Mom Hacks – Volume 1

When a baby is first born, especially for first time parents, there is so much to learn and adapt to. It is a whole new lifestyle, keeping a tiny human being alive, all while sleep deprived. Everyone and their cousin is going to offer advice, and it will get super annoying. Even people without children or those whose children are now 30 years old, will tell you how to do things or have opinions on how you are handling things. While advice is all good and dandy, we are getting it from all directions, so please keep that in mind, it can be overwhelming and confusing.

The worst, is the comparison game. “So and so did it this way”. “You should do what so and so did”. Can we stop with that right here and now? Unless you are being directly asked about something, leave it alone. Or if you must, ask if you can offer some advice. Us mothers are hard enough on ourselves, to than be compared to others who made it look easy or presented to be better at something than we are. It is not nice.

There is a difference between giving advice and sharing ideas. It is a one sided conversation versus a two sided one. Anything shared on this blog is simply what worked for us. This may not work for you, or you may want to adjust the idea to your own lifestyle. But if you’re clicking on this article, you’re likely seeking some friendly idea sharing and I invite you to read on!

I found the things that worked for us, were quite often things no one mentioned to us or offered as advice. Here are a couple Mom Hacks that worked for me.

Second change station

We had our main change station in the baby nursery, which was on our second floor. During the day, we spent most of our time on our main floor, in our living room. Now for someone who had a C-section, stairs were not exactly friendly for me. So we set up a second change station in our living room – dining room. I was gifted a mat style changing pad at a baby shower that we used on our dining table at the far end that was typically not needed. This assisted with height as it was less bending over. We kept a diaper caddy next to it with extra supplies, so we were always ready. We then would simply toss the diapers into our kitchen garbage. We were not about host any dinner parties during the beginning of our sons life, but if we did have guests over, we could easily take this apart, clean the table thoroughly, and it was if it never existed. This lasted until our son was starting to roll and it was becoming a safety concern.

Scented poop bags

They make them for baby diapers and doggy number twos. We used these for the nasty diapers. Less stench in garbage bins and diaper genies and are super considerate for diaper changes in public places.

Main floor/room laundry basket

This is one of the simplest hacks that just kind of happened and worked and we have stuck with it and haven’t looked back. We had purchased a plastic laundry bin for our son’s nursery before he was born. We were then gifted a much nicer looking one that went with his nursery colours, so the second one ended up next to our downstairs change station. It is so easy to toss in soiled clothing and receiving blankets and anything baby laundry related. I have even thrown in my own robe or sweater after a spit up mess. It creates a designated spot for it all to go versus being thrown about or a clutter pile that needs to be cleaned.

Crib sheet in your Pack ‘n Play

I couldn’t for the life on me figure out how to clean our pack ‘n play mat. It is sewn together as a whole, so it can’t easily be thrown in the washer machine, it can only be spot cleaned. Now our son was the king of spit ups, and that simply wasn’t going to work for me. I had a few crib sheets to allow changes from accidents and spit ups, so I took one of them and put it over the base of the pack ‘n play, and now I can easily clean it at least once a week or as needed. It is not a perfect fit, so I do have to pull it taught into place as best as I can, but it is a wonderful solution.

Large toy basket

I had looked at toy bins and chests as I wanted the toys to be out of sight when not being used, but worried about my baby’s little fingers getting stuck in the lids. Instead, we got a large, soft and flexible, woven basket. What I love best about this, is not only the safety of it, but the accessibility for both my son to access his toys, but for me to toss them back in at the end of the day!

Stability ball for baby bouncing

This was a trick suggested by my brother-in-law and sister-in-law. Our son, Calum, required a lot of bouncing to be comforted as an infant, which, as you can imagine, was incredibly hard on our backs. We already owned a stability ball for fitness and exercise, so we brought it into our living room and could bounce on it lightly or sway back and forth on it, with Calum in our arms and still have a conversation or watch TV. It was genius and life changing.

Buy your diapers in bulk

If you are going to disposable diaper route, once your little one reaches size 1 diapers, buy them in bulk. You’ll save money and panic less as you won’t run out as quickly. What is great too, is as you reach the end of the bulk amount, you can then determine if you need to go up a size or buy another batch of the same size.

These were my favourite newborn baby hacks. There will be many more volumes of these to come.

What have been your favourite Mom Hacks?

Melanie xoxox