Extreme Breastfeeding: Pumping for NICU Without Losing Your Mind

-or- Free Your Hands and Your Mind Will Follow

When our littlest geek (locally dubbed the Baby Detective) ended up in the NICU, I found myself back in familiar breastfeeding territory.  My role on supply side of breastfeeding began in the NICU.  As a first time mom who gave birth by c-section, my milk didn't come in for days.  That newborn, a "sugar baby" in NICU lingo, had low blood sugar and a low body temperature, so my first attempts at breastfeeding were bedside in the NICU.

It was awful.  There's no just way to prepare for breastfeeding or the hormonal postpartum roller-coaster.  Throw in the physical separation, heightened anxieties, and lack of privacy of NICU, and the natural act of breastfeeding dials itself up to an 11 (on a scale of 10 for those who haven't had the senseless pleasure of This is Spinal Tap [available on Netflix streaming]).

I won't tax you with all the gory details (although keywords like nipple shield coupled with a multitude of synonyms for breast might spice up my Google hits).


When we decided to grow our family to five, I assumed the third round of nursing would be without surprises. Then BabyGeek 1.3 arrived six weeks early after swift and furious pregnancy complications.


Instead of a bassineted baby in my hospital room, our teeny geek was an isolette half a building away.  She was challenged to digest liquid food, much less consume it.  While she drew most of her nutrition from IVs and lipids from a feeding tube, I pumped every 3 hours in an attempt to provide breastmilk that she could consume by bottle.

The only things previous breastfeeding experiences had taught me were I hated pumping, I didn't have much success with it, and with growing sleep deprivation, the low moan of the pump motor turned into crazy words that made me loathe pumping all the more.

With 8 pumping sessions a day on the horizon, things had to be different this time.

In order of importance, here are the big changes:

1. Go hands-free: this list-topper may seem painfully obvious to the working moms, but somehow I managed to miss the advantages with earlier infants.  Maybe it was the early '90s era models in their shoulder padded power suits, but somehow hands-free seemed inappropriate for someone who spends most days in jeans, tees, and a sea of Cheerios.

Prior to this baby, I loathed pumping and avoided it at all costs.  The deeply bovine feeling of hooking up to a milking machine felt humiliating (especially in the hospital with people walking into the room all the times).  Holding the flanges in place kept my hands and mind focused on the pumping process.

This time, with the phone ringing off the hook, and hardly a moment to bolt a meal, I walked my hospital gown clad self into the lactation boutique and bought an Easy Expressions hands-free bustier.

Suddenly, I had my hands back, and along with them came a solid measure of dignity.  Yes, I was still fastened to a very dairy machine, but I felt more 80s throwback (think Madonna) or crazy fashion forward (Lady Gaga) and even a bit Amazing Stories.  It was the best kind of ridiculous.  When my hands were unshackled, my brain and soul were now free to contemplate something, ANYTHING, other than the pumping process.  Pure awesome.  Worth every penny.

2. Kick back and watch something distracting.
I hesitate to offer this advice as television kills brain cells and such, but there are times in life where really senseless shows can be blessedly soothing and distracting.  While I couldn't sleep and pump, I could pump while watching every episode of Sons of Tuscon, Doc Martin, The IT Crowd, Toddlers & Tiaras, and Man v. Food on Netflix streaming.

3 . Hospital grade pumps should be considered.
Before Ranger was born, we bought a Medela Pump-In-Style Advanced pump.  I still own it, but I instead opted to rent a Medela Symphony from the hospital boutique.  When pumping 8 times a day, it's important that the pump works well- 10 minutes more per session adds up to 80 more minutes per sleepless day.

4.  Lactation consultants can help immensely, but tend toward generalizations.
I love the lactation department at our hospital.  The consultants have helped me over the years.  This time they lent me a DVD copy of Hands-On Pumping (the 3 videos are available free online at http://newborns.stanford.edu/Breastfeeding/).  Those techniques improved my supply quickly.  Pumping every 3 hours (at the hospital or at home) is an insane challenge.  Undersupply broke my heart because (in my hormonal insanity) it felt like the only thing I could do for my vulnerable baby (in more reflective moments I realized the error in that thinking, but I'll save that for a later post).

