(Part 3) Best products from r/AskParents

Yes to everyone who said something for Mom. One person got me chapstick at my shower and I almost cried... everything is about baby basically for the rest of her life. It’s nice when someone remembers she exists, too. Gift certificates for massages are especially great- everything hurts afterwards. Comfy pajamas that have pockets, a silicone breast pump if she plans to nurse (life saver for clogged ducts... you can latch it while in the shower), meal delivery service or gift cards for places that deliver (or something like Postmates). Make a point to get her out of the house, too, once baby comes. Obviously you don’t give that as a gift at the shower... but it’s sadly pretty common to lose touch with your non-parent friends once baby comes. Make sure to keep in touch with her and not just to come over and see the baby.

For baby- multiple crib sheets, crib liners for the inevitable spit-ups and pees, these washcloths (or something similar. SO soft), this teething toy (this is pretty much the only one my son will use), these books. If you’re willing to splurge a bit, one of the bouncers that has a motor to bounce itself (some are pretty inexpensive, but the MamaRoo was awesome to have). White noise machine.

Reusable stickers are awesome. My daughter loves playing with the type below. And I love that they’re not actually sticking on anything I’d have to scrape off.

Eyelike Stickers: Dinosaurs https://www.amazon.com/dp/0761174842/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_oSmoDb9W1H6MP

Otherwise coloring or sidewalk chalk is great if you have concrete patio or front walkway.

Or healthy snacks like crackers and cheese, fruit like your friend mentioned, milk or yogurt. Not sure if they have any allergies.

I’m super late but hey neighbor!

Yeah, it’s definitely a case by case scenario thing.

There’s this book called The Gift Of Fear that I plan on giving to my niece when she gets to be a teen that basically teaches you how to follow your instincts in certain situations and stay safe. You got some time before your little one will be able to read it lol but maybe you can check it out and give him the same lessons as he grows up. I think that’s the route I’m going to take.

Could always try a lockbox like this one and then keep the keys somewhere secure like a wallet and taped under a drawer. You obviously want to be able to access the box when you need it, so I'd probably try under your clothes in your dresser, closet, or something similar.

Edit: Also good on you for taking steps towards safe sex! You're going to get a mixed bag of people telling you wether or not they think you're ready, but only you will know the amount of quality sexual education, knowledge of consent, and practices for safe sex that you have learned.

If you have a partner, and you feel comfortable discussing sex with them and safe sex practices, you may be ready even if you wouldn't want to openly discuss it with your parents. Just make sure your partner is the same! If theyre undereducated or uncomfortable, obviously don't rush them. Also on this train of thought, why not try to keep the condoms with your partner (if applicable) if you feel unable to store them at your own place?

Hi there, I absolutely experienced the same thing. It took us several years to get pregnant with our daughter, and then when she was born she was a very alert and colicky baby. The sleep interruptions were really hard on my husband who has an autoimmune condition so I do understand that (I ended up being diagnosed with one when daughter was 6 months old). He had also been hired at a new and better job (hired the week daughter was born), but there was a huge ramping up period so on top of learning how to be a dad he was struggling also with feeling competent and capable on the job. So maybe your husband has some similar stressors?

I can't tell you how many times I heard things like, "I never really wanted this." or "I don't know how to do this." My all time favorite was, "I love her kinda like how I love our cats." (it took a long time for him to live that one down). My husband also suffers bouts of depression.

I think the newborn aspect is a large part of it. Once my daughter was able to more blatantly socialize with him (around 1 - 1.5 and up) they bonded fabulously. She's almost 12 now and he has said and proven on countless occasions that she's the center of his universe. It's pretty cool.

I think my analysis is that at the end of the day his inability to take to fathering right away was a last vestige of my husband's immaturity and a hole in his own sense of being an adult. Maybe it's something similar for you. Maybe he is depressed, things are different. Instead of having his wife's focus and attention there's a little, noisy person who took it and turned his world upside down. There may be stress at work, but he can't get much sympathy because there's also stress at home. Plus he just doesn't have the same hormones that help seal the mother-child bond. -And this is not to downplay your stress and upset with him at all. This is also not to excuse him from being a father. You are totally justified and valid in being upset with him, he is endangering his family.

It can get better and it should get easier the older your child gets. You guys need to keep trying to talk, and trying to be friends during what is a difficult time (even though it is a blessing). I don't remember a ton from my daughter's first 6 months because I was so sleep deprived and focused on her, but I have the impression that it was a happy misery if that makes sense.

Maybe suggest that he get a physical in case there is a medical reason for him to feel down (particular checking thyroid and sex hormones as they can often be culprits in this area). And ask him if he is depressed and might benefit from talking to a therapist.

I don't have an easy solution or answer for you. For us, the best medicine was honestly just time. We both needed a little time and the baby needed to grow up just a bit, so that we could sanely start going over the issues. And no one discussion solved it. There were a lot of "cold war" type nights. There were times where I expressed my disappointment with him and he'd say there's nothing he could do aside from faking it (and did I want him to fake it), and then we just wouldn't interact for a day, so I'd focused on my daughter instead and he'd do whatever.

