What a baby wants

Baby Billy loved the door bouncer

Today's Guardian features an article on the most pointless baby purchases, you know, those nonsense articles that have "baby" as part of the product description, and seem like you must have them in order to care for your little one. Such as "baby bath," "baby door bouncer," and "baby seat," and you don't really know what you need and what you don't, because there is so much "baby" stuff out there, it seems like the very last thing you'll have room for in your house is the actual baby.

Number one on their top ten list of pointless buys is a baby door bouncer, modeled here by young Billy, which I would have said was one of our top ten most useful items. Now, the Guardian is a fine newspaper, and surely the writer is a rigorous journalist, and anyway she's simply writing about a survey conducted by Which? magazine, but according to me, they have the lists mixed up. At our house, the baby door bouncer was definitely in the top ten, followed by the Baby Bjorn carrier, the manual breast pump (which allowed me to go back to work), analog baby monitor, baby sleeping bag, little purse pack for diapers (not a big diaper bag), nappy bin with a lid, floor gym, travel cot, and the womb sounds heartbeat bear. When Billy came to live with us, we also added a swing to the list of must-haves so that he could join us at the dinner table, as well as the terrific "Moon in my Room", which Isabelle used as a night light to help her go back to sleep when he'd wake her up with his screaming. We never owned a bottle sterilizer (wha?) or a baby stair gate, a digital ear thermometer or a baby bath, and we all survived.

So, I guess it just goes to show that one mom's trash is another mom's treasure... or door bouncer. What were your favorite/silliest buys for your little one? I'd love to know. xo