Life Changing Baby Hacks For Parents

hi everyone and welcome back to my channel and if you're new welcome and I hope you'll consider subscribing for more great videos like this one so you guys really seem to like my video of newborn baby hacks so I wanted to continue that into a new video of hacks that you can use throughout the first 12 months of your baby's life now these are hacks that I have discovered over the past five years of parenting to children and also that I have discovered through extensive research and googling on the Internet during those late nights of feeding my new baby I hope that you'll find them helpful and this is enough rambling let's hop to it and talk about some baby hacks to make your life easier so I'm gonna kick this off with a hack that you might have seen in my diaper bag hacks video but it is one that I absolutely love and that is using a plastic wipes container to make the ultimate baby changing station so all you need to do is secure a wipes refill to the top of a plastic wipes container with two hair ties and then you use the inside as a storage compartment for a change of clothes some hand sanitizer some diaper cream and anything else that you might need while you're on the go this is the ultimate changing kit you can keep one in the back of everyone's car you can give some to grandparents you can easily fit it in a diaper bag that way you just have a changing kit no matter where you are you always have a backup and you're prepared you can also take the same idea and convert it into atraveling snack box so I like to put a few bars a couple of pouches and the bottom of it as snacks for my kids and then I keep the wipes in the top so it's easy clean up before and after they eat another great idea if you travel a lot is to make a little first aid kit to keep in the back of your car or in your suitcase you can put a thermometer some Tylenol or other medications that your children might need some teethingsupport and then of course you have the wipes as well in case you have any boo-boos or anything you need to clean up and it just makes a great convenient place to keep everything together now if you are changing your baby on the go a lot I highly recommend using the drunk or back of your car as a changing station it is much more sanitary than those discussing public changing tables I also recommend that you keep a roll of these dog poop bags in your diaper bag at all times of that way if you have a dirty diaper or soiled clothes you can easily just tie them up in that bag that way you can keep everything clean until you can find a trash can or an appropriate place to put it if you're changing a squirmy baby especially in public when you need them to be still another great tip is to hand your baby a bottle of diaper cream or a baby wipe so that they can feel like they're involved in the change and it sort of distracts them from rolling back and forth another tip I have for thesuper wiggly baby is to you zip up clothes whenever possible and my son hates having stuff going over his head and he's always turning from side to side when I'm getting him dressed so zip up clothes have just made it so much easier to get him dressed and also both of my kids seem to have really really big hands and getting their hands through tight long-sleeved clothing was always a struggle for us so you might think this pack is a little silly but if you have a child with large hands that I'm sure you can relate and maybe this will help you so all I do is I simply just cut off that tight wrist cuff from their pajamas and long sleeve clothing and it makes it so much easier to get their hands in so they don't fuss anymore so that's all you need to dojust cut that tight wrist cuff off and then you won't be having so much of a struggle now I showed you in my newborn hacks video to use the Sun as a magic stain remover but I also have a recipe for you for a magic stain remover that works wonders for stains that get on baby clothes and that is to use two parts for oxide one part dish soap and one part baking soda put it in a jar and shake it up so it's mix as well and then you can use just an old toothbrush or whatever you want to rub it on to the stains before you wash the clothes usually this works so well that the stains are pretty much gone before I even wash the clothes another thing about baby clothing is that it's pretty small and it can be tricky to organize it in a drawer or in a closet so I have a couple of tips for you if you do want to hang up your baby's clothes I recommend sorting them into outfits and then using clothes pins to attach the pants of the outfit to a hanger and then slipping the onesie over that and that way you can hang up the pants and the shirts together and you can pull out a full outfit at one time so you're not trying to look around and match something up now if you are working more with drawers that I recommend going Marie Kondo on those clothes and rollingthem or folding them into small rectangles and then putting them into rows and the drawers and that way you can see everything that you need and now if you plan on traveling with your baby you may realize that their clothes can easily fill a suitcase my hack for packing with the baby is to use gallon-sized ziplocks bags and toorganize your clothes by the days of the week then you can compress the clothesdown in these bags and they will take up much less space in your suitcase I alsohighly recommend traveling with a pair of scissors some tape and a black trash bag that way you can use these to make an impromptu blackout curtains should you end up in a hotel or be seeing somewhere where there are bright windows you can also pick up a white noise machine like this small one that I got off of Amazon because they easily fit into a suitcase and then you can recreate a dark room with the whitenoise machine to help your baby to sleep better in a new environment I also recommend packing some tape or band-aids along with you because they make great impromptu plug covers and I feel like most of us and you open your diapers away it's recommended to and you may realize that it's actually pretty hard to pull out those first few diapers from the bag it can be a struggle and when you're working with a baby and trying to do things one-handed it can be even harder so I found that if you turn your bags of diapers on their sides and cut them along the