Rainy Day Activities with Your Toddler

A couple of weeks ago I was doing double duty remote work and childcare. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I set up days like this in such a way that I start very early in the morning so that I have a window of time from mid-morning to early afternoon to spend with him (and then I get back online as soon as he’s down for his nap).

Usually that time would include a visit to the playground and the library, or maybe the children’s museum or zoo if we wanted something different – but none of those were an option that particular week. My son had a weird rash that was starting to spread, and since we weren’t sure what it was, we didn’t want to take him around other kids. A Nor’easter was also coming through our area on one of these days, which meant even going to our backyard wasn’t a good idea.

That left me staring down two days of making up some alternative activities – but it ended up being easier than I thought it would be. Here are some of the things we did together: I hope it gives you some ideas the next time you’re looking for some rainy day activities at home!

Everyday objects can be lots of fun on their own.

My son is only two and a half, so I’m not sure if this applies as much to older kids – but he loves to make up games with stuff around the house. On the first of the two days (the one where the Nor’easter was coming through), he decided the big throw blanket in our living room was his new favorite toy. We came up with a bunch of different things to do with it – his favorite being “making a boat,” which entailed him lying on his back on the blanket, me gathering it up, and dragging him across the length of the first floor in it like I was pulling him on a sled. When he got tired of that, he wanted to read some books – so he dragged the blanket (and me) over to the couch, climbed into my lap and put the blanket around us to read for the next half hour.

Chores can be exciting for toddlers – if you make them exciting.

Between all the rain and the not being able to take him to places with other kids, my son became my errand buddy for those couple of days. We went to the grocery store, put new sheets down on the guest bed, cleaned the kitchen, and did a few other things around the house that were safe for me to involve him in – and when possible, I made some of those activities more like a game for him. What I’ve realized about my son in recent months is that generally, when he’s getting fussy, it’s just because he wants to spend some time with me and my husband. And at this point in his life, getting to help me with little things is a great way to keep him busy while also spending some time together. And don’t worry; I interspersed these activities with fun things that he wanted to do too.

Pick a thing you like to do, and do it together.

Cooking is one of my favorite things to do, and my son sees me in the kitchen a whole lot during the week – so I decided to do some cooking together with him for those two days, since that’s something my mother used to do with me when I was little. I got his little apron out (my mother made it for him last Christmas) and on one of our grocery store trips, I got the couple of things we needed to make blueberry crumble. He was relatively limited in what he could actually do (it mostly consisted of me measuring everything out and then giving it to him to pour into a designated bowl, and the occasional attempt at stirring ingredients together) – but he still felt involved. Since it was just us and I wasn’t pressed for time the way I usually am when I’m cooking for us, I had a chance to slow down and let him take his time. And since then, I’ve been a lot more open to him helping out in the kitchen for kid-safe activities, especially since he seems to have fun doing it!

The Baby Products I Used the Most for 0-12 Months: Travel Edition

Six months after our son was born, we were heading to a wedding a couple of states away for a close friend of mine. A month after that, my husband and I took our son with us on a trip to a beach town a couple of hours away from our home to celebrate our anniversary, and three weeks after that we drove to Washington D.C, for a yearly gathering of my friends to cheer on our friend who was running a marathon.

That meant three car trips, three hotel stays, and a ton of on-the-fly planning while our son wasn’t a year old yet. And while we haven’t yet attempted a plane ride with him, we learned a lot about traveling with a baby in those first few car trips together. This is a list of the products I swear by and that I’d repurchase in a heartbeat if I were doing it all over again.

For the Car

Beis Diaper Bag: This diaper bag has become my favorite gift to give my new mom friends. It’s got a ton of useful pockets, and it’s just as good-looking as some of my nicest work bags. There are tons of other diaper bags out there that are just as utilitarian as this one, but I’ve been so happy with this one over the years – and I’m still using it.  

Travel Tray for Car Seat: This travel tray is great to give your kid a surface for toys and snacks (depending on their age). I’ve found that it’s helped to keep the back seat just a bit cleaner on longer car trips.