While I appreciate their expertise and enthusiasm, I've also been given general advice that didn't apply to my specific situation and made me feel like I was failing.  Go breastfeeding, but skin-to-skin contact, homeopathic supplements, and 2 hour pumping schedules just weren't options I could consider.  They really wanted my baby to feed directly before leaving the NICU, but it was simply too difficult for her and taxed her limited energy.  I understand their concerns that breastfeeding might not last as long if she's bottle-fed, but I also knew my daughter was overtaxed by breastfeeding.  The neonatologist agreed that the baby would come home sooner if bottle-fed, so I focused on more effectively pumping and bottle-feeding.  For us, bringing the baby home sooner was a much higher priority than direct breastfeeding (or even breastfeeding).

Once the baby was bigger and stronger, the transition to regular breastfeeding was easy.  We were so glad to say goodbye to bottles.

5.  The White Wave -or- What to do with all the milk

During time I pumped daily, the surplus milk quickly engulfed our fridge's freezer.  The hospital can only store so much per patient, and the nurses told me about other moms buying deep freezers.  I started freezing the surplus in Lansinoh breastmilk storage bags instead of the space-hogging NICU bottles.  They freeze flat, and 10 can be neatly stowed in a gallon freezer bag .  With Amazon Mom and Subscribe and Save, I was able to get cases of these delivered to my doorstep at an excellent price.

6. Washing Up
Cleaning the pump parts after every session brought to mind Sisyphus forever rolling the stone up the hill to watch it immediately roll back down.  In this sleepless rendition of the classic tale, it's easy to feel that the stone is actually rolling over you on its disheartening downward fall.  This is where a kindly clan of magic bottle-washing elves would come in handy, but my neighborhood owl seems to have taken them out (along with the toilet paper fairy).  Wash up all the parts as soon as you put the milk in cold storage.  It feels even worse to start the whole process with the washing.

We went through 3 different bottle brushes before again settling on the Munchkin's Deluxe Bottle Brush which we liked back when Ranger was formula fed.

All in all, it's no small feat to pump for a NICU baby.  If you are a parent who is going through this now, take care of yourself as much as you can.  Your kiddo needs YOU more than breastmilk.  Sleep as often as you can, eat, and drink lots of water.

If you know someone else going through this, feed them a meal (or, even better, set up a food registry for them at mealbaby.com).

***Baby Toolkit is the ongoing story of a couple of Midwestern geeks and their kids.  We are not affiliated with Medela, Munchkin, Ziploc, Meal Baby, nor Netflix, but we are Amazon affiliates (so a small portion of purchases made through our Amazon links go toward the Baby Toolkit jet fleet).

And be sure to check out related post The Boob Wars. 

Munchie Mug: The Snack Cup That Makes Us Eat Our Words

Way back in 2007, we gave up the hunt for an effective snack cup (Snack Traps: Very Small Money Pits). I filed the fantasy of a truly spill-proof snack carrier in with Nessie, Big Foot, and a drive-through diaper store.

When the McNichols posted a wildly favorable review of the Munchie Mug on Z Recommends (titled The Best Snack Holder Ever), I sent an email along the lines of "No! Really? NO!" to receive an emphatic "YES!" in reply.

Mug makers Witty Works Incorporated, upon my request, sent me a Munchie Mug to review.

With genius simplicity, the split panel fabric top offers access without overflow. Forget about the flashy snack cups with gyroscopic motion, kids will figure out how to foil or break those. These straightforward cups are workhorses that always meet user demands.

The Munchie Mug has easily handled regular cleaning and Ranger's toddler (ab)use for ten months. To Ranger's disappointment, the cup accommodates even the large hand of a hungry adult without difficulty or damage.

On the other end of the spectrum, our 11 month old Raptor can also manage the mug's pragmatic design:

Her catch and release technique reminds us that even the best designed cup will be challenged by these tiny agents of entropy. I promise you that the escaped Cheerios are all part of a larger PEBKAC error (problem exists between kid and container in this case). The high lip on the lid that mystified the Z Recs team makes perfect sense when used by a baby. It catches some of the dropped food increasing chances of recovery. The cut-out offers an easy grip (even when crawling) for tiny hands.

The Munchie Mug is the only snack holder that meets our family's expectations. It is made of durable BPA-free polypropylene.

If you're looking for a great baby shower or baby/toddler birthday gift, the Munchie Mug ($15.95) is sure to be a hit with both young'uns and their faithful attendants. Munchie Mug is available with a blue, pink, or yellow lid and an alternate clear storage lid to keep treats fresh and tasty overnight.