But as time went on, he resented less and interacted more. Now I have video of him teaching her at age 2-3 to say all the states on our big wall map. Now they're constantly giggling and rough housing and he speaks proudly of working at his job to provide for her and us. In other words, he got over it and grew up. He still has his occasional dark moods, but he's gotten better at talking about it, he's less likely to resent because he's on the look out for that, and he's in those periods for shorter times (oddly enough diet also had an effect, a huge effect).

Since you've said your husband definitely gets depressed I want to suggest Solo on a Tandem Bicycle. It helped me to better deal with him and he actually was very moved to see me reading it.

It sounds like you're on the right track. Kids need boundaries and logical consequences for misbehavior. Some of my favorite parenting books are:

How to Talk So Kids Will Listen & Listen So Kids Will Talk

Raising An Emotionally Intelligent Child

The 5 Love Languages of Children: The Secret to Loving Children Effectively

Understanding Your Child's Temperament

These books can be pretty dry, but the information is very useful. If you google enough you can probably find the cliff's notes versions. Good luck!

Usborne "That's not my...." books were very popular with my 1 year old. They are short board books with bright, high contrast pictures and sensory integration. They give a parent a lot of teaching moments - colors, shapes, identifying animals or vehicles or whatever, textures, etc. We had about 10 of them and my son would bring them to me over and over to read.

My favorite thing in the world, which my son loved at 1 and still loves at 3, is basic wooden blocks like these (probbaly available cheaper, we got ours at a yard sale). Fine motor skills, building, balancing, creativity, shapes, counting... lots of developmental teaching there.

Another good thing for a 1 year old are push walker toys. Here's one that comes with wooden blocks.

FYI bookoutlet.com has books featuring African-American children/subjects

https://bookoutlet.com/Store/Browse?N=isKids&Nc=12&size=24&sort=popularity_0&Ns=34

"I Love My Hair" is good. I remember my older daughter reading it and she also liked "Amazing Grace" too.

if you go thru www.ebates.com you'll get a discount on your purchase there

Also, a board book with different textures is good. https://smile.amazon.com/Baby-Touch-Feel-Animals-DK/dp/0756634687

It's been awhile since we had a little girl around. I've been stuck with boys. lol You could always go with the standard barbies and baby dolls. There also:

Aquadoodle mats My cousin had one of these and she used it all the time. Plenty of sizes and types.

Floor Piano

The EZ Bake Ovens

Leapfrog they have all kinds of stuff made to let kids learn. Kids carry it everywhere because they think its a game.

Karaoke Machines Walmart has various ones and the Moana one is like $10 cheaper. I have never met a kid who didn't love this.

What girl doesn't want a castle? I bought something like this for my niece, shes like nine now and still sets it up.

Lego Friends Playsets

Play Makeup if you're okay with that kind of thing. They do have plastic sets that don't give off any colors or anything.

Okay, this was cute.

Shopkins lots of kids have these toys.

Dress up

Dollhouse

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Outdoor toys are a lot of fun too. Any kind of sports and bicycles and trikes.

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Whatever you get, make sure it's acoustic--as in, they have to actually play it to make noise vs, say, keyboards that you press buttons and they play songs. I would check with his parents to see what kind of noise level they're up for and go from there. If not much, ukelele is relatively pleasant. He might also have fun messing around with a harmonica. If you have the budget and they have the space, he'd probably have fun with something like this for a while, though it's definitely more a toy than a real, masterable instrument.

What sort of range do you need? We go to hotel-based conventions with our kid, and use the previous generation of this monitor so we're not trapped in the room, but it's not WiFi (setting up hotel WiFi on a baby monitor is, shall we say, not cost effective).

It does have a temperature sensor (no humidity, but the temp display turns red if it goes too hot or, IIRC, too cold) and remote pan/tilt/zoom, plus the walkie-talkie and night vision, and the ability to have up to four cameras and two parent units. It's always-on, lets you know when you lose signal (loudly!), and has decent video quality. (If you want, I can PM you a couple photos and a video I've taken of the monitor over the years, both day/night.)

We've found that the range easily extends through our entire house (~3000sqft), and outside it without trouble. Haven't tried it from inside the neighbours' houses, but I can walk past our nearest neighbour and still get signal most of the way past their house.

At hotels, where there's more interference and significantly different wall construction, we can easily get down the hall and to a public room where we could sit and play games with friends. Call it 40-50 feet.

My only gripe is that now, 4yrs later, the OEM charger is busted and the parent unit can't hold a charge. We'll have to buy one of the current generation for this new kid and future travel.

The Monster At the End of This Book!

It’s super cute and it’s fun because you can be super animated when you read it. It’s one of the few that I can keep my son interested in because of the animated tone!