Essentials 3/10

I remember reading a list such as this when I was pregnant. It helped me a bit and also made me conscientious, during Ev’s first year, of our needs. Without further ado (since it’s 3 months late anyway. Who am I to make my readers wait?)… I present the ten things we could NOT live without for our first year of parenthood. I’ll post them one at a time because they’ve turned into quite lengthy little guys!


3. “The Pink Bucket”—When I asked the hubs what he thought was the most valuable asset to him in E’s first year, he quickly replied, “The Pink Bucket.” I’m going to include this as one item while in all actuality it included a plethora of goodies. It was our portable diaper changing station. At the hospital, we’ve all seen those plastic, flimsy pink tubs. Everyone gets one (or ten) when you are admitted into the hospital. Well, when we were being discharged, we were packing up our room, sorting, throwing things away, etc. We came across two pink buckets (I’m pretty sure they were given to me because I thought I was going to hurl when I reached 9-10 cm but I never did. I promise we didn’t take home a used puke bucket.) Anyway, I was about to toss it when Wade said to just pack the extra diapers and wipes they had given us in it so that we’d have some way to carry a bit of the extra stuff. When we got settled in, it ended up finding a little home with the Watts. We filled it with about 7-10 diapers, a box of wipes, some A & D ointment/ Boudreaux’s, and a changing pad. We would keep it in the living room or our room and would tuck it away when guests came. It was easy to just whip out the changing pad and do our stuff wherever the need arose instead of having to run back to his nursery changing table. We also used it when he got out of the bath because he always bathed and got ready for bed in our room and bathroom. I’m sure they have cute portable diaper caddies but seriously that pink bucket worked like a dream and was the perfect size.