First time mum!

[Lobsided]

Hello all!

Well, we had our first scan today and thankfully all went really well! We are absolutely over the moon and feel so grateful… as well as incredibly overwhelmed!! 😅

I thought I’d pop a somewhat light-hearted post on here asking… where do we even BEGIN with clothes shopping for baby?! I can tell it’ll be so easy to find absolutely everything very cute and want to buy it all but I’m also conscious of being sensible…ish! 😆 so what would you all recommend is a good amount of vests/baby grows/other bits to have for each age range (as in 0-3, 3-6, 6-9) I can imagine some clothes will last longer than others but I’m just after a ball point. I really haven’t a clue how much is too much or not enough!

Thank you all so much for any advice! Xx

Few things to think about first. What's your budget like? Do you want future kids? When is your baby due?

Budget - This is key. Tbh you can get away with buying baby clothes from anywhere. It's all good. DC2 has enjoyed wearing stuff from Poundland, Primark, Tesco, Sainsbury's, Boots, M&S, and Next over his 10 months of life so far. I will say though, that the more expensive quality stuff washes better, and feels better. I love Next, but given in the early months, they will literally only wear it for, at most, a couple of months, then grow out of it. Which ties into...

Future kids - Quite honestly, for the first 3-6 months, my two lived in vests and baby grows. No faffing about with outfits. So I bought neutral high quality stuff, so that even though it doesn't last long on one child, it'll get multiple uses out of it. All babies look adorable in white. As they get older, and start to wear gendered stuff, then I start getting basics from supermarkets and Primark. Might only be for the one kid (I have a girl and a boy so far), so no point going mad. As they get older and clothes start lasting more than a year, then I'll look at the more expensive stuff again.

Baby's due date - Something to think about is what season will they be born in, and at what stage will they be for the rest of the year. No point buying a lovely thick woolly 6-9mo outfit, if it's going to be summer at that stage. Ditto for sun dresses and shorts in the depths of winter.

As for what you'll need, I would say at least 10 vests for each stage. In the early months 0-6 months, if you have a refluxy/poonami baby, you can always buy more. If it's hot, it's all they'll need to wear. I love vests. Baby grows, the same amount as vests as a rule, though if maybe hold off buying them in the size your baby will be in the summer months. If we have another scorcher like last year, you might never need them. As I said earlier, I tend not to do outfits until they're 6 months old.

As for other things light cardigans are useful. Socks go on tiny feet, then magically work their way off. Up to you if you want to bother. Mine get shoes when they go to nursery, or they walk. Whichever happens first. I got a pram suit for the winter months, as I walk everywhere a lot. Less useful if you regularly need to use the car. Otherwise, I find that friends and family tend to go a bit nuts buying baby clothes, so I just need to fill in the gaps.

Hope that helps a little.

The best thing I did was buy the basics for up to a year (the length on my maternity leave). It meant that when money was tight I didn’t have to worry about my dd sizing up. She was born in September so I was lucky that her sizing up aligned with the seasons too!

I would say less is more. You won't know how big they'll be, how fast they'll grow, what the weather will be like, how 'sicky' they'll be etc etc.

DD was not a sicky baby and we also had a heat wave so she didn't go through loads of baby gros in a day, and she spent most of her first month in Just a nappy or a nappy and vest.

However my advice would be...

Get baby gros with zips not poppers.
Leave the cute fiddly outfits until they're older, comfort is key. So footed onesies or leggings, vest and a cardi.
If you're on a budget Vinted is great for bundles of baby stuff most of which is hardly worn, for the nice branded stuff
Go supermarket for basics, vests and leggings etc.

@Dyra This was incredibly helpful, thank you! And some fantastic points about budget, seasons, future children etc. We do plan on having more so I was thinking it would make perfect sense to have a decent amount of neutral clothing in case they are different genders. I think I'll leave more of the cute little outfits to anybody who wishes to buy one for the baby and stick to buying more practical bits!

@Excitedmumma1 This was my thinking, too! I'm a planner by nature and although I know I can't plan too much here, I'd like to be in a place I had a decent "foundation" for each size that I can add to if needs be but I'm not scrambling about to the shops every month because I don't have enough!

@Parkopedia Thanks for your recommendations. It seems a common theme is to stick to comfort! 😊

You must be due in August the same as me! My last baby was an August baby too. I would say the one thing I underestimated last time was the fact I thought it was going to be so hot that I’d need all shorts and light clothes and not cardigans etc. It was hot and he did have quite a few days of lying in the pram with the cover off (in the shade) with shorts etc on but there were also a lot of times going a walk that we really needed a cardigan or even a little fleece on him. I bought one zip up next fleece and he ended up wearing it all the time!

