New Baby Gadgets

It already seems like an eternity ago, but last weekend the Bailey and Righter girls conspired to throw me a lovely baby shower at a local spa. They really went over the top and brought in catered food, flowers, and even magazines to read while we awaited our spa services. It was by far the most relaxing few hours in recent history and I didn't want it to end. While I thought I had instructed otherwise, they also showered me in gifts. I received some lovely pajamas that have become my daily uniform lately. (All of my pants are starting to feel tight around my LOW and growing belly--I'm definitely carrying differently this time around.) We also got the new-and-improved diaper genie--I'm sold on the foot pedal and lack of squishing diapers already. Reese and sister also received a few matching outfits that they can sport once baby sister is into 3mo clothes.

Kevin and I didn't make many purchases to prepare for baby #2, but the two we chose to make were biggies.

First, we got Reese a new car seat. While the one she was using was working perfectly fine (and it will be years before she reaches the 40lbs weight limit), we decided that we finally needed to "christen" Kevin's car with a car seat. Yes, you read that right--in the 2+ years of baby time in our house, Kevin's car has not yet welcomed a car seat. It was never a logistical issue, but now that we'll have two kiddos around we figured there might be circumstances when the kids need to go in different directions and/or we don't want to leave someone stranded at the house without a car that can transport kids. All that being said, a giant investigation was launched about which/what kind of car seat to buy. With the car seat laws expanding constantly, we wanted a car seat that would last Reese and/or her sister for the long haul (no pun intended). All the reviews pointed to one car seat in particular--a Britax. When Reese was a tiny baby I refused to buy into the Britax fan club on the basis of their ridiculous cost. They all pass the same tests, right? Why spend twice the money (or more) on a brand? Or, that was my logic anyway. After lots of searching, I got the options down to two car seats and took Reese to the store to try them both out. And...she and I fell instantly in love with the Britax. Thanks to some coupon cutting it wasn't quite as expensive as I thought it would be, but it was still a bit of a sticker shock. We've had the seat now for a few weeks and I like it even better now that we're using it regularly. Fan club, sign me up...

The other purchase we made in prep for baby #2 is a new monitor. This time, we knew we'd go for the "upgrade," and we immediately started looking into audio video monitors. The search wasn't quite as painful as the car seat (although the price tag was similar), and last week our new monitor arrived--complete with two infrared cameras that can pan, tilt, and zoom around the girls' rooms. The parental base unit lets us switch our monitoring from one room to the next with a few clicks. It's pretty nerdy, but exciting. While the camera function sucks the battery life a little, it is already great to use the video feature while Reese is sleeping or playing independently in her room. In the past, when she'd go play in her room, if I peeked in on her to check on what she was doing, she would immediately loose interest in playing independently and want me to join her, or she would abandon her play completely. At first Reese was a little preoccupied with the infrared lights, but once we explained them, she's been fine.



And so you have it...we're all geared up for little sister to arrive, with exponentially less effort than the first time around.