HOW TO PREPARE FOR A NEWBORN *THIRD TRIMESTER CHECKLIST* Watch This Video If You Are Pregnant!

Hey guys, welcome back to my channel or welcome if you are new here. Today's video is going to be all of my tips and advice on how to prepare for a newborn and kind of like a third trimester checklist. These are all things that I think that you should be focusing on in your third trimester. Things to do before your baby arrives. If you are new here, my name is Ali. I have a 16 month old son and I am due in February of 2021 with a little girl. I make videos on my channel all about babies and motherhood and vlogs and everything like that. So I would love if you guys would subscribe and hit the like button. I have been thinking about this video for months. I definitely have a lot of stuff I want to talk about and I know that this is probably going to be a longer video. So feel free to put the speed of this video in like 1.5 so that you can watch it a little bit faster, but definitely watch till the end because I guarantee you are going to learn something in this video that you're not going to in other preparing for newborn videos. I'm certainly no expert by any means, but I do feel like having a newborn the first time taught me so much and I am preparing for baby number two so much differently than I did for him. Having a newborn was absolutely insane for me the first time around. I was so unprepared. I did not do half of these things that I wish I would have done. So if you are a first time mom, this video is going to be so valuable to you. So please watch the whole thing. I'm going to start with some of the more obvious things to do to prep for your newborn and then more towards the end I'm going to talk more in depth about some of the things that I like desperately wish that I would have known going into having a newborn. So the first thing I have on here is to set up your nursery. This was so much fun for me the first time around. I think for most first time moms and just moms in general, nesting for your baby, creating a space for your baby is so much fun and it's also somewhat practical too. Depending on what you're planning on doing with your baby, they might not even be in that room for a very very long time but I still felt like the nesting part of it was really great. But also setting up your bedside nursery because realistically, and I feel like for most people, your baby is probably going to be in your room with you for at least a little while after they come home. So you're going to want to have a few things in your room close by so that you're not having to go room to room in the middle of the night. My son slept in a bassinet next to our bed but for a while we were still taking him to his nursery in the middle of the night to change his diaper. We very quickly realized that that was not a sustainable thing for us so we have a little caddy in the room with diapers and wipes and diaper rash cream and everything that you would need for like a middle of the night issue. Extra swaddles, extra pajamas, little things like that. That way you're not having to go back and forth between rooms. Also just getting your bassinet set up, figuring out how everything is going to fit in your room. The next thing I have on here is to wash all of the baby laundry, all of the baby blankets, clothes, crib sheets, bassinet sheets, just every single thing that you're going to use for your baby. Personally, I really like to wash things as I buy them so I've been collecting things for baby girl here and there my whole pregnancy and I just wash it with our laundry. We use free and clear laundry detergent for our whole family anyway so I like to just have everything pre-washed and ready to go in the dresser but if that's not something that you do somewhere towards the end of your third trimester you're going to want to do a big load of baby laundry and get everything clean and ready for your baby. Cutting off all the little tags and plastic parts and everything so that you don't have to worry about it later on. You're also going to want to sterilize everything else. Bottles, binkies, teethers, plastic pacifier clips if you're using those, pump parts. I don't have a sterilizer that I use or anything I always just use the dishwasher and I do like one load of just all little baby stuff. You can also boil everything in a big pot of water but just getting that out of the way at the end of your third trimester so it's not something that you're worrying about. Once you're home and you need to use your pump and you realize that none of your pump parts are clean, just having everything ready to go in advance will be so helpful. You're also going to want to prep a postpartum station or something like that in your bathroom. I just designated an entire drawer in our bathroom vanity to all of the postpartum stuff I'm going to need when we come home. It is filled with Depends, pads, perennial spray, peri bottle, literally every single thing I'm going to need it's right there. Another super obvious one but you're going to want to pack your hospital bag and you're going to want to pack it sooner rather than later. With my son I had to have an emergent induction. I found out that I had become a pre-eclamptic at my 39 week appointment and I had to go straight from my midwife's office to the hospital to be induced right then and there. I didn't have any time to go home. Thank goodness I had packed half of my hospital bag the day before. It wasn't fully packed but I'm so glad that I at least had something in there like the majority of stuff that I was going to need. I'm not going to let that happen again. I'm going to start that bag early. After that experience here is what I suggest and what I'm going to do different this time. I am going to write out a full checklist of every single thing that I want to bring with me to the hospital and I'm going to pack as much of it as I can right now. There's a lot of stuff that I'm still like waiting on in the mail, stuff that I use every day, just stuff that I'm not really ready to pack just yet but I could probably pack the majority of stuff now because I just don't need it. So I'm going to put as much of it in the bag as I can and that checklist is going to be in the bag too. So when it comes time, no matter what the situation, I can see this list, know exactly what else I need to put in that bag or worst case scenario