In terms of the basic stuff.. he was 8lb 6 and I took 0-3 months and 0-1 month stuff to the hospital. I think I also had some next first size but that was too small within literally 2 days so this time I’m going to go with the 0-1 month. You do need to do a few changes per day at the start if they’re sicky or have leaking nappies, which seemed to happen to us loads at first. Now he’s 1 he puts an outfit on and that’s him sorted for the day so it’ll be a shock to go back to that 🙈 I would say with vests you can’t really buy too many.. you usually get 5 in the big multipacks so I’d probably get 3 of them in 0-3 and maybe two packs in the newborn size. That will still involve a lot of washing so the more you have the less faff itl be!

I went overkill on the actual ‘outfits’ for the first 3 months when there was really no need. A nice babygrow with a collar would have done for him to wear if I wanted it to be a proper outfit when people came to visit. I found myself getting him fully dressed every time but all they do is sleep! My mum made a comment when I was pregnant about seeing a baby out somewhere and she said he was in his pyjamas. She said would you bring a baby out in pyjamas? In hindsight, yes! I probably should have but I was so conscious of making him look all nice and get the use out of all the outfits. Some short baby grows for sleeping in during the days if it’s hot would be good or just basic shorts etc. I’d worry about the bigger sizes when you get nearer the time, you’ll have a much better idea by then and it’s most likely those sizes people will buy you!

agree with the zips not poppers! Mori is the most adorable (but expensive) website.. I got a few double zip sleepsuits the last time and found I used them again and again while some with the poppers didn’t get worn

@BCxx That's really helpful, thank you! And congratulations on your second baby!! I'm thinking between 10-15 vests and 10-15 baby grows for each "stage" will be a good starting point!? We can always add to it and great idea with waiting a bit for the older stuff. Our baby could be tiny or really tall... who knows!

DS was born in the June of a particularly hot summer. He was just in a nappy at home and vest when we were out. If we were meeting friends i would pop some shorts on too but that is as far as i went. No faffing with little outfits.

But honestly don’t stress about how much you buy. We only bought around 5 vests and when we got home and realised we needed more, DH just grabbed some packs from the supermarket. So many places also do next day delivery. Clothes aside, we just bought the essentials to start (cot, nappies, pram) and then just ordered other bits online as we decided we did need them and they were here the next day.

You can tell from the above that neither DH or I are preppers!

@Betsyboo87 I appreciate this outlook! Because of the fact I love to plan and prep I could see myself getting way too carried away and buying WAY too much of everything so I'm trying to take a bit more of a sensible approach. We'll still buy the bits we want to buy but I don't want to end up with hundreds of clothes that just won't be worn!

I like the idea about buying the essentials other than clothes and seeing what you felt you needed, too! I feel there's a lot of bits that are obvious but also a lot that you "could" buy but may not necessarily need! For some reason it always reminds me of my sister (eldest) starting secondary school years back and the school providing my mum with a huge list of things that were ABSOLUTELY NEEDED and she never used or benefitted from the majority of it! By the time it was my turn to go to secondary school the list was ignored! I think with your first baby it's similar in that with a lot of things you won't know until you know if that makes sense!

For a summer baby I would go for at least 10 vests and 10 sleepsuits. I also found the short sleeve rompers super cute and easy for summer, even cheap supermarket ones. Don’t buy too much in the smallest sizes unless your baby ends up on the smaller side. We barely used the newborn cardigan for our July baby born in a heatwave. Found a blanket just as convenient if needed for the pram.

Even for 3-6 and 6-9 (both stages over winter) we’ve mostly had DD In sleepsuits. They always seem more comfy and cosy than separates with a waistband and baby socks are a real faf. We tend to have 10-15 sleepsuits at one time and the same for vests with a mix of long and short sleeve vests over winter.

For cooler weather when vests will usually be under sleepsuits I just buy a large multipack of white cotton ones. For warmer weather look for ones with cute designs so they look nice on their own if baby just ends up in a vest.

@trrk Thank you Trrk!

Another person here who dressed their baby mostly in gros for the first six months or so! So pleased to see this is quite common.
I was really miffed when MIL said she was out in jim-jams! I felt really embarrassed 😳

Quantity I'd say less is more & definitely consider pre loved as most of these things are worn only a few times! The more expensive brands do tend to wash a bit better but I've also found tesco stuff good.

My bub was predicted to be (and was) on the small side so we were in first size, newborn then 0-3 but i think most people seem to go straight to 0-3 & if you need to smaller stuff could be purchased quickly at the time. Tu (sainsburys) do a small baby range.

Other things:

Definitely think about seasons.
Bulky pram suits are v impractical in the car

@SBR1 Thank you! This was very useful 😊