Car Backseat Organizer: These hanging backseat organizers helped to keep the car more organized – it’s where miscellaneous toys, extra paper towels, water bottles, and snacks end up, rather than being scattered across the floor in the backseat.

Sunscreen sticks: Even if your car seat has a sun cover, chances are your baby’s going to get more UV exposure than normal when they’re in the car for an extended period of time (the UV can sometimes be higher when it’s cloudy out). I always have at least one of these sunscreen sticks in the car and a couple in the diaper bag for my son’s face and hands (and all over, if needed).

For Feeding

Bottle prep and cleaning items: We basically created a mini go-bag of all the things we’d need to make and clean our son’s bottles, including a small container of kid-safe dishwashing soap, a bottle brush, a small drying rack, and a sponge. After I fully forgot to bring dishwashing soap with us on our beach town trip – which resulted in me driving through a full downpour to the nearest CVS to go get some – we never forgot that go-bag ever again.

Baby Brezza: Full disclosure, we also brought our Baby Brezza (and the distilled water needed to operate it) on every single trip with us, all the way up until our son stopped using bottles. It was beyond helpful to have this around, especially in the middle of traveling when you’re encountering germs left and right.

Toddler Snack Cup: Once our son was old enough to start eating snacks these containers became one of our favorite items to travel with – I largely attribute my car not looking like a warzone to them.

For Sleeping

Pack n Play: This was our sleep solution for our son when we traveled. He wasn’t a huge fan of it, but when he needed to nap and sleep at night it worked for us. If I could go back and do these trips over, I would have introduced it at home prior to traveling, maybe during a couple of daytime naps, so that he would already know what it was by the time we were out of home. This ended up being worth the money as well – we used it up until just a couple of months ago, and it also served as a back-up sleep solution when we had friends with babies/toddlers coming to visit us.

Hatch Sound Machine: We’re a Hatch household and it’s a big part of our son’s bedtime routine, so we typically travel with ours. It can be tough to use it with the app when you’re dealing with hotel wifi, but the basic sound functions will work just as long as it’s plugged in, so when we travel that’s what we use. We did try using the travel Hatch for the car, but to be honest we didn’t get a ton of use out of that, largely because he can fall asleep on his own in the car (if your baby doesn’t do that, then a travel solution may be better for you). But if your baby is like ours and you already have a sound machine that you like at home, it might be best to just bring that with you.

The Baby Products I Used the Most for 0-12 Months: Nursery & Diapering Edition

In my third trimester of pregnancy, I spent an embarrassing amount of time on Pinterest looking for nursery design ideas and essentials for that room. A lot of the room inspo I found on Pinterest looked beautiful, but I failed to find a comprehensive list of products I’d actually need that also suited the look we were going for. This is a list of the nursery (and diapering) items that we used the most in the first year of our baby’s life.

Furniture

Crib: This was a bigger purchase for us but since it converts from a bassinet to a crib to a toddler bed, we saw it as a piece of furniture we’d be investing in. We went with the Nestig one in white and we love it – it looks great, it’s easily adjustable and it has wheels so you can move it from room to room if you need to. We’re still using it in its crib form, and in about a year we’ll convert it to the toddler bed.                                                                                                       

Dresser: This one is close to the one we bought from Wayfair – in retrospect, I probably should have gotten a taller one with more drawers, but we ended up using the top of the dresser as our changing table (more on those products further down in this post), so we intentionally went with one that would be closer to this kind of height.

Nursing Chair: This was a purchase that I was 100% influenced into, but it ended up being one of the best ones we made. We went with this one from Nurture& and this thing saved my life (and my husband’s) when it came to feeding. I’ve taken lots of naps in this chair and when we no longer have a need for it in my son’s room it’s probably coming to our bedroom.  

Diapering

Changing pad: We purchased two of these, one for our son’s room and one for our living room. One other hack: we use puppy pee pads to put over the changing pad and switch them out as needed. For us, this has been a lot more hygienic than using one of the reusable plastic ones.

Products: We use water wipes, A&D cream, a butt spatula, and Sassy bags for dirty diapers.

