Child Development Resource

TheSavvySource

The Best Parenthacks

Before baby arrives

**Stock up on toilet paper
**Squirt witch hazel onto maxi pads and freeze them

**Have easy-to-grab snacks at the ready

**Change your voicemail to announce all of the baby’s stats

**Pre-stamp and address envelopes for baby announcements and thank you notes

**Stock up on dove chocolates

**Thumb thing for one-handed book reading

Going Out 

**Sanitize pacifiers in a small plastic container filled with water and a little antisceptic listerine.

**Wear a maternity jacket over the baby front carrier

** Breastmilk in a medicine-dispensing pacifier for ear pressure travel issues, or to get the baby to take a pacifier.

**Tie toys, bottles, pacifiers, and cups to the stroller, car seat, or diaper bag with links. Also, attach a new eater’s spoon and cup to the high chair with links.

**Get extra spoons for baby to play with when you go out to eat

Laundry  **Corral mismatched socks via a pegboard in the laundry room.

**Wash small baby hats and socks in a mesh bag

**Glue down collars on baby outfits to keep them clean

**Put socks over too-big footed pjs to keep feet in place

**Dress your child while they are strapped into the stroller (shoes and socks) or high chair (jackets). Put pants inside out on your hands first.

**Nursing tanks + faux wrap tops, mesh and/or dry wick tops for nursing leaks

**SmartMomJewelry teething pendants and bracelets

Changing Table 

**Use olive oil on baby’s bottom so that the meconium will not stick and baby will be easier to clean up. Put a piece of toilet paper or a gauze pad in the diaper to help you know for sure if baby wet early on when it’s not always easy to tell.

**Mark different-sized diapers with different-colored Sharpie stripes while they are still in the package

**Empty baby wipe box as kitchen cabinet organizer for small bottle parts

**After blowouts, pull a dirty onesie off over the legs**Diaper changes: Open wipes box and prepare new diaper first, grab farthest ankle and lift both legs with forearm

Misc. Good Advice 

**Stash spare pacifers in the corner of the crib

**Buy furniture that sits flat on the floor to avoid having to retrieve objects

**Showering: put the baby bathtub at one end of the shower while you shower, or bring the bouncy seat in, or bring the high chair in and give him a snack while you shower.

**Cornstarch gets vaseline out of hair

**Zinc oxide highlights where to trim fingernails

**Learn to drink from a cup while in the bath

**De-sand kids with baby powder

**Soft rope lowers stairway banister for toddlers

**Over the door shoe organizer for small toys

Pumping:**Massage, shake, reposition, visualize white rapids

**Drink water while pumping

**Use Camelback for nursing thirst

Changing Table Options

Ikea Mandel 3-drawer dresser in black and natural, $129.00

Ikea Malm 3-drawer chest in black, brown, oak, natural, white or pink, $79.99

Baby Name Remorse

CNN reports on parents who change their child’s name.

How To Sew Children’s Pants

A tutorial is here.

Gifts For Small Children

6-months:  Stacking cups, water-filled blocks, bumbo seat, Burt’s Bees products, Lamaze fishbowl, music, magnets, bath toys, colorful Container Store boxes.

1-year:  Radio Flyer or IKEA walker wagon, push/pull toys, play drum, cut-apart vegetables, rocking horse, table and chairs, doll, doll stroller, board books.

1.5 years: Play kitchen, instruments, blocks, art supplies, sidewalk chalk, play dough, play foam, cars, magna or aqua doodle, dress-up clothing, board books.

2 years:  Play tea set, easel, lacing cards, wooden and matchbox cars, Plan toys, doll house, doctor set, tools, trike,  Mr. Potato Head, sewing block,  doll stroller, Automoblox, Bilibo, sand/water table, slide, climber.

3 years:  Puzzles, Memory, duplo/lego, little people, lincoln logs, play wooden food, puppet theatre and puppets, nesting Russian dolls, magna-tiles, playmobile, Kinder-Eggs, simple dollhouse.

Esty Awesomeness

Beaded Socks, $6.50 per pair

Spiral Market Dyeworks, snapsuits and ts in subtle tye-dye patterns

Timers

Timers are great for children: Blanket time is 10 minutes, we’ll clean up for five minutes, Sesame Street starts in 15 minutes.

This lovely wood egg timer is just $5.95 at A Toy Garden. 

Sewing Project

How to make a shirred dress or smock for a toddler.

Changing Trunk

Have a too-short dresser you’d like to use as a changing table? Get a Kalon Studios changing trunk that later converts to toy storage.