat in the living room.

As many things to plonk baby in or on as possible - we had the crib upstairs, Moses basket downstairs, bouncy chair, and now can use the Jumperoo and a doughnut cushion.

We bought new spoons and sippy cups for weaning, a new mattress for the crib, an Isofix car seat base (easier than belting in a second seat - I found this really fiddly for some reason) and a Moses basket.

Shnuggle bath is amazing!

We also needed some new clothes, mainly seasonal (eg summer rompers as DC1 wasn’t in them at the same age).

DC1 decided he wasn’t bothered about the buggy board but with your age gap I think you’d need that or a double.

Buggy board has been handy. To be honest I'm still quite nervous to take them both out on my own; and with lockdown I've not really had to. The carrier has been good so that we can still take the toddler to woodland and the beach without a pram, but I am still a bit about being agile enough to chase him with the carrier on.

Yy to "docking stations"! I've still got DS' play mat and two bouncy chairs for downstairs. Upstairs she goes in the cot when needed.

Some new series' to put on TV or tablet for during feeds or when the toddler needs downtime. My just 3yo loves the new Noddy series on Netflix and Ben and Holly. Creative Galaxy on Amazon is good too. I find Disney + a bit old for him still so it doesn't hold his attention as well.

There’s 2.5 years between my DD and DS, I have found a sling/carrier to be invaluable so I can still run around after DD without having to keep putting DS down (I also have dogs so it’s just easier to keep him on my person!). A changing caddy is also very useful as you can move it from room to room along with the toddler.

Only other thing I can think of just now is the Angelcare bath seat as it allows me to bath the two kids together.

I think I would get the newborn baby seat for the stokke tripp trapp high chair next time. With one baby its ok moving baby bouncer around, but with 2 children, being able to have that in kitchen diner, and leave bouncer in living room would be easier. Plus its high up to stop baby being poked in face by small toddler if your busy trying to serve dinner.

Would also order loads of 'cook' ready meals or similar. With first child you can just eat later if busy with baby, but with a toddler they need to eat at a similar time regardless.

@FizzingWhizzbee123

Following with interest.

At the moment, all we’re planning on is

New car seat (first child’s car seat still in use)
Buggy board
New cot mattress
A few new baby grows
New bottle teats/dummies if needed
New breast pump if needed

Plus topping up on toiletries that we don’t use any more like Water Wipes, Bepanthan etc

Just a note - if your first has one of those 0-4 ones, sometimes you're better off getting a larger seat for the toddler (up to 25kg rear or forward facing depending on your preference) as they only tend to last until 4 for average or smaller children. If you're going to buy two toddler seats anyway it makes sense to get one in a slightly bigger size. The 25kg seats aren't suitable from birth.

And they don't recommend changing the cot mattress any more so you can stick with the original one :)

We walk everywhere so I've been looking at the Tula Explore carrier. It would fit the newborn or the toddler so I thought it could live under the pram and whoever needed to be carried could go in it and whoever needed to buggy could use that.

Pricey but good resale values and gorgeous prints.

Depends a bit what your toddler is like but I found it helpful to have somewhere higher up where I could put baby so that my younger child couldn’t climb all over him. I used the Tripp trapp with newborn seat (which then could use as they got older too so didn’t feel like a waste to buy)

Some kind of double buggy was my other go to. Again depends a bit on how much walking you’re likely to do but even if your 2yo walls well it’s always handy to be able to just shove them both in the buggy and power walk to the park on those days when you need to get out without stopping to look at every flower on the way. Similarly I had a sling which was always on the bottom of the buggy so I was never in a situation where the toddler suddenly refused to walk and I couldn’t do anything about it, I’d just put him in the buggy and put baby in the sling