Ubbi diaper pail: We like these, and we just use normal trash bags in them, instead of buying the specific bags from this brand. We stationed one of these in our son’s room and another one downstairs in the living room so we would have the option to change his diapers downstairs.

Sleeping

Sleep sacks: After our son was out of the Snoo and his portable bassinet (at six months), these were a great way to transition out of the swaddle situation.

Hatch sound machine: I did a lot of asking around about this product and ended up getting it – and two and a half years later we’re still using it. Have a specific sound and light for naptime and then another combination for bedtime was a big part of solidifying our bedtime routine. There is an associated app you’ll need to purchase, but for us it’s been a worthwhile purchase.

Baby monitor: There are a ton of these out on the market, but we went with the Wyze system so we could have the same camera system throughout the house. We’ve liked it and the app (which does come with a purchase) is pretty easy to use.

The last installment in this series will be on travel essentials!

The Baby Products I Used the Most for 0-12 Months: Home Edition

When my husband and I brought our son home, I quickly realized that the home prep we’d done before leaving for the hospital wasn’t exactly enough. This is a list of the home items that we used the most in the first year of our baby’s life!

For the Kitchen

Dish basin: This helped to keep our baby’s bottles, my pump parts, and anything we used for feeding separate from our regular dishes in our sink. We also used a separate sponge just for anything baby-related (pro tip, it helps if that sponge is a different color from the one you use for your other dishes).

Upright bottle drying rack: We started with the OXO one but switched to this one because it had more space at the bottom for drying parts. This saved us a ton of counter space, it’s pretty easy to clean, and we still use it to this day!

Bottle brush and stand: It’s a good idea to have a bottle brush handy just for baby bottles – and I love this one because it comes with its own stand.

Baby Brezza: If there’s one buzzy product to put on your registry, this is the one. The sterilizer and dryer make it so much easier to keep baby bottles, pump parts, and pacifiers clean. In the first six months when they need bottles all the time, this thing will save you a ton of time. We ran this at least once a day (sometimes twice) to stay on top of sterilizing our son’s things. Once his stuff had been washed in the sink and put on the drying rack, it would go into the Brezza for sterilizing and then put away. My husband and I have gifted this to a bunch of our friends, and everyone we’ve given it to considered it an essential for the newborn phase.

For Everywhere

Portable bassinet: Depending on the size of your living space you may not need this, but we ended up getting this portable bassinet for our son’s naps in different parts of the house that weren’t our bedroom. When they first come home, they’ll sleep a lot more frequently, and having a bassinet that we could easily move from room to room was a life-saver for those early weeks before they’re sleeping on a more routine basis. As someone who was recovering from a c-section, I especially found it helpful to have a sleep-safe space on the same floor as the kitchen and living room, and not have to take my son upstairs whenever he needed a nap. Once we were ready to start sleep training, we moved the bassinet into his room, where he took his daytime naps (and then his nighttime sleep took place in our bedroom where we kept the Snoo).

Baby nail trimmer: This was a recommendation from a friend as well as the mommy blogs I read when I was pregnant and it got a whole lot of use. Fun fact: babies’ nails start growing in the womb, so by the time they’re born they’re already on the way to needing a manicure. This trimmer was a Godsend for filing our son’s nails down without having to worry about cutting him. It comes with different attachments depending on how old your baby is – and we liked it so much we bought a second one to live in his diaper bag for car travel.

Activity gym: This is another purchase that you really could get anywhere - this is the one we used (I loved how it looked and my son was obsessed with the mobile objects), but regardless of which one you get, you’re likely to use it a lot. It was great for tummy time (the moon-shaped pillow it comes with is also a great way to help prop them up as they’re getting used to lifting their head on their own), and we used it all the way up until our son was crawling.

For the Bathroom

Baby bathtub: Most of the ones on the market will work, so this was a purchase we didn’t spend a ton on (we went with this one).

Baby bath kneeler and elbow rest: Your knees and elbows will thank you for this one, from when they’re small to when they get bigger and are spending more time playing in the bath.

