Baby products I would actually recommend to a friend
The most dependable, restocked, or otherwise noteworthy items from the first two years.
My Favorites lists are earnestly annotated, regularly updated, and free of affiliate links1. I only include products I’ve personally used at length and found worthy to recommend.
My philosophy for baby gear shopping is: you don’t need everything, you don’t even know if anything will work for your particular baby. But! It’s good to be aware of promising options for when the need or occasion arises. So this list is me sharing all of my tried-and-trues, from essentials to just for fun.
Ok, here we go!
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Clothing & Accessories
⭐ Tip: Everyone told me this and it’s really true: Don’t go crazy buying clothes for the early months. I was very excited about exploring baby brands, but they grow so fast the first 9 months, it’s quite sad how quickly things become too small. Embrace hand-me-down offers—we’re so thankful for our bajillion secondhand Gerber footed PJs…those were the real MVPs, especially when baby was little enough to just live in them all day. Also, less clothes means less stuff to wash, organize, and declutter, right? I think simple, mix-and-matchable uniform dressing makes a lot of sense for babies… and overwhelmed parents. For example, “bodysuit + shorts/leggings” for warmer months, “long sleeve bodysuit + crew neck sweatshirt + sweatpants” for cooler months). See some of my favorites for these “uniforms” below.
Gap organic cotton footed PJs—great for longer torso/shorter legs.
Gerber footed PJs—great for shorter arms.
Carter’s zip PJs — short sleeve, long sleeve, footed, footless…these go up to size 5T!
HonestBaby organic cotton joggers—love the roomy bum area, tight-fitting legs.
L.L. Bean bear ear fleece jacket—sooo cuddly and cute.
Love to Dream arms up swaddles—after trying a bunch of swaddles, I think this is truly the easiest to put on.
Woolino sleep sack—started using these around 5 months, still going at 21 months…got two and just alternate/have one as backup.
Feeding
⭐ Tip: Don’t stress out if something isn’t working well with your kid—that’s just how it is sometimes. Prime examples of this: swaddles, baby carriers, and straw cups. Personally, I have found that there is no perfect straw cup—there’s just a cobbled together system of cups that get the various feeding jobs done. So none of the straw cups I’m recommending below are “perfect”, but they are noteworthy for one reason or other and may be worth trying.
Moonkie silicone containers— first started using these to serve oatmeal, then to send steamed veggies to daycare, and now for portioning pesto to freeze. Love that there are measurement markings!
Munchkin weighted straw cup—possibly the only straw cup with just 3 parts and does a decent job.
Munchkin ‘Simple Clean’ cup—Munchkin cup innovations, part 2. The straw here actually splits open for complete cleaning.
Zak toddler cups—big size, relatively easy to dissemble/wash.
Thermos straw cup—durable!
Baby Brezza dryer/sterilizer—big capacity, worth it for the drying function alone.
Joseph Joseph basin—makes my bottle washing routine feel cleaner, neater.
Clear bins with handles—pretty clutch for bringing a “formula making kit” (formula, water, bottles) upstairs every night and then everyone’s bottles and cups back down in the morning. Now I use them to store toys!
Diapering, Bathing & Wellness
Pottery Barn animal hooded towel—so cute and a larger size.
NeilMed nose aspirator—I don’t know when they started selling these bulbs that can open up but it just makes so much more sense.
Boogie saline nose wipes—I’m turned off by many scented products but I actually love this one.
Oogiebear—what you see is what you get and it works.
Toys & Play
⭐ Tip: To Lovevery or not to Lovevery… long story short, I decided against it and have no regrets. The one factor I somehow didn’t even think about when debating this question: where would we store everything? One of the main selling points of Lovevery is that you won’t have to spend time figuring out the perfect toys at every age. But at the end of the day, I decided it’s not that serious. In the first year, I took a look at some of their sets as inspiration, and found a couple of similar toys. I stopped making it a point to buy toys regularly toward the end of the first year, because she can play with more regular household stuff, loves books, and receives toys as gifts from family/friends.]
’Hide & Squeak’ eggs—bonus points for being therapeutic to put away at night.
Farm animal jumbo puzzle—the big knobs are so satisfying.
Smartpad—a simpler and less expensive alternative to the Toniebox and Yoto.
Jazzy saxophone—very elegantly packs in sounds, colors, numbers; the same cannot be said for many other electronic toys.
Stickers! (Christmas edition!)—they tear easily and are not very reusable but there are millions of them so the book lasts long and you feel rich.
Elmo!!!— the “cost per wear” on this is 0 ;)
Books
Giraffes Can’t Dance—one of the best in terms of narrative arc and rhyming.
Blown Away—also fun rhyming and something a little different.
The Going to Bed Book—perfect length for one very last book and then actually going to bed 🫰
Furniture
⭐ Tip: The short of it is, like I discussed in a previous post, go with what makes sense for your space/routine, not what looks like must-haves on Instagram. I suppose this applies to everything…
Toddler toy/bookshelf—nice size, rounded corners.
Nestig convertible Wave crib—beautiful, nice quality, the wheels are a gamechanger.
Alzip playmat—worth it!!
Delta dresser/changing table top—more petite-friendly than others, a nice medium-sized option.
Travel & On the Go
Bugaboo Butterfly—easy, breezy, truly fits in overhead bins.
Munchkin disposable pads—good size, good quality, versatile.
Philips Avent formula dispenser—so glad this exists, made me feel much better about feeding on cross-country flights.
Daycare
⭐ Tip: This is not necessarily a shopping tip but one of my favorite pieces of baby advice was to put spare clothes in a gallon ziploc bag so it's ready for putting soiled clothes back in. It sounds so simple, but I hadn’t thought of it until I saw it on Reddit. This is my spare clothes system for both daycare and the diaper bag.
Colorful painter’s tape—for general labeling
Lalo stainless steel lunchbox—”unibody” design (no seams!); tip: it’s way lighter and less to clean without the bottom silicone cover.
PlanetBox snack container—the compartments are really useful.
Burts Bee sleep sacks—lots of sizes, designs, levels of thickness for a good price.
And that’s all I got for now!
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Previously
My link "policy" continued… I use the link/store where I actually got the item from. If the item is no longer being sold there, I link where I personally would most likely buy it from. Also, I actually manually get rid of any tracking codes at all to share the experience of a totally clean URL 😎