your husband, partner, mom, anybody who might have to be packing your bag for you has that list. They know exactly what to add and that will just make the entire process easier. There is so much stuff that you could probably be packing right now like a pair of flip-flops, your coming home outfit, your postpartum stuff, anything for the baby. Obviously you're not using that right now so your baby's coming home outfit, swaddle, things like that that can already be in the bag and ready to go just in case. The next thing I have on here is to pack your diaper bag. I actually brought my diaper bag with to the hospital too because that's where I packed all of my baby stuff for him. Stuff starts happening really fast after they're born too. If you have to leave the house for their first doctor's appointment after a few days, it's nice to already have that ready to go and not have to worry about packing that. So that's something that you can do towards the end of your third trimester as well. If you're planning on using an infant car seat, you're going to want to install your car seat base in your car. This is another thing that you should probably start thinking about around 35-36 weeks pregnant. You just never know when you're going to go into labor. I don't suggest that you keep your car seat in your car just because if you do happen to get in some sort of fender bender or anything like that, I think a lot of times car seats want you to replace the car seat if it's been in any sort of accident. So you definitely don't want to keep your expensive car seat in your car if you're not using it, but it is nice to have that base installed and it's not something that you have to be worried about or fussing with while you're in labor or in the hospital trying to come home or anything like that. Just have it done in advance. If you are planning on doing a convertible car seat that just stays in the car all the time, I'd probably wait closer until the end. That's something that you could probably do less than it. Those are pretty easy to install, but along with that I think that you should read over your car seat manual, practice with your car seat, practice the buckles, figure out how to tighten it, how to loosen it, stick a little teddy bear in there, and really figure out how your car seat works. You don't want to be messing around with that in the hospital trying to like learn how to loosen and tighten straps for the first time with your newborn baby. I think most car seats you could probably just look it up on YouTube and then watch someone show you exactly how to do everything and it'll make it really easy, but that way you just feel really confident when you're putting your baby into the car seat for the first few times. Also go ahead and install a car seat mirror too if you are planning on using one. I could not survive without a car seat mirror. I know that there are a lot of differing opinions on whether or not you should use a car seat mirror, but personally it's something that I would not feel comfortable without. It is so nice for me to be able to glance back in my rear view mirror and see my baby back there. See that they're okay. While you've got your little teddy bear buckled into your car seat, click it in and make sure that you can see your baby in the car seat mirror once everything is all installed and so that everything is ready to go. Along with learning how to use your car seat, also learn how to use your stroller. How to open it, how to collapse it, practice putting it in and out of your car, getting the car seat in and out of it. I can vividly remember the very first time I ever left the house with my newborn and I was so anxious. I literally just went to the three times to have him help me figure out how to open and close the stroller and how to get the car seat in and out because I had no idea and I had never done it before without him. Just like with car seats, there are so many videos you can watch online of someone showing you exactly how to open and close your stroller. Look up the travel system that you got, watch the video, practice it a few times. You're going to want to stock up your fridge and pantry. Do Costco run in your third trimester. Stock up on toilet paper and paper towels and things that you're just not going to want to worry about. Stock up on pantry items and easy dinner options and things like that. You can make freezer meals if that's something that you're into. I'm not like a freezer meal person. I just, I don't know. I don't even know like what I would make but I know there are like so many options on Pinterest so if that's something that interests you, stock up on some freezer meals. I also really think that you should do a good deep clean of your house before your baby gets here or pay somebody to do it. We did a Molly Maid's deep clean on our house before our son was born and it was first of all so much more affordable than we were expecting and it was so so worth it. Someone to just come in do a really good deep clean of everything so you don't have to worry about it for a little while after your baby is here. Dust everything really good, clean your baseboards, your bathroom, but it's also something that you can absolutely do yourself as well. Get your space feeling really really good and you probably have a nesting bug anyway so I'm sure you're already doing this. The next thing is to have a labor and delivery plan. Who's going with you to the hospital? Whose car are you taking? Who's getting what? You obviously want to have a plan for who's watching your kids if this is not your first baby. Who's watching your pets? Is anybody going to be house sitting for you or keeping an eye out for mail or packages or anything like that? Have all that planned out in advance. If you do have kids or pets that somebody else is going to be taking care of, it is a great idea to have everything written out really well in a lot of detail for them and for you to have peace of mind. For me, leaving my son to go and have another baby is so stressful. It makes me really anxious and so writing out a really really in-depth schedule and meal idea is basically just our entire daily routine for my mom so that she knows exactly what to do all day long. Every little detail that she could possibly need like knowing that she has all of that gives me a lot of peace of mind that he's going to be okay and