Baby bath wash: We’ve been using the Honest Company brand since our son was a newborn, and we still use it now! We also use this lotion from a Black-owned company that I love – my son’s had some dry skin periods here and there, but as long as we’ve been using this his skin has been locking in moisture a lot better.

Baby bath towel: In the first six months, getting infants in and out of the bath can be a lot (plenty of babies don’t like the bath at first), so having a towel like this can be helpful for keeping them comfortable.

Next up in this series: nursery and diapering essentials!

The Baby Products I Used the Most for 0-12 Months – Feeding Edition

When you’re preparing for a new baby, it feels like there’s a shopping list a mile long — and every store aisle is screaming “You must have this.” After going through it myself, I realized that a few simple items became lifesavers I reached for every single day. To save you time, money, and storage space, I’m sharing the baby products I actually used the most: the ones that earned their spot in my home, and that I would 100% buy again.  

I’ll start this series off with feeding essentials, followed by additional lists for diapering, home essentials, and travel favorites.

For Everyone

High chair: There are lots of options out there for high chairs, and anything that’s safe and comfortable enough for your baby should be just fine. In our case, we wanted one that would be versatile but also a little more aesthetic (since it’ll be a fixture in our dining area for actual years) – so we went with the Joie Chai chair. It’s on the pricier end, but this one is still less expensive than the Graco version that looks pretty similar. We’ve used it every day since our son was old enough to sit up in it, and even though it’s gotten a lot of wear, it still looks great.

Burp cloths: Trust and believe me when I say that you’re going to go through these like crazy in the first six months, so I recommend getting yourself a few packs of them so you always have clean ones handy. The muslin ones are soft to the touch, but they also wash well and you can get a lot of wear out of them. I also recommend getting them in a darker color so stains aren’t as visible as they can be on white or pastel-colored ones.

Bibs: When your child is a few weeks or months old, cloth bibs are generally a good idea – and when they’re teething, it can even be a good idea to just have one handy for your child even when they’re not eating. Once they’re old enough to start trying food, I highly recommend the softer silicon bibs like these. I learned the hard way that they’re usually a lot more comfortable for babies than the harder, less flexible plastic ones (my son hated those, and he’s not the only baby I’ve met who didn’t like them). 

For Formula and Bottle Feeding

Dr. Brown bottles: My son was born with both a lip tie and a tongue tie, so feeding was a challenge in the beginning – even with bottles. This brand was recommended to me by a friend, and these bottles really helped him because of the flow control. They also help prevent air bubbles, which help reduce gas build-up as your baby’s eating – something that’s important for every baby, whether they have feeding issues or not. These worked well enough that we continued using them until we weaned him off bottles entirely.

Tommee Tippee Bottles: Same as the above, these bottles were helpful for helping control the flow as he ate, especially in the early days when he was adjusting to a bottle. I loved these just as much as the Dr. Brown ones.

For Breastfeeding

In addition to your pump, here are a few more things you’ll need.

Nursing pillow: I got the Boppy breastfeeding pillow as a registry gift, but the My Brest Friend was so much better for my (short) breastfeeding journey. The fact that it lays flat and also straps around your body made it a lot more comfortable for me and my son.

Nipple cream: I went through three containers of this cream in the three months that I breastfed and pumped. It’s gentle and saved my life particularly in the early days of breastfeeding. It’s non-GMO Project Verified, so you don’t need to wash it off before nursing or pumping.

Milk storage bags: I used these milk storage bags on the occasions that I had enough milk to put away. They’re great for the freezer because you can lay them flat, so they’re easy to store in smaller amounts.

Fall Activities for Babies and Toddlers (That Won’t Leave You Exhausted)

Fall is lots of fun with little ones, but when they’re under three, a trip to a pumpkin patch or a fall festival may not be as engaging for them. Here are a few ideas for activities that we’ve done with our son.

Make a leaf sensory bin. Collect leaves, acorns, and pinecones on a walk and let your baby explore the textures safely.

Bake something simple together. A boxed muffin mix or pre-made dough can be a fun way to let your little one help you in the kitchen!

Plan a cozy story afternoon. Build a pillow fort, grab some fall-themed books, and sip warm cider together. This is a good one for rainy fall afternoons when the playground isn’t happening.

