Building a baby registry

As a first time mother to an infant, creating a baby registry has been one of the most difficult processes of pregnancy. Moms are marketed to all the time about making the best choice for baby. Well, what is the best choice for baby? Is it Graco, Chicco, Britax? Is it having a pinewood, oak, or cherry nursery furniture? Is it bumpers, breathable bumpers, or no bumpers? I don't have answers because in the end, you just have to research and weighs pro and cons of each individual product, but there is a lot of help out there to get you through it!

I started off making two registries one at Babies R Us and one at Amazon.com. I figured those invited to the baby shower would like the option of buying online or in store, and using those two venues gives them options.

Both of the sites I am registered at have check lists of "Baby Essentials," this is a helpful starting point, but not everything is necessary, or not in the quantity they recommend. 

One of the things I'd also like to point out is that some moms don't need or want much for baby. They are perfectly content co-sleeping, breast feeding exclusively without bottles, and thus they only need to worry about buying the bare essentials like diapers, cloth or disposable. Each parent is different, and that's perfectly okay. Since this is my first, I plan on being over-prepared for anything a newborn can throw my way. If that means baby likes bouncer instead of swing, so be it! But we will have both until we figure it out. :)

I've compiled these helpful registry lists that look at different products and attempt to give moms an idea of what they think is best and essential as well as other items that moms loved and how they were rated.

1. Lucie's List
This is probably my favorite that I've come across. Everything was just matter of fact, no frills, and I liked that there didn't seem to be some big bias or diss towards parents who may choose to go with a different option. There was nothing like, "Buy Graco if you actually love your baby." Also, I liked the ease of using the site. It wasn't too confusing about what pages to go to. I never felt lost about where to find information. She also gives you pros and cons for different things like car seats. I found it really helpful.

2. Amalah's Ultimate Registry Checklist
This wasn't my favorite, but it had a lot of different brands that I wasn't used to seeing. The format isn't as nice as Lucie's List, so the content can be overwhelming. I haven't used it much, but it's another option for moms to take a look at!

3. A consolidated version of Amalah's Registry Checklist
This one is definitely easier to go through with lists and links! Something she had put on her list that I never thought of: Splat Mat! Definitely going to be adding one to my registry.

4. Pregnant Chicken's kick-ass registry
This one has lots of useful items, as well as, some fun ones like mustache pacifiers and monkey hats. It definitely important to remember to ask for some fun things for baby!


My next registry related post will be a compiled list of stuff you might want for a baby, which will essential be my registry list maybe with a few modifications. I don't think my list will include brand name recommendations, but just a thorough list of things.

It's been a while/ DVD and Video game organization

I am officially done reorganizing DVDs, adult and children, and video games! It really did take this long, but that's not why I did not post for so long. Finding out your pregnant in the middle of organization projects and dealing with the subsequent first trimester energy drain and morning sickness all took its toll on blogging abilities and inspiration, especially when you're not telling anyone you're not pregnant until your first trimester is over. Now enough about that- onto organization!

In one of my older posts {DVD/Blu-ray organization}, you can see I had started my reorganization endeavors with a very large DVD case. I am happy to report back that it is now EMPTY.

All of our movies and games are being temporarily stacked near our fireplace.

 

  I've already explained that the DVDs and Blu-rays are now being put into Atlantic DVD sleeves, and the video games are in these sleeves, which I then put into these Avery Binders. The binders hold about 18-20 video games each, depending on the thickness of the instruction booklet. We included the instruction booklet, which is why we chose the sleeves we did rather than just a standard CD case. So our games look like this: 

The last aspect of the re-org was our children's movies. The Atlantic DVD sleeves seemed a bit to fragile for little hands, so I went with this Artisan 240 Disc Album. The nice thing is that there is room for two discs per page, and if you need to include a third disc, we just slipped ours in front of the cover art. 

Now I just need to come up with a new permanent spot for everything! Whew! Glad to be mostly done with this project though.

DVD/Blu-ray Organization

I received my organization products that I wrote about in my last post, and I just had to show off how much space they save!

Here is the stack of DVDs and Blu-Ray cases that I'm tossing as compared to the height of my dog, Watson. He was very interested in the process. ;)

And here is a comparison of the cases and the discs in their new cases:

Overall, I am pretty pleased. We'll be getting rid of our monstrous DVD case in the near future and be able to put the DVDs somewhere more obscure.  This is where are DVDs are currently held:

It's pretty tall and takes up a ton of room! So I will happy to see it go. I didn't purchase enough to do the whole case yet, and I have a cool idea for how I will do my husband's and son's video games, which I will share with you soon!

Happy de-cluttering!

Christmas Shopping Shout Out

I cannot believe it, but I have already purchased my first Christmas gift of the year! It, of course, was for my mom. She's difficult to shop for so when I saw something that I thought she'd like, it made sense to purchase it without hesitation. Now, if only I could do that for all my family members!

My husband and I plan to buy gifts for both sides of our family and for Micah. With extended family (which is usually just my side), we [I] love to make cookies for everyone. I cannot wait to share pictures with you when that event happens, but for now, here's a view of 2011's:

Apparently, I did not take a picture of the final product for 2012 so here's some cookie pictures from last year!

Is it too early to be talking about Christmas? I am just super excited! Back to focusing on Halloween, I guess!