***Baby Toolkit has no financial stake in or undisclosed relationship with Witty Works Incorporated. Witty Works sent us a free Munchie Mug to test. We're geek parents with ample opinions and two enthusiastic amateur test engineers. Video: Baby Toolkit, (c) 2009; some rights reserved.

Menu Planning for New Eaters: Babyfood101.com

At 6 months, the Raptor can easily be described as an enthusiastic eater. It's a joy and a relief after years of struggling with Ranger over food.

I recently stumbled onto babyfood101.com (I cannot figure out how I got there, so please let me know who I owe credit for this). This amazing site is great for the confounded parents of early eaters.

Babyfood101 offers a weekly email outlining two new foods for baby (see week 2). The email instructs on the selection and preparation of the foods, the appropriate age for introduction, homemade baby food recipes, storage, whether or not the food is sold in jars, if buying organic is worthwhile, and adult recipes for the same ingredient.

It's like Relish for babies!

The emails start with recommendations for the earliest eaters and progresses to more complex foods over time.

Babyfood101's web site is also searchable by food, recommends gear (starting hilariously with the finger), offers a grocery guide, discussing making baby food, foods to avoid, recommended books and web sites, and a first feedings question and answer section.

Bon appetit, mes petit amis!

Handcrafted Heartbreak: Our Favorite Swaddling Blanket Will Soon Be Off the Market

One sleepy afternoon this summer, I started snuggling a new naptime lovey: Simply Baby Blankets' seersucker swaddling blanket.

The blanket sat near my favorite napping spot after being used as a dancing cape in the previous evening's family dance party (Ranger is a dance maniac). The seersucker seemed so light and airy that I couldn't resist pulling it over me for a few minutes of shut-eye. The fabric was cool and soothing. It became a napping staple well into the chill of late Fall.

It's rare to find a baby blanket big enough for an adult to nap under. The size of Simply Baby Blankets' swaddlers hooked me. With long, tall Ranger, we quickly ran out of blankets large enough to wrap him. Fortunately, one of Jim's coworkers made Ranger a few oversized flannel blankets to fill the gap left by store-bought blankets.

The mom and pop team of Rachel and John Greene experienced the same problem in 2007 and have answered it with their large, well-made swaddling blankets. John's mom suggested a seersucker blanket for the summer months which (I speak from experience here) is the perfect weight for summer napping. Comforting and cool.

They're also HUGE at 42 by 50 inches (as are their flannel counterparts)- much larger than our mass market baby blankets. In the photo, the white flannel blanket is a standard Carter's receiving blanket, the rectangular blue one under it is a cotton Carter's baby blanket, and the square blue blanket is a Gerber cotton thermal blanket. Ranger couldn't resist their allure when I spread them out on the floor. The blankets are the perfect size for toddler beds and crib blankets (for toddlers, not babies).

Simply Baby Blankets are well-made and should last through numerous children.

Sadly, the Greenes are one of many family handcrafting entrepreneurs troubled by the soon-to-be implemented Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act. Their beautiful blankets may be off the market as of February 10th, 2009. They've reduced their entire blanket stock to 50% off ($6 for flannel, $8 for seersucker, and $10 for luxury flannel) as they will no longer be able to sell them after February 10th.

Please do yourself a favor and pick up some of their seersucker and flannel lovelies. If you're swaddling, your baby will love them; they're fabulous baby gifts, exquisite summer napping covers, and exceptional dancing capes.

Please call or write your representatives so families like the Greenes can continue to produce and sell quality goods in the United States.

Are you stocking up on handcrafted favorites?
Have you heard anything interesting from your representatives?

Win Giggles Baby Nursery Rhymes Software

Happy Monday, folks!

Last January, I wrote about Giggles Software for Babies at Parent Hacks. We, especially Ranger, really like the software.

Since that time Giggles' maker Leveractive, has issued a great new Giggles offering: Nursery Rhymes.

Nursery Rhymes offers a Toddler setting for more advanced play. Ranger loves it so much that we bought a flexible USB keyboard so he could play on our laptops without handling the whole machine (thanks, Parent Hacks for this smart suggestion!).

