My faves...

If this is your first pregnancy, you're probably getting tons of advice about what different baby and pregnancy items you should try. Some of the advice is good. Some is worthless. My advice, of course, is the best. All jokes aside, I would like to share some of my favorite items and some of the ones I wasted money on.

1) The absolute best item you can have in your pregnancy wardrobe is a Bella Band. It's a stretchy band that you use to help your pants fit. You can wear it over unbuttoned pants that are too small in the beginning of your pregnancy, use it to help hold up maternity clothes that are too big in the middle, and wear it over your pre-pregnancy pants again after the baby is born, but before you've lost all that baby weight. It's affordable and it will save you from trying to buy clothes to accommodate your ever-growing body before you're ready for them. Check it out here http://www.ingridandisabel.com/bellaband.html. They are carried in several stores, but the cheapest I've seen is $16.99 at Target.

2) Sleep bras. Typically, I don't sleep in a bra. When that area becomes super sensitive, though, I find it helpful to sleep with a little support. My favorite was a sleep, nursing bra from Motherhood Maternity. I bought it for when I would be nursing, but it came in handy well before the baby was born. It's just a gentle support. Nothing tight or constricting.

3) It's not a product, but I love www.babycenter.com. It's a website all about pregnancy and parenting. There are great discussion boards that you can join to talk to women that are due around the same time that you are and see what they're going through. I enjoy reading them and knowing that I'm not the only crazy pregnant lady out there. There's also a week-by-week calendar that shows what's going on with your baby and your body. I love to see the progress.

4) The mother of all pregnancy books, of course, is What to Expect When You're Expecting. I read it religiously. It's a good resource for all those questions you have that aren't necessarily doctor worthy. I very strongly recommend it for all pregnant women.

5) Hand-in-hand with the book is www.whattoexpect.com. It has a lot of the information that the book has, but it also provides an outlet for discussing your pregnancy with other moms-to-be. It's a great resource!

6) With pregnancy brain being a common problem for expecting mothers, I recommend lots of note pads and a planner/calendar for your purse. The note pads are great for making lists of things to do or things that have already been done, just in case you forget. And you will. The calendar is super important as you will constantly be scheduling doctor's appointments for you for the next nine months, and then for your baby as soon as he or she is born.

7) Extra pillows or a special made pregnancy body pillow. By the time our daughter was born, my husband barely had any room in our bed. I used 4-5 pillows every night to try to stay comfortable. Two under my head, one to hug, one between my knees, and one between my feet. It was insane, but it helped.

8) While I have no experience with morning sickness, I have heard Preggie Pops highly recommended for anyone that does. You can usually find them at Target and bigger drug stores.

9) Soothie brand bottles. The nipples are the same shape as the Soothie pacifiers that hospitals give out. They were great when we needed to transition from breast to bottle. I also loved the bigger shape of the bottles.

10) If you choose to use formula, don't be afraid of the generic brands. Formulas are government regulated, so they're all basically the same. Even my pediatrician said that generic was just as good. And you can't beat it at half the price!


Pregnancy/Baby items that I didn't like...
1) Stretchmark lotions. While they're great for soothing stretched out, dry skin, doctors agree that they're not going to help. You either get stretchmarks or you don't. Any good lotion will help with the dry skin.

2) The Itzbeen timer. It's a device that allows you to track diaper changes, naps, feedings and even what breast you last nursed on. However, I found that as a harried, sleepless mother of a newborn, I rarely remembered to push the button to reset the timers, so it wasn't effective at all for me. You may have better success with it, but it wasn't for me.

3) Butt Paste. It may be good for preventing diaper rash, but there's nothing that competes with Desitin for healing diaper rash. What Butt Paste will take days to heal, Desitin can do in a treatment or two.

Those really are the only three I can think of at the moment. And you may like the ones that I didn't like, and vice versa. These are just my personal experiences and opinions:)

How I'm feeling today...exhausted!!! Either I'd forgotten how tired you get or it's worse this time around. I feel like I can't keep my eyes open!