New Baby Nappy Hacks

Welcome to our new series of BB blogs on surviving life with a new baby. Here at the BB office we have more years than we care to admit of parenting experience and although we are still regularly flummoxed by our own kids we have put together a list of top tips that we wish we had known when we started out on our parenting adventure. I hope that these tips help you along your own parenting journey and make those first few weeks with a newborn slightly less overwhelming.

First up - let's talk about poo...

As a new parent, I couldn't believe quite how much time I spent looking at, cleaning up and discussing poo - frequency, colour, consistency, it became a bit of an obsession. And after having three children I must have spent hours just changing nappies. So below are some of my top tips gleaned through those hours of night-time nappy changes and piles of dirty nappies.

• Our first experience of our baby's poo is pretty terrifying, the tar-like meconium in those first nappies is like nothing else. And although the baby books warn you about this, I wasn't expecting it to be quite so sticky, it stuck to my tiny baby's bottom like superglue. Try adding a small amount of olive oil onto baby's bottom to help remove it, otherwise you may be wiping all day.
  
  

• I think this one is genius and I have to admit it took me until child number 2 to clock this one. The little shoulder flaps in a body suit or vest are to enable you to pull it down past baby's shoulders rather than over their head. When faced with a poo explosion this means you can avoid smearing poo in baby's hair, which is always a bonus.

• Another genius hack that it took me to baby number 2 to realise is that most nappy brands have a line at the front of the nappy that changes colour when the nappy is wet. I was literally speechless when someone pointed this out to me, I must have changed hundreds of nappies and had never noticed.

• Night time nappy changes can be the worst, you just want to get baby changed and fed so you can both get back to sleep. I found it best to change baby before feeding as then if they fell asleep during the feed I didn't have to disturb them - unless of course your baby poos during a feed, then the whole wonderful process starts all over again.

• Another helpful hack for night time changes is to double up the mattress protection and sheet on baby's bed. Then if you have a nappy leak in the middle of the night you don't need to go hunting round the house for clean sheets, wasting valuable minutes where you could be sleeping.

• Another time saving nappy hack is to place a clean nappy under baby before you remove the dirty one. It saves time with a wiggly baby and if you have a boy, a quick nappy change will reduce the risk of getting wee in your eye.

• During the first few weeks you will find yourself almost constantly reaching for the changing mat, and with my first baby I trudged upstairs each time to baby's bedroom where we had put his changing station. After a few days, a friend pointed out that I could keep a changing mat downstairs - absolute genius. I stashed a mat, some wipes and nappies under the sofa and saved my legs, energy and sanity.

• Finally pop a change of clothes for you in baby's change bag. This will avoid having to dash home smelling of poo when your baby's (or somebody else's baby) nappy leaks on your lap.

Please share with anyone you think may need these nappy hacks and we would love to hear any of your top tips and parenting hacks on our Babyblooms Facebook page.