Win Nursery Rhymes:
Leveractive generously provided us with a copy of Nursery Rhymes to give to one lucky reader! To enter, please send an email to babytoolkitcontests[at]gmail[dot]com with the subject Nursery Rhymes.

General rules: Entries will be accepted until 5 PM CDT, Friday, Sept. 19. One entry per household. US residents only. Winner will be determined by random number generation. Winner will be notified by email. We're cheap, so shipping will be through the US Postal Media Mail (which puts the snail in snail mail); we'll do our best, but if the software gets lost in the mail, we'll take it as a bad omen and will not provide a replacement. Baby Toolkit family members cannot enter (sorry, Mom).

Good luck!

Nipple Cream Recalled: Mommy's Bliss Off The Shelves

A friend sent me a notification of an FDA product recall on Mommy's Bliss Nipple Cream by MOM Enterprises.

Since it's an FDA recall rather than one by the CPSC, it has not shown up in the regular RSS feed of recalls (I recommend everyone who uses a feed reader subscribe to the CPSC recall feed).

Why was the nipple cream recalled? According to Janet Woodcock, director of the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research:

[The] FDA is particularly concerned that nursing infants are being unwittingly exposed by their mothers to this product with dangerous side effects. Additionally, these two ingredients may interact with one another to further compound and increase the risk of respiratory depression in nursing infants.

I find the manufacturer's response to the recall a bit intriguing. Although it has many of the same characteristics of Tylenol's laudable response to the deadly Tylenol tampering of the 80s, I can't help but feel their self-defensiveness is premature as their ingredients are under scrutiny. It also seems apparent from their own web site that they're using natural ingredients in quantities that have not been tested with infants:

The FDA also neglected to mention that the amount of chlorphenesin and phenoxyethanol in the product is minute relative to what is considered allowable for adults.

Wow, I feel like I'm having flashbacks to my April conversation with Johnson & Johnson's Susan Nettesheim regarding the safety of products made by start-up companies and the fact that natural isn't synonymous with safe.

All Shook Up: Win HABA's (discountinued) Dice Tumbler

Although we made a cheap imitation of this great product in 2006, our substitute fell short of the glorious original (which may actually be one of Plato's ideal types).

HABA, for reasons we cannot even venture to guess, discontinued the brilliant $5 Dice Tumbler last year.

I was practically giddy (thinking them re-issued) to see them stocked at my fabulous local toy store. Sadly, they are no longer being made, but the owner bought a lot of them when she heard they were going off the market. And she sells them for $4.98, their original price (again, the store is truly fabulous).

The bottom of the dome unscrews very easily with a coin and it can hold quite a few dice (though maybe not enough for Descent).

It also works as a stand-alone toddler amusement. Ranger likes to play with it with a few random objects inside (currently it houses two fuzzy craft pompoms).

WANT TO WIN ONE?
We bought an extra for a lucky Baby Toolkit reader. CONTEST ENDED February 29, 2008 (leap year day!). We welcome international entries in this contest- though it'll probably be shipped by the most economical (aka slowest possible) conveyance.

General disclaimers regarding contests on Baby Toolkit: we'll do our best but we can't guarantee the same efforts from the postal system. If a prize item were to be lost in the lost in the mail, we would take it as a message from a higher power that the situation was simply not meant to be (no compensation or replacement will be issued). We will use a random integer generator at random.org to determine a winner. Jim, Adrienne, their parents, and Ranger are not eligible for this contest. We respect your privacy and will not use your personal information for any purpose beyond determining a winner.

And, if you don't feel lucky today- or simply want to buy one- you can call the great people at my favorite local toy store [Toys To Treasure, (812) 477-2720] who still have some in stock. They don't have a web site, but they can ship credit card orders at reasonable rates.

***This is the independent, unsolicited, unprofessional, and sometimes random opinion of the geek parents at Baby Toolkit. While we love the HABA dice tumbler and our local toy store, we're shoppers and fans- not affiliates, partners, or beneficiaries. Baby Toolkit, (c) 2008.

Holiday Hack: Toddler-friendly Ornaments

Jim and I didn't own a Christmas tree the first year of our married life. His mom thought that was a travesty and bought us a 2' tall artificial tree. This little tree was our primary tree for years. We liked to load it down with comically large ornaments or decorate it with only lights and keep it on the bathroom counter (I smirk to think of this, even though I have no idea why).

