Gro-swaddles & Gro Bags

[Weathergirl1]

I'm starting to look at bedding options (due end of November) and I'd love to hear feedback from those of you with experience of these! What did you use and what worked well?

I'm also a bit confused by the listed tog ratings - they seem to be 0.5 up to 2.5 tog, but our summer duvet is a tog 4 ( and we'd be on a tog 13 in the middle of winter)!

TIA!

I think babies need less tog than grown-ups; they can't regulate temperature the way we can. The Gro company is good as their bags come with a thermometer and a guide to bedding and sleepwear for each temperature, so you can see exactly what to put the baby in – eg at 19 degrees you'd use a 2.5 tog bag and a long-sleeved bodysuit.

We got the swaddles but never used them as they seemed impractical. Wouldn't be without the bags though. There's guides to bag togs and clothing at different temps on the website and on the box. Our DD was born end of November last year and I think we were using 2.5 tog bags. However at a fairly average 7 lbs 7 oz at birth, I was surprised at how many things, including the regular style gro bags, aren't suitable until they are bigger. The recommended grosnug was also rubbish, as agreed by others in our nct group, but I found a slightly smaller version of the regular style grobag from white company and had her in that.

I'd just say that for a swaddle use sth with zip up arms. Otherwise little Houdinis wiggle out and wake themselves up.

Really recommend love to dream swaddle bags x

Sleeping bags should be a lower tog as they surround the body and trap air. You can get up to 3.5tog for colder rooms

Gro bags all the way! Our house is freezing and used 3.5 tog as the temp was so low. I’d also recommend gro suits as the arms are padded, but not the body and baby wears the gro suit as opposed to a normal all in one when in the gro bag.

We used gro swaddles when DS was tiny then gro bags or other sleeping bags when he was bigger. We tended to use vests or babygros and low tog sleeping bags - changing outfits with the weather rather than bags as they are expensive. Plan to do the same with ds2 when he arrives in a few weeks!

Ah thanks for all the replies. More reading to be done by me by the looks of it!

We had the grosnug. He was a squirmy baby and would wake himself up with his hands if they were loose, so it was a lifesaver. He's still an active sleeper, so I don't think he'll be able to have blankets for a very long time yet!

When he was a newborn, we set the thermostat in our room to 19 degrees overnight (which is supposed to be optimum for baby sleeping, anything to help). He wore a sleepsuit and long sleeved vest under it, I believe (October baby). When it got really cold in January, we put him in fleecy sleepsuits.

I don't know if you've read the Grobag FAQs, but that should help you out. We still use the thermometer that came with the grobag to figure out what to put him in at night.

My baby hated the swaddles. She’d be furious and fight her way out in the night so I gave up on them pretty fast. The Gro bags were great though, I used 2.5tog in the winter and 0.5 or 1 tog in summer, still use bigger ones now she’s nearly 2.

We had a gro-swaddle to start with. DS was too small to fit in the 0-6m gro-bag so the swaddle was perfect (we also had a love to dream one) and then transitioned to the gro-bag when he was big enough (at around 3m!) the swaddle wasn't too expensive and I've kept it for future babies so feel it was value for money for us.

Another vote for the Love to Dream arms up swaddle bags. My DD much preferred these.