that she's going to know what to do. This also goes for pets. My in-laws watched our dog last time and we did not do this so we forgot to tell them how many scoops of food my dog got at each meal which was one scoop and they were giving him three scoops each meal. He came back a much heavier dog than before so just a good idea to have everything written out and that's like such a simple easy thing that you can just be working on in your third trimester. Okay now I'm going to get into some of the less obvious, less talked about stuff that I wish I would have known so much before I had my newborn. I actually have another video on my channel called 10 Things I Wish I Knew Before Having a Baby. I'll have that linked for you guys if you want to check that out as well but I'm going to talk about a lot of that right now as well. I think that we can get really caught up in preparing for a newborn, preparing all their stuff, preparing our house, this that and we forget about preparing for what it's actually going to be like to take care of a newborn and the newborn's needs schedules and everything like that. At least that was my experience. I feel like I spent my entire first pregnancy preparing for all the wrong things and was so so underprepared for how to actually take care of a newborn once he was born. So this next one might seem obvious but I'm going to go into a little bit more detail about it. That is to research all of the different ways that there are to feed a baby and you might feel really really confident going into things knowing that you are going to breastfeed or that you're in a formula feed or that you want to do some sort of combination of the two. With my son I was so extremely passionate about breastfeeding and I expected my experience to be that he came out, that I put him on my nipple, and that he would eat and everything would be perfectly fine and easy and man that was not the case whatsoever. And I feel like it is very very rarely the case for anyone but I didn't know that because I didn't look into it at all. I just said oh yeah I'll breastfeed and that was that. So if you are planning on breastfeeding, taking a breastfeeding glass first of all is so so helpful and great. Research everything about breastfeeding. Know as much as you can. Like example schedules. How often does your baby need to be breastfed? Should you feed them on both boobs or just one? How long should they nurse on each side? How long should a nursing session take? Should I be pumping? You also want to know about all of the things that could go wrong for troubleshooting. Like what if your baby has tongue and lip ties? What if it hurts really bad? Should I be pumping? Is my baby gonna have bottle confusion? Knowing all of these things can help you be so prepared. I'm not joking when I tell you that I didn't know how often I needed to feed my baby at all. I went into breastfeeding so confidently clueless because I was like yeah it'll be fine I'll put him on the boob. I had no idea how often I needed to feed him or for how long or if I needed to wake him up from sleeping to feed him. None of that. So having all that information beforehand would have been extremely helpful instead of me just literally struggling to figure out everything that I needed to be doing. Even if you feel so confident that you are going to breastfeed, learn about formula. Let's say worst case scenario you aren't able to breastfeed. What formula do you want to give your baby? That might be something really helpful to know beforehand so that if something does go wrong, your milk isn't coming in quickly, anything along those lines, you know okay I want to keep breastfeeding but I need to feed my baby so thank goodness I researched beforehand and this is the formula that I want to use. And also if you are just planning on formula feeding from the get-go as well, I still think it's really good to know everything there is to know about breastfeeding and nursing because you never know maybe that baby's gonna come out and you are gonna feel these extreme instinctual feelings to want to breastfeed and in that scenario it will be really great for you to know everything there is to know about breastfeeding. Somebody woke up from his nap a little bit early so he's gonna sit right here next to me with a snack. Being really well informed and feeling prepared will make you feel so much more confident about feeding your baby. Along with that if you are planning on breastfeeding or pumping, figure out how your pump works. Take that thing out of the box in your third trimester and figure out how it works. Also clean all of the pieces and what I really recommend is to get a little pump caddy ready. This is actually something that my husband did for me the first time around with him and it was so helpful. He just found like a random little decorative tray that we had in our house and he put all of my pump parts and stuff in it and I actually ended up using that for our entire breastfeeding journey for like 10 months. That's definitely something I will do again is to just get some sort of little container that has your pump, your pump parts, some nipple balm, your pumping bra, throw a granola bar in there, just like everything that you would need for your pump. Or if you don't have a pump that is rechargeable, have a little space set up somewhere where you plan on doing your pumping, whether it's on the couch in the living room or at the kitchen table or wherever, just having everything in one spot ready for you. Very similar to learning all about baby's eating needs, this one is huge and that is to learn as much as you Another thing I did not do, went into it completely clueless and it made my life so chaotic. Something I've advocated for for a very long time since he was a tiny little baby is the taking care of baby's newborn sleep class. I feel like there's a lot of misconceptions about this. It is not sleep training at all. It is a class that teaches you everything that you need to know about a baby's sleep needs. It is immensely helpful. So my number one recommendation would be to take that sleep class in your third trimester before the baby is born. That way you're going into having a newborn with all of this information rather than taking it when your baby is a few weeks old and you are dying because you have no idea what you're doing. It's so much better to go into it prepared