All About Babies- What's in My Bag?
Now that I'm 37 weeks along, it's time that we put the finishing touches on getting ready for baby. For us, that means packing up our bags to keep by the door and installing the infant car seat!Preparing for this birth is a little different than our last experience of delivering our son. Knowing we'd be in a hospital for at least three days, we had to bring more clothing and items of comfort for our stay. This time, we're using a birthing center, and since we'll be staying there for only a couple of hours after the delivery, our bags are a lot lighter!
Preparing for labor and delivery with a toddler to keep watch after has changed our thought process on preparation too as we have to keep in mind that he'll have a bag to take to stay with family for a couple of days. Lots of packing and remembering to do for this Mama. I started out my search for "How-to's" on my usual spot, Pinterest, which proved to be very helpful! Here are two checklists I used as a baseline, adding some products I bought to my last labor, and omitting things I knew would already be at the birth center to use too.
I'll start with Dad's items since they are the simplest. In our bag, he's got swim trunks, a set of underwear, gym shorts, two tee shirts, flip flops, and a toothbrush, just in case!
Next up is Mom's bag! For myself, I packed a swimsuit top, a nursing bra, a nursing tank top, two sets of cloth nursing pads, a set of comfy pajamas, a robe, postpartum mesh underwear that I kept from the hospital after my previous delivery, a comfortable going home outfit (cute pajamas), a postpartum belly band, toiletries for showering after the delivery, non-slip socks, an extra t-shirt, and gum.
Baby Girl is lucky this time around, and has a special bag of her own! Since we're doing newborn pictures immediately after her birth, I have a special swaddle and going home outfit I want pictures of her in. Besides that, I know we'll be doing extended time in kangaroo care, so she likely won't be very dressed during our entire stay at the birthing center. So I bought her one set of pajamas, an extra swaddle, some disposable diapers, a hat, mittens, socks and that's it! We don't plan on giving her a bath for about two days, so there was no need for us to bring toiletry items for her. We also have some other memorabilia items in her bag for photo-ops; her baby book to stamp her footprints in and milestone numbers.
For the labor itself, I have an actual list of items to keep us comfortable, nourished, and energized. In the hospital, I wasn't allowed to eat anything or drink anything other than their approved juices, jello, and popsicles. I was famished by the time I finished pushing and delivered my little boy. All I could think about for those 13 rushed hours was a pan of lemon bars and a giant sub sandwich. I'm so glad I'm allowed to eat light snacks this time throughout my labor instead of having to starve myself.
This pregnancy I've eaten significantly healthier than the last time since our whole household has transitioned into a mostly organic, dairy-free, and semi-vegetarian lifestyle. Since we're on a tight budget, we don't keep copious amounts of snacks in the house, instead always keeping plenty of fruit and veggies on hand instead. This labor is the exception though, and I am happily embracing the chance to buy some of my favorite snacks from the health food store and prepare some snack recipes I don't make that often. The things that sounded the best to me that would be easy for my body to digest while also providing the most energy were:
blueberries
fruit leather
honey sticks
all-natural popsicles
pistachios
dairy-free protein bite balls
Besides the snacks, I'm beyond excited about my special post-delivery meal. I'm stuck between bringing a delicious, authentic tamale meal or something with seafood, with my favorite summer beer top it off!
In addition to food, a few other things we plan to bring along while I labor are my pregnancy body pillow, favorite essential oil blends to diffuse, our tablet to watch a movie or show (that was a helpful distraction for me through labor last time), our family video camera, my DSLR camera, large water bottles, a portable/ waterproof speaker, a heating pad, a sleeping mask, a set of birth affirmations for me to meditate on and keep me encouraged, prayer requests I had friends and family write out at my baby showers for me to pray for them while I labored and any supplements from home to help reduce bleeding and cramping after giving birth.
Well, that's all that we've packed! Nothing more, and nothing less! As always, many of these ideas and recipes are saved to my Pinterest board, so please, follow the links and follow my boards to try some of these recipes yourself!