At some point we bought a 6' artificial tree which we suspect is made of plastic and standard grade pipe cleaners. I'm sure we got it on clearance. Its weak boughs can't support an ornament of much weight. Every year we get motivated enough to put it up (which is something like 1:3) we swear we will buy a new one next year.

Ranger LOVES holiday lights. We put the big tree up last year without ornaments. We added a foot tapper on/off switch to our tree on the recommendation of Parent Hacks- and he loves controlling the lights.

As we're not very invested in tradition, we decided to try this year to make the decorations as toddler-friendly as possible.

When a friend mentioned that he was wiring all his gaming figurines to hang as holiday decorations, it struck me that we might not need ornaments or wire ornament hangers at all. With yarn or ribbon and the versatile lark's head knot almost anything can become an ornament (and you can jettison those silly wire ornament hangers for good).

Thus, the first Baby Toolkit video was born! Learn to make a lark's head knot:


Sorry about the off-screen portions, I shot the video alone while Ranger napped, so there was no time for a retake. I promise I'll do better with framing in future videos, but I will probably always sound like total tool.

We hung our lighted tree primarily with Barrel-of-Monkeys monkeys (again, Parent Hacks inspired) and linking letters. We also put up some other small toys that Ranger generally tends to ignore most of the time. We didn't put anything very tempting on the tree because we didn't want to torture the kid or inspire him to take up indoor tree climbing.

When it's time to put the tree in the closet, I'm getting all the old ornaments out. The ones without sentimental value (which is most of them) are headed to a local thrift shop.

Recast toys or other objects you already own as ornaments reduces decorating costs and required storage space for those other 11 months of the year.

There will be no more talk of replacing the tree. It finally looks like it actually belongs in our house.

Move Along, Little Chubbies! Viking Toys' Ingeniusly Simple Line

We love Chubbies! And that's no reference to pot, dating, anatomy, music, hamburgers, body type, or fat babies...


Viking Toys (Sweden) make the very best in toddler rollers. When I was pregnant with Ranger, we bought a fleet of these great cars to entertain our visiting toddler niece. We kept them in a basket on the coffee table long after her visit. On more than a few evenings, Jim and I would find ourselves on opposite ends of the living room floor rolling these cars back and forth or absentmindedly trucking them around the coffee table.

With super soft, non-marring rubbery wheels and flexible rubber bodies, these cars take on a luxurious feel. We thought the strange little guys wouldn't roll well on carpet, but it turns out they travel farthest and fastest of our mini-fleet. They flip less than most of our rolling toys thanks to a low center of gravity.

One strange benefit of the soft materials is that cars make less noise (almost none) when dropped in, say, a large solemn, formal service in a grand, stone-floored cathedral. Not that we would know about that firsthand...

Ranger loves that the individual cars can hook together. It's easiest for him to link the 4" ones, so we're getting him some more for Christmas (right now, they're on sale for a great price here). There's a train set (3 4" pieces) for the happy linker.

The 3", 4", and 5" versions get the most play time in our house. While the 10" ambulance (with rolling gurney) gets some play, I think many toddlers prefer toys that fit well in a toddler hand. I like the 3" ones because they fit in my coat pockets and bag pretty easily.

I just found that Viking even makes a disposable playscape placemat (like our beloved Table-Topper) to keep kids tidier and entertained while eating out.

Viking Toys are manufactured in Thailand and haven't been subject to any lead recalls. They are purportedly dishwasher safe, but I don't like the idea of chlorine dish detergent on the axles, so I hand wash them in dish soap or wipe them down as needed.

The smaller versions are a great late infancy/early toddler toy (though they have appeal for a wide range of ages). The 5" versions can have more detail than their smaller counterparts- and they're sometimes sold in themed sets. Slightly older kids get a lot of use out of the 10" Super Chubbies which are more specialized vehicles (tractor, sedan, dump truck, ambulance, a fire engine, and a Woody-esque roofless SUV).

If you get some Viking Chubbies for your household, make sure to share them with your kids.

*This review is the independent, uncompensated, and unsolicited opinion of Baby Toolkit. (c) 2007, all rights reserved.

Wubbanub: A Friend in the Dark of Night

Jim and I were talking about Ranger's early months, and a piece of gear with Most Favored status came up: the wonderful Wubbanub. Not only can you substitute the word Wubbanub into the lyrics of Roger Miller's "Chug-a-lug," it also helps you get more sleep during your child's infancy.