side of the bag it's actually much easier to pull the tie press out I don't know why the manufacturers don't recommend this anyway then you can easily pull them out in stacks and you're not struggling even with one hand if your baby requires a lot of late night diaper changes and I highly recommend picking up one of these salt lamps or getting a red light bulb for your regular lamp the red light has been shown to be the least stimulating to your baby so it will provide you with enough light to change their diaperwithout waking them up now I wanted to move on to some hacks that will help youwith your baby's health now if you're deciding to vaccinate your child I know that that time can be super stressful because we all anticipate the pain that our children are going to go to through and so I wanted to recommend to you a product that saved me with this with my daughter and that is getting a lidocaine you can order lidocaine cream off of the Amazon and it works so unbelievably well my daughter never during any of her vaccines now in order for it to work you need to apply at about 30 minutes before your child's doctor appointment and all you need to do is apply a thin layer to their leg and then you take kind of a larger blob put it on top and seal that in with acotton ball and then you can wrap that with a band-aid or like an ace bandage so it's not hard to take off and then you'll just remove it right before the vaccines and wipe it clean and that way their leg will be significantly numb right before they get their shots and they won't feel a thing be sure to talk with your doctor first as well to make sure that it's okay for your child now if your baby is going through some teething pain I know that can be incredibly frustrating so here's a couple of things that I've found to be helpful with that one tip is to take some clean baby wash rag and then place a drop of baby food or water in the middle of the towel twist it and put it in a ziplock bag and freeze it it's super easy for your baby to hold on to it no matter their age and the cold crunchy I see in the middle is so soothing and some other things that I have found to be super helpful full 40 ting with my kids has been a meshed either I do like it much better than the silicone teethers and you can fill that with frozen fruit or ice or whatever you think your baby would like and then also teething tubes this eating tube is amazing it's such a nice texture in the way that is shaped it makes it easy for my baby to manipulate reach all of the spots that are bothering him in his mouth you can also use a baby food pouch to make some frozen baby food bites all you need is a pan or a tray and you can put little dollops of different size of the baby food on there and just pop it in the freezer for about 20 minutes these melt super fast and they're fun and challenging for your baby to try to pick up so it's good practice for the pincer grasp and it's soothing to their teeth another hack that I showed you in my breastfeeding hacks video is to use a pacifier that comes with a lid and fill that with breast milk and you can put the pacifier into the breast milk wood and freeze it and it makes a little pacifier popsicle that babies of any age can use another hack for pacifiers is to use souffle cups that you can pick up at a restaurant to keep them clean you can put a few in your purse or in your diaper bag or even in your car and then you can have some backup clean pacifiers whenever your baby inevitably throws one on now if your child ever should require medication I learned this tip from our doctor and it has been so helpful in keeping up with it all we needed to do was write a chart on the side of the bottle with a sharpie and then I'll just put a check in each square after each dose that he takes the chart is divided by days and so it helps me to remember if he has had medication or not if you have health insurance and you haven't yet claimed your free breast pump then I highly recommend checking out the link in the description below they will send you a free breast pump of your choice within about a week or two of submitting your informations if you're looking for a place to store your bibs one tip I have for you is to attach a command hook or two to the back of your high chair that way you can hang your bib and havethem accessible when you need them another thing that we of course all need to be doing more of is tummy time with our babies that helps them to get stronger and to develop better motor skills but it's gonna be a struggle and so I have a few tips for increasing tummy time one tip is to do tummy time on your belly so you'll lay on your back and put the baby on your belly so they can look down at your face you can thentalk to them make funny faces or do whatever you need to do to keep them engaged and staying on their stomach longer you can also use a ziploc bag to make a tummy time water mat or a tummy time art project you can simply put in some water and toys in the bag and seal it up really well and then put tape over it to be extra safe or you can put a piece of paper with some paint in the bag of seal it up really well again and lay it down and your child should enjoy the sensory stimulation and it will keepthem occupied in tummy time for quite a bit longer now if you're into these DIYsensory projects make sure that you're subscribed to my channel because I amcoming out with a video really soon of all DIY dancer you play ideas for you and your baby to do together my last tag for you guys is one that you might have seen before but if you haven't seen it I'm happy to bring it to you and that is to put a crib sheet over your pack and play or your play yard when you're outside the sheet will offer a bit of shade from the Sun and it will also keep any pests out now I'm demonstrating this with my crib because I didn't have I can play and I'm not rich enough to buy one just for my video so but you guys get the idea I'll put a picture here of exactly what it's supposed to look like you can also flip this idea around and make a little DIY play yard using a bottom sheet this is great for taking to the beach or from making it alittle safe and clean space for your baby to play if you're outside or you're at the park so hope you guys enjoyed this video I hope you found some tips that will help you if you have some more baby hacks be sure to leave those in the comments below