Baby Stuff

What is it about baby stuff?
You need so much of it! I really do have to wonder how people managed back in the days before somebody invented mothercare. I don't think anybody knew what they were trying to do before then! Certainly civilisation as we know it did not exist before Toys R Us, that's for sure.
It starts with the simple stuff. Baby needs a place to sleep so you get a moses basket. Thankfully ours has come from Hope via Sean and is becoming something of a family heirloom. Couldn't believe the cost of basket sized blankets and sheets so I bought some cheap cotton sheeting and fleece to make my own.
Baby needs bottles. Wasn't expecting to have to give up on the breastfeeding as soon as I did, but having some back up for Andy to do the odd feed seemed like a good idea. Bought own brand bottles as they were cheap. Also need a steriliser. My goodness! You can actually buy things that seem to have come directly from the Russian space programme as they bear far more relationship to Sputnik than something baby related. You've got your electrical steam jobs, your microwave jobs and your good old fashioned milton bucket. We're a little short on space so we took the bucket. It does the job.
The own brand bottles were a failure, didn't let the air back in properly so baby ended up sucking on a flattened teat. Switched to Avent. Even more bottles. You also need a proper bottle brush with teat cleaning end.
Baby needs a contrivance.
He he! Well, we looked at a lot of buggies. BTW, don't read Internet reviews, they're all wrong. We settled for a "travel system" which means that you clip the various bits on and off as you need them. Much more lightweight and practical. Folds down pretty small too!
Baby also needs a bath. We found a folding one. Honestly, why do the manufacturers all assume everyone has acres of space in their bathrooms? You can't swing a cat in ours and believe me, I've tried. (Cat needed a bath after a bad vet visit. Cat doesn't like baths, cat climbing the walls.... you get the picture.) The cheap ordinary baby baths are huge - considering the size of what you have to bathe - and the only place I could think to store something that size was on a hook outside the back door, Victorian style.
Babies need special towels with special bits on one corner to put over their heads. He's got more towels than we have, but then we don't tend to wee all over them after a bath.
Thankfully my sister in law gave us a lot of clothes, but he's getting into bigger sizes now and we've had to buy more. Ah, teeny tiny clothes! Nothing so sweet as baby socks!
Ended up getting a free nappy bag from the boots baby club. The only nappy bags I saw that didn't look like something only a drag queen would use were hideously expensive. The free one is nice though. Problem is, a lot of women have gone for this option and confusion might ensue.
Then you need special baby furniture to store all of this...
Does it stop? Please someone tell me it stops at some point! I feel like I'm drowning in baby stuff! He has a special bouncy chair with vibrate function  (?!) and a special unfolding play mat with a toy arch and we even tried eco reusable nappies which were a total failure, being too big round the waist, but to short lengthwise. Much leaking followed and we switched back to pampers. Doubt we'll bother trying him on the next size up, don't know when I'll get the time to wash them anyway.
We bought a cot yesterday. He's getting big for the moses basket. We put him in the cot and he suddenly looks tiny again. Cot has one drawback. You're still supposed to do the feet at the foot of the bed thing, it's a health thing, not sure why.
Joseph woke up wanting a bottle and some attention. He starts kicking his feet and when he gets going, he sure gets some force behind them. Instead of the faint noise of creaking basket, we get Bang! Bang! Bang! as his little heels impact on the wood. I'm moving him up the cot. Just a little.
Got to go now. Joseph managed to break his Dad in the night so I've let him have some more sleep and am going to apply some Dad "glue" in the shape of bacon and scrambled eggs on toast. Then I will be attempting to extract myself from my house full of baby gizmos.