They're the only pacifiers you'll take the time to name. And for good reason... when your pacifier-lovin' baby wakes in the middle of the night to find the pacifier inexplicably missing and/or unobtainable, they YELL LOUDLY and with great urgency. This is really inconvenient for anyone trying to sleep. After a few nights of pacifier emergencies we decided there must be a better way to live and turned to the wise old Internet.

And like a beacon in the night was the not-available-in-my-community, Wubbanub. The Wubbanub sports a silicone Soothie pacifier (exactly the one that Ranger had been introduced to in the hospital's NICU).

We bought an express-mailed little red dog who provided enough ballast to remain with the baby throughout the night. The stuffed animal offers a lot more maneuverability for the barely dexterous, so even youngest infants can maneuver the pacifier into their mouth. With the dog on night watch, we found ourselves getting a lot more sleep.

We ended up buying two more of the dogs for us (one is inevitably lost and/or needs cleaning) and about 20 others which we've given as gifts. I even convinced the local hospital to carry them in the gift shop.

Wubbanubs come in a variety of species: cats, frogs, horses, and ducks. At around $10 each they also make a cute, useful, and affordable gift.

***This is the independent, unsolicited opinion of babytoolkit.com. We have no relationship with the Wubbanub's maker (Trebco Specialty Projects, Inc.) and have received no compensation for this review.

Don't Sink the SCHIP: Important Children's Health Care Legislation Needs Renewal

Judy at Goodyblog just pointed out that a critical children's health care funding program is set to expire on September 30th if Congress doesn't intervene.

The State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) helps working families who don't make enough to pay for private health insurance but make too much to qualify for Medicaid. What this means is that if the legislation expires, many more families will have to abandon regular preventative health care and only seek medical care in emergency situations and settings.

Now everyone who has spent time in an e-room or has been admitted to the hospital, can tell you that even the aspirin are extraordinarily expensive. So the expiration of this legislation will end up costing everyone more in the long run. And more importantly it will unnecessarily endanger the health of infants and children nationwide.

Medical debt already ranks as a leading cause of bankruptcy in America (to understand this situation more fully please read Elizabeth Warren's findings on who goes bankrupt in Maxed Out), so making preventative health care less accessible to children and infants can only damage our national and state economies.

Please take a brief moment today to let your national representatives know this needs to be addressed before it expires on SEPT 30th.

If you blog, please post something to encourage widespread public support of this critical legislation.

Snug Little Bugs: Swaddling & Sleep Sacks

When Ranger was a wee newborn we swaddled him for sleep. Initially I couldn't get the hang of it, the blankets just melted off him in the first few minutes. Jim was a natural though, so (being naturally competitive) I kept trying. I found the book Babygami extremely helpful (as well as being beautiful and funny).

Although we had a specialty swaddling blanket, I found it much easier to use a slightly stretchy cotton waffle blanket in the Babygami snug wrap. The specialty straightjacket-style swaddling blanket was hard to adjust for a newborn's small size. When Ranger was big enough to fit the custom swaddler, we were all quite comfortable with blanket swaddling.

Our hands-down favorite blanket for swaddling is the Gerber Thermal receiving blanket. We bought about a dozen of them in various colors (new expecting parents, trust us, bad things happen to blankets faster than you can launder them). They're useful long after the baby outgrows swaddling. We still have everyday uses for them with 2 year-old Ranger.

After swaddling ended (babies get too active to be contained), we moved on to ultra-cozy sleep sacks. Sleep sacks tend to be fleece and run around $20. We weren't going to buy a dozen of these because of cost, bulk, and a very limited period of use. We ended up with around six of them because generous grandparents found them extremely clever. We'd usually put these over a jammies, a onesie, or a baby gown.

Through craftster.org I recently found a good tutorial at Jan Andrea for making sleep sacks. This was really fortuitous as the end user of the girly baby booties I made was recently revealed by ultrasound to be male and I've been looking for a new gift project.

So, meet the Super Sleep Sack. It's for the offspring of an ace graphic designer/illustrator (I won't link because his sitemeter will reveal this page but you can see his blog at jacobelijahwalker.blogspot.com) and an incredibly talented portrait artist/printmaker. I had extra fabric, so I made some no-scratch mitts to spice up the newborn days.