than to be trying to play catch up once they're already here. So put this on your list of things to do in your third trimester. If you don't want to take that class, that's totally fine, but definitely learn all about baby sleep needs and what's normal. How often does a newborn need to sleep and for how long should you be waking them up to feed them? Is it normal for your newborn to sleep six hours during the day? These are things that are super helpful to know. I'll try to leave as many resources as I can in the description box below for everything that I talk about in this video, but especially for this as well. Just having a general idea and general guideline about a typical newborn schedule, like how often do they need to be eating and sleeping throughout the day and throughout the night and what's normal. I did not know what a wake window was whatsoever until he was probably like, I don't know, eight weeks old. Everybody will warn you when you are pregnant with your first baby that you're never going to sleep again and that does not have to be the case. If you just go into it prepared and educated and knowing exactly what your baby's sleeping and eating needs are so that you can meet their needs and that they're going to be a happier baby, you're going to be a happier mama. Something to kind of go along the lines with both of those two things is I think you should download the Huckleberry app. It is a completely free baby tracking app where you can track all of their feeding and sleeping. Something that makes it more unique than other baby tracking apps is that you put in the age of your baby and it will tell you their sweet spot for nap times and bedtimes and will basically help you to know exactly when your baby needs to be sleeping. I think that Huckleberry is an incredible tool for parents, especially in these newborn phases where everything feels really chaotic. That's not really a third trimester anything. It's just kind of a little hot tip for you. Maybe just download that one real quick while you're in your third trimester so that it's ready to go when your baby gets here. Another really really great thing to educate yourself on is to learn all about newborn cues. Newborns especially have specific little ways of communicating with you and letting you know that they're tired or that they're hungry or that they are gassy and their stomach hurts and they're all slightly different from each other. So take some time, watch some videos, read some articles all about baby's cues for when they're tired versus when they're hungry so that when your baby is here and they're crying and they're upset and feeding them isn't working, maybe it's because they're tired and you're just kind of reading their cues wrong. I'm almost done. I only have a few more and the next one is to have a small postpartum wardrobe ready for yourself. This is something I've been focusing on a lot this time that I did not do at all with them. I just figured I would start wearing my old clothes again right away or if I wasn't going to wear those that I would just keep wearing my maternity clothes and for me neither of those options really worked very well postpartum. So this time around I have ordered a few like loungewear sets that are cute and a little oversized and comfortable, a few pairs of yoga pants that are bigger than my normal size but definitely not as big as maternity, just kind of a little transition wardrobe. I'm obviously not going to be going anywhere really or seeing anyone. I'm not super worried about looking really cute. I just want to have some things that are really functional and comfortable, nursing friendly, basically loungewear sets. Get yourself a couple of those and if you are planning on breastfeeding, breastfeeding tank tops were my favorite thing ever. The last thing I have on this list to do if you haven't already in your third trimester is to join a due date group on Facebook or kind of like a mom group in general. This probably either sounds like so crazy or you've already done this but if you don't know about due date groups on Facebook they can actually be so amazing. Basically all you have to do is just go on Facebook and search in the search bar your due date and then group. I'm doing February. I would search like February 2021 due date group or something along those lines. Not all groups are great. Some of them are definitely better than others. I generally think that groups that are on the smaller side are going to be better than groups that are on the really really big side with like thousands of members and it doesn't have to be specifically for your due date group either if you don't want to. I know that Jess Hover here on YouTube, she has a mom Facebook group that's kind of like this and I'm in that one and it's really really great. So that's definitely one that you could look into as well. I know that she has that linked in like all of her videos. These due date groups and mom groups in general can be such a great resource both while you're pregnant and once your baby is here. I am still in my pregnancy groups from when I was pregnant with him and they continue to be such an amazing resource for me. A place where I have made so many amazing lifelong mom friends of women who were due at the same time as me and they have babies the same age as him. They're really great for advice when you are pregnant and when your baby is already here. It's a great place to make mom friends which is definitely really hard during these crazy trying times right now but it's also a great place for support and advice. Okay so that is every single thing that I had on this list for things to do in your third trimester and ways to prepare for your newborn. I know that this is a crazy long video so I really hope that you can take something away from this and that this will somehow help you feel more prepared for your newborn. I really love when the comment section can be a place for moms to go for more advice so if there's anything you feel like I left out of this video or things that you agree with or anything like that leave it all in the comments so that other moms can go through and get even more advice. Yeah I think that is all I have for this video so thank you guys so much for watching. Don't forget to give this video a thumbs up and subscribe and follow us on Instagram and I will see you guys all in our next video.