1 week, 2 days old

Zoe Christine is finally here! In fact, she has been here for a week and 2 days. I'm going to write the labor story... but not today. Today I want to focus on how to be a non consumeristic parent. Now, I don't exactly know how to do that... seeing as I've only been a parent for 1 week and 2 days, so I want to keep track of what I have -actually- used in this first week as far as "stuff" goes.

- DIAPERS. Our little girl is a poop machine. I've tried one cloth diaper and if this keeps up Matt and I may move to newborn prefolds by the end of the month. Each diaper is about 19 cents - and seeing as we change diapers about 10 or 11 times a day - what is that? Almost $2 a day - cheaper than the 50 cents or dollar if we did laundry every day.
- Burp clothes. She has only spit up once (and of course, I didn't have the cloth at that time) - but I need them when I feed her. No one ever tells you about how milk is sort of...uncontrollable. I feel like there is milk all over the places where I feed her - thus, burp cloth.
- Pack and Play. We opted to use this instead of a bassinet for the bedroom. I love it! One reason I love it is because the sides are mesh which allows air to flow over her, the bassinet wouldn't have done that. Not only that but it grows with her and we can take it when we travel.
- Baby gowns and onesies - however, I inherited about a million of them and have probably only used 4 gowns and maybe 7 onesies.
- Nursing bras and nursing pads and a nursing cami - absolutely neccessary. I was going to try and not use nursing bras - but it was destroying mine in the hospital. I have two and I wash them in our sink. I also have reusable pads which I was in the sink. I have about... 20 of these and I need that many.
- Sling. Also neccessary. The car seat is ridiculously heavy. There is no way I can lug that around anywhere...so when we shop, I put her in the sling which she likes and I can manage.
- A "baby papsan" given to us by my step-brother and his wife. We have it on top of our table so we can eat while she rests.
- The glider - a lot of feeding and rocking goes on there and it is defintely the easiet place to feed.
- the Boppy pillow: a good place to prop when feeding or not feeding. Also useful for me in the hospital.
- nursing wrap: I've only had to feed in public once - but it defintely helped in the hospital with all the wonderful visitors
- changing "pads" - i dont know how to describe these. they are little cloth-like squares that we can lay down under her when we change it. technically - a prefold would work just as well, but these were a gift and we put them to good use.
- lanolin: oh. so. neccessary.


Finally, here is an inventory of the diaper bag:
- 5 diapers
- portable box of wipes, perfume-free
- changing pad
- burp cloth
- sling (!!!)
- hand sanitizer
- camera
- nursing wrap
- lanolin