Baby Toolkit is the independent opinion of Adrienne and Jim Jones. We have received no compensation of any kind from anyone affiliated with BabyGami, Gerber, any of the sleep sack companies, Jan Andrea, or Craftster.org. 2007, some rights reserved.

Bootie-licious: Craftster Addiction Leads to Sewing Binge

Warning: craftster.org may lead to inspiration and spontaneous arts and crafts.

I've been reading Craftster lately, and it's leading to strange behavior: spontaneous sewing.

My grandmothers were both fabulous seamstresses, but my mom only learned basic sewing and pretty much loathed it. In 2004-05, I lucked into a year of sewing instruction from an amazing group of octogenarians who have been a sewing club since 1957(!). They're fascinating people and great teachers. I'm now a functional seamstress. It took me a few months to make a curtain (one curtain).

Anyway, it's soon to be raining babies here- so I started thinking about useful gifts that we didn't receive before Ranger was born.

One of our favorite things was given to us by the hospital. They had these little flannel mitts to keep him from scratching himself. He had a blue pair at first, but after a barf incident those were replaced with a red pair. Ranger was mesmerized by the red mitts as they floated past his face. Seriously, they were his first toy and they kept him captivated.


So I made some baby mitts from some red bumblebee satin with a flannel backing for a couple friends. They needed something more, so I found a cute bootie pattern in a library copy of Handmade Baby Gifts (Teresa Layman).

Two pairs of booties later, I started thinking about a friend expecting a boy in the Fall. I didn't think the made-up bees would be very appropriate for the son of a military man, so I found some discarded BDU sleeves from my brother's military service and whipped up a third pair of booties.


6 booties and 4 mitts in less than a week. I'm pretty pleased with myself.

So, what fabric- based baby items did you find indispensable? And where can I find a pattern?

P.S. The intended recipients of these gifts are not to my knowledge readers of this blog, so if you happen to know them too, please don't tell them about this post. Thanks.

Strollertown: Baby's First Wheels- the Graco SnugRider

When we started stroller shopping, it seemed that all the registries were strongly encouraging travel systems for new parents. In my limited stroller-pushing experience with travel systems they seemed heavy, unwieldy, and less than compact when folded.

When it became apparent that Ranger would enter the world via cesarean, the weight of a bulky travel system (20+ pounds) seemed out of the question in the first month when I would be on lifting restriction. The "compact" travel systems didn't seem that much smaller or lighter (~17 pounds).

We had decided that we wanted a specific top-rated infant car seat, so we sought a compatible stroller, but they were all so heavy.

Then I started reading about stroller frames that carry car seat strollers. At the time, the Baby Trend Snap N Go frame stroller (~$50) was the only option available locally. It weighed around 12 pounds, but it was reported to be a little complex to work with the Graco car seat we had chosen. We registered for it with reservations.

A few weeks later Graco's SnugRider (~$60) came on the market. It was much easier to use with our chosen car seat than the universal frame strollers. We changed our registry immediately.

The SnugRider is incredibly light and still very stable. It's adjustable push bar works for people with a wide variety of heights. The basket is HUGE and easily accessed unless you stuff one enormous object in there. The stroller folds up to a moderate size, and with the adjustable push bar lowered, it works well as a carrier holder in restaurants.

We think this frame would be great for maneuvering airports with an infant, although it would have to be gate checked upon arriving at the plane (there's no way it would pass for carry-on).

It doesn't have a an additional sunshade like the ones on travel systems, so we often took along a light blanket to cover the carrier in bright light or wind.

A Graco car seat is very easy to install and remove from the frame. Snapping the seat in and out of the stroller are as simple as using the locking base in the car (maybe even easier).

The SnugRider was a vast improvement upon using the car seat as a solo carrier (which wears out already tired arms and shoulders).

We tricked out his car seat for winter with a sherpa Bundle Me cover by J.J. Cole (incidentally one of the few car seat covers that work well with the Graco seat) that a friend didn't want and a flannel receiving blanket attached to the shade with a few big safety pins (on the outside so Ranger couldn't tinker with them). We just flipped the blanket back over the seat's shade when Ranger was out of the elements and awake.

Ranger really liked riding in the SnugRider as it let him face whoever was pushing and he could encourage us to make faces or do little dances to keep him entertained.

