What are some things, not particularly necessary, but you find nice to have for either yourself or LO?

ie. My LO isn't here yet, but I read about a wubbanub (stuffed animal with pacifier attached) and bought one or her...and while watching my niece, seeing how she kept losing hers, gave the wubbanub to her, and she is 3 months now, and absolutely LOVES the thing! She pets it, throws it, mouths it, and doesn't lose her pacifier! Pricey for a pacifier, but worth every penny.

I'm on a buying spree until LO gets here, and I already have diapers and clothes hoarded.

What are your suggestions??

Oooo, stalking!!xx

I'm stalking this thread too! I would love to see what ladies/moms are finding useful. Nothing here yet... pretty early on for me yet

Interesting topic!! Sorry to hijack, I was hoping someone would have an opinion on nursing chairs...?

We have a sleepytot for my elder daughter (similar idea with the dummy attached) - it's taken her time to learn how to use it - but now she'll put dummy in, flip ears over her eyes like a blindfold and go to sleep, and if she wakes in the middle of the night she'll sing and talk to bunny for a while and nod back off - getting another one of them definitely for this baby.

Biggest one - a basket downstairs mirroring all the nappy change stuff upstairs - so we have duplicate sets of thigns like sudocreme, nappy sacks, a pack of nappies etc... saves sooo much to-ing and fro-ing doing daytime nappy changes.

Buggy clips if you have a pushchair with one single handlebar rather than two separate handles - so handy to have the ability to hang stuff off the back if you need to (obviously don't be daft and weight the buggy so it tips over).

One we didn't buy initially - a music/light lullaby thing... the music now has such a strong sleep association that it's almost instant in its effect (although I am now at the point of losing the will to live listening to that Mozart loop again and again)

Everybody will tell you different things, but the things I really liked with my daughter were:

- my lovely leather changing bag - indulgent little treat for me but so much nicer than carrying a cheap plasticky looking one around for a couple of years
- Car seat base - brilliant when it's cold and wet out instead of faffing with seatbelts, plus it gave me confidence that the seat was correctly installed
- changing station in the corner of the living room - keeps everything tidy rather than strewn all over the living room when they are small, plus saved my back which was sore after labour
- buggy snuggle carseat liner thingy. Saves dressing them up in snow suits when they are tiny, particularly when they are sleeping - just strap them in, add a blanket on top and then zip it up round them
- blankie with rabbit in little pocket - amazing effect on LO when she is upset, she just adores her!
- white noise machine - really good for helping get LO to sleep as you would think getting to sleep should be easy, but it's not at that age!
- grobags - saves her getting cold in the night because she has kicked the blankets off, and stops me worrying about blankets over her head.
- Dr Brown's bottles -made a world of difference to LOs reflux, just wish I hadn't bought the entire set of Avent bottles first!

I also want to buy a swing for this LO as my friend had one and it was great for helping to get her LO to sleep, but I couldn't afford it at the time.

This is an expensive one, but a jumperoo!!! Saved my life. It was the only thing that kept my son entertained and quiet for a while, until he figured out that he could jump across the room with it, sliding it along. LOL... It took him a long time to figure that out, though, and no one else I've talked to who has kids have ever had a child who did that, so it's a rarity I'm guessing.

Bouncy/vibrating baby seat. All my LOs loved them.

My LO is 9 months and so far the things I have that you'd have to pry out of my cold dead hands are:

Pack and play with newborn bassinet- This was AWESOME for the first few months when he was in our bedroom or the living room. It was a convienent place to lay baby down for a nap and we could keep an eye on him, it also served as a changing station (and I second having a portable/secondary changing basket), and mine had a nifty organizer that hung over the side for pacifiers/toys/blankies etc. Plus now that he is older we use it for travel/grandparents houses

Wipe Warmer- I've had so many people tell me this is a "non-essential" and it's worthless. I say it's worth it's weight in gold! Mine was given to me by fellow parents who praised it. When I was up at 2am changing my son he really appreciated warm wipes instead of getting an ice cold surprise that just made him fuss.

Itz-Been Timer- Another gift from the same parents (I loved those people). It is a little digital timer/tracker that you can get online, it's spelled oddly with the z and all. Basically it provides a way to track how long it has been since the baby was changed, fed, slept or whatever you want to track. It has 4 or 5 different things you can track at once. It even has a little tracker for which breast they fed off last. In the hectic early days having to remember how long it had been since my son fed was darn near impossible. This thing was amazing, and cheap too!

Bouncer- This was where my son spent the majority of his time that wasn't in my arms. He would sleep in it, play in it and it was a great way to keep him safe and confined.

For the mom:
The Undercover Mama- It's a camisole that hooks onto any regular nursing bra to turn your regular t-shirts into nursing tops. It was my favorite nursing accessory, I never left home without it! You can find them online.

Bamboobies Nursing pads- These things were the bomb. They were a little spendy but I ended up loving them. I had unbelievably sore nipples in the beginning and these things were soft, cashmere hugs for my boobies.

Ring sling/Moby wrap- I have both a ring sling and a Moby wrap and I treasure those two things like they were family heirlooms. My ring sling was custom made so it was very expensive but worth every cent. Carrying around a baby in your arms gets exhausting and limits you on what you can do. Although I am pro at making lunch one handed. The nice thing is with my older baby I can use a hip carry and still get use out of these things. I just went on a five mile hike with my son in the Moby wrap the whole time!

A GOOD baby monitor- I started off with a cheap little video monitor...and then it's iffy signal went down one night shortly after our little man started sleeping in his own room. I panicked and quickly bought another one, a much better one. I found one that had a digital signal (so no one can hack into it) with a 600ft range, it tells me the temp in the crib, talk to him through it, play music through it and I can move the camera remotely. This last feature is what makes it all worth it. 9 times out of 10 my son is on the completely opposite side of the crib from where he started.

I think that's all I can think of for now! Hope that helps a little!

Another one... Sock Ons! I'll be honest - I've found the 6-12 month ones less good, but 0-6 months they were a godsend at keeping escapee socks on her feet.