Do a fall nature walk. Narrate what you see, hear, and smell. For babies and toddlers, every crunchy leaf is an adventure.

The Baby Products I Didn’t Need

The Wall Street Journal has been publishing a series of articles this week on the cost of childcare, and yesterday's article on how new parents spend their money was especially interesting if you're in - or approaching - that phase of your life.

Having kids has always been expensive, but when you're in the process of preparing for your first child, the never-ending list of perceived "must-haves" can be pretty overwhelming. There were plenty of things my husband and I purchased that we either didn't use much or didn't use at all in the first year of our son's life. 

So for everyone who's doing this for the first time, here's a list of everything I didn't use much, in case it helps you to make some of those purchasing decisions!

Baby-wearing gear: I know this is a popular item on a lot of registries, and I had it on my registry too - and then we realized in the first few weeks and months of our son's life that he absolutely hated it. In our case, this probably had to do with the tightness he was carrying in his body for the first few months (he had some feeding issues and we had the help of a physical therapist help him resolve some of the discomfort), but even after he was in better shape, he never really took to baby wearing. So on this purchase, like much of this list, this might be a purchase you hold off on until a week or two in, when you have a better gauge on your baby's preferences.

Baby bouncers: This was another one that our son just didn't like. Fortunately, we bought a bouncer on the lower end of the cost spectrum (no UPPAbaby for us in this case), so when we found out that our son really didn't like it, we didn't feel as bad about how much we spent on it. For this item, I'd recommend taking a similar route - trying a less expensive (but still safe) option first, and seeing if your baby takes to it before investing in something pricier. Pro tip: while bouncers can be great to keep them occupied, mats with mobiles above them are another good option - and once they're ready for tummy time, you can use the mat for that as well. 

Bottle warmer: My son was combo-fed pretty much since he was born because he had a poor latch, so he got used to drinking cold formula pretty quickly - and that came in handy when we started to prep formula bottles and keep them in a fridge in his room for middle-of-the-night feedings. That might be why he wasn't that picky about temperature - so we almost never used our bottle warmer. That said, if you're breastfeeding exclusively or even often, it might be worth buying. 

Next up, I’ll put together a list of the products that I used the most!

The Working Mom’s Guide to Establishing Routines with Your Baby

When you’re a working mom, your time becomes your most precious resource—and building a flexible daily routine can help your days to feel more grounded and less chaotic. These are a few things I tried in the early days of my son’s life to make space for meaningful connection with my family on a regular basis.

Morning Matters.
Whether you're heading to daycare drop-off or working from home, mornings set the tone. You can try waking up 30 minutes or an hour before your baby (if possible) for a quiet moment to breathe, prep, or caffeinate. Baby’s morning routine should be simple: diaper, feed, cuddle, and a short play session.

Daytime Rhythms.
If your baby’s at daycare, you can coordinate with caregivers to understand nap and feeding schedules. If you're home with baby for part of the day, try to stick to consistent rhythms. Anchoring your day with consistent wake, nap, and feeding times provides predictability for everyone.

Evening Connection.
Evenings are gold. Focus on small moments of connection—reading a book, bathtime giggles, or 10 minutes of undistracted play. Create a wind-down routine that signals sleep, but also lets you soak in the magic of your little one.

Make Room for Grace.
Not every day will go according to plan, and that’s okay. Routines are here to serve you, not trap you. Adjust as needed—and remember that love and presence matter more than perfection.

Bonding with Baby After Work (Even When I’m Exhausted)

Switching from work mode to mom mode isn’t easy - after a full day of my corporate job, it can be hard to feel like I have adequate energy to be fully “on” for my toddler. But even when you're running on fumes, there are small, meaningful ways to reconnect with your baby after work

Try These:

• A 10-minute walk outside with your baby (baby-wearing when they’re small enough can add an extra layer of connection)

• Reading a short book together

• Singing during diaper changes or bathtime

• Baby massage before bed

Tip: If you can, try to turn off distractions around you. Some days, just 15 minutes of focused connection can be just what me and my baby need.