We were all a little sad when he got too tall for his infant car seat and had to move to an actual stroller (the Maclaren Vogue- our review).

*This review is the independent, unsolictied opinion of Baby Toolkit (babytoolkit.blogspot.com). We have no relationship with and have received no compensation from Graco Baby (beyond being satisfied customers).

More Peapods For Me, Please: The Peapod Plus Travel Bed Offers Great New Features

UPDATE: 12/11/2012: The PeaPod and PeaPod Plus have been recalled after an infant's tragic entrapment and suffocation death. Recall kits with replacement mattresses are being offered by manufacturer KidCo. We haven't used the PeaPod with non-mobile infants, and we don't recommend it for that developmental stage. We also feel the PeaPod should only be used as instructed (make sure to zip the mattress in its own pocket) with any age group.

4/8/12 Update: A heartbreaking report of infant asphyxiation in a PeaPod has come to our attention. We DO NOT recommend the PeaPod as a crib substitute for an immobile or marginally mobile infant. We still like and use ours as a travel bed for toddlers and preschoolers, but only in the manufacturer recommended configuration. Our own partially-mobile baby (who until very recently only army-crawled) sleeps in a Pack N Play when we travel.

This is not the first post I've written about KidCo's PeaPod travel bed (left, blue-green). We bought our first PeaPod for traveling when Ranger outgrew the Pack N Play's bassinet. We found ourselves accidentally waking him when we tried to lower him to the Pack N Play's floor, so we had to find a better option. The PeaPod has served us well in the year+ that we have used it. We consider it essential travel gear.

When we reviewed the PeaPod last December, I noticed the new, bigger PeaPod Plus (right, red) had been released. It became apparent last month that over 3 foot tall Ranger might soon emerge permanently distorted by his beloved bed. I found a PeaPod Plus for around $70 online. The retailer removed it from its original box and sent it in a smaller box with the large folded original box enclosed. This economy of packaging really didn't impress me, so I won't recommend the retailer.

The PeaPod Plus' folded size in its travel bed isn't much larger in thickness than the original PeaPod. Its diameter is quite a bit larger than the original. Each PeaPod is easily packed in other luggage and could easily be carry-on. During air travel I wouldn't check either PeaPod in only the light nylon travel bag. They would seem too susceptible to damage.

The elastic strap (which keeps the PeaPod folded) is sewn to the PeaPod Plus. The original PeaPod's strap is separate, so it is much easier to lose.

In terms of raw space, the PeaPod Plus is a great upgrade compared to the original PeaPod. I could fit (albeit uncomfortably) in the PeaPod Plus. It stands a lot taller than the original and has a much larger floor. I photographed the inflatable mattress inserts (they zip into the PeaPod floors) to offer some perspective on the size increase.

The PeaPod Plus' windows and door have shades! This is a great improvement on the original PeaPod. When we had to share a room with toddler Ranger, we couldn't turn on the computer or television without seeing little eyes peering out the mesh windows. We finally decided that covering his PeaPod birdcage-style was our best option. The window and door shades make it a lot easier to get him to sleep.

The original PeaPod's roof opens back farther than the Plus' roof. The original's larger roof opening makes it easier to place a sleeping infant. Both PeaPod versions have large mesh windows so it is easy to observe a sleeping infant without opening the door.

The Plus has a sleeping bag style, double layer, double zipper closure blanket. The original PeaPod contains a single layer floor liner/blanket. It's far less versatile, but it was more than adequate for those first months of life. Even with the Plus, we find ourselves using only one layer of the sleeping bag liner at night.

We still recommend replacing the included hand pump with a foot bellows pump (available for under $5 anyway inflatable pool floats are sold). The hand pump's motion is ripe for adolescent boy humor and it can cause a repetitive strain that is ripe for even more adolescent boy humor.

The carry bag is big enough that we can easily fit in a favorite stuffed toy, a bedtime book, pajamas, and a couple blankets.

If you're considering buying a PeaPod and can't decide between the original or the Plus, we'd recommend getting Plus and only using one half of the sleeping bag. The only drawback to the PeaPod Plus is that it lacks the extra-large opening of the original PeaPod. The Plus' window features and extra space will serve well with a growing child.

This review is the independent opinion of babytoolkit.blogspot.com. Baby Toolkit has no relationship with and has not received any compensation from KidCo or its affiliates.