Layette for a toddler – things that are also useful when traveling!

You can find dozens of articles on the Internet about completing a layette for a toddler. And we’ll limit ourselves to just a few layette items that worked well for us at the beginning of our journey together as a family of four, and are perfect for travel.

With the first child, it is difficult to complete a layette. From everywhere we are attacked by advertisements, recommendations and advice on what should necessarily be included in our new life, so that it looks straight out of the most beautiful pictures from Instagram, showing beautiful, trouble-free motherhood (you know it? Smiling children and moms, coffee with a book, everything cleaned up around, a fancy dinner every day). On top of that, preferably everything should be designer, wooden, eco-friendly….

With a second child it’s definitely easier, because real life has already verified once what is really worth buying and what is essential (and besides, we already have most of the stuff!). Of course, every child is different and something that worked with the first will not always pass the test with the second, but this is true for few aspects of infant life.

We have already written about what turned out to be completely unnecessary in our case here. And today, we come to you with new tips, this time, what worked for us at the beginning of the journey with a second baby on board. And you may be in for a few surprises here, as you will probably find some contradictions with what we wrote in the aforementioned post and what we recommended earlier, but as we mentioned, every child has different needs, and we also already approach certain aspects differently.

Of course, we focus on things that come in handy when traveling, but we also use them in everyday life. And yes, some of them we got for free to test, some of them we bought, and some of them we made ourselves and cost us pennies! Nevertheless, we have selected only what is really useful and worthy of recommendation.

Lassig bag

Well, that’s it – this is one of the contradictions we wrote about above ;) In an earlier post we advised against buying a bag, or a bagbo-backpack, but only a cow doesn’t change its mind. Well, it turns out that with two, however, versatility comes in handy :)

How did we get to this point? It started with the purchase of a stroller extension (in panda, of course!), and since it worked great we also bought an extension for our Yoyo stroller. Unfortunately, with a delivery, no more stroller bag is right so the question is what to do with a rather large bag that does not always fit into the stroller basket. With help comes just the bag we write about below.

In everyday life we can have it on the handle of the stroller, and whenever Olive wants to go on the delivery, we make it a backpack. Anyway, there are many other situations when such a solution comes in handy – such as when we have to leave the stroller somewhere, climb some stairs, or even when carrying in a sling and carrier, a backpack is much more convenient than a bag.

The bag we’ve been using recently is from Lassig, and it’s actually a bagbo-backpack, although we can’t judge whether we carry it more often as a bag or a backpack. And it turns out to be a great solution, especially with two children. We are able to pack all of us (all four of us!) into this one bag, which we hang on the stroller and, if necessary, carry on our backs (the color and cut is universal enough for everyone to carry). It is also versatile in terms of style – it goes well with both sporty and elegant outfits (this is more for everyday life than for travel ;) ).

The Lassig bagbo-backpack is quite durable, you can pack a lot of stuff inside, and neither the shoulders nor the strap wear out or deform (we use it briefly, but very intensively). He has already survived a lot of sand, some rain with us and is all right.

In the bag, it comes with a bottle cover, a changing mat, an organizer for small items or jars that can be unzipped, and a small cosmetic bag. For this we get a long strap and cart attachments.

So far it works great for us :) We finally stopped forever repacking children’s things from bags to backpacks and vice versa. We simply have one bag that we take with us whenever and wherever we go.

You can read more about the bag on the manufacturer’s website. For purchase, for example, here.

Hugs

Honestly, you can forgive yourself buying mascots and cuddly toys for the very beginning. Seriously, it is not needed, the child sees little anyway (in the beginning, children see only strong contrasts, and the best will be white and black elements, but about that below), let alone talk about play. What’s more, he won’t grab anything in his hands, he won’t play, but there is one aspect you can take into account if you absolutely want to buy something already – the smell of mom. Young children have a much more acute sense of smell than sight and such a cuddly toy or mascot will be more reassuring if it smells like mommy :)

So we decided to see if this patent would work.

The arrival of a toddler is a big change in the life of a family. Also for older siblings. From the very beginning, we prepared Olive for the little baby boy who was about to come home. We wanted an older sister to give the toddler a gift, and we didn’t want another teddy bear or rattle. So we thought of such a small cuddly toy, which doesn’t take up much space and has contrasting colors.

We jointly chose a bunny from SIGIKID. The cuddly toy is very nice to the touch and has no rustling materials inside (we were annoyed by the sound). Plus, it has contrasting red and white stripes to hang your eye on. We like it, and Philip is more and more eager to “go towards it” ;)

And that’s where we ended up picking toys for our Junior. We already got a lot from family and friends, we got a lot from Olive…. and we still think it is way too much :)

You can buy the cuddly bunny from the photos here.

Wrapping

Hugs are also for sleeping, and if sleeping, so is wrapping. And here is the conundrum – to wrap the baby or not? On the Internet you will find various terms: wrapping, wrapping, swaddling, shrouding…. the idea is to wrap the baby quite tightly for the first few weeks of life. This is very common, babies immediately after birth are often wrapped by medical personnel – this is supposed to help them adapt to new living conditions, calm them down, and it is also said to help with colic.

In Olive’s case it worked very well. Wrapping helped and calmed us down, although we never complained about nights full of crying. Somehow we were taught this in birthing school, then in the hospital, and it continued to go quite well. We used thin blankets and large bamboo tetras for wrapping.

The second time, we also set our sights on wrapping, and this time we decided to test the wrapper GRO Company and it turned out that Philip is not at all fond of wrapping ;) Fortunately, nothing is lost, because the wrap is universal and also has the function of a sleeping bag – it has snaps on the shoulders, which you unfasten and pull the handles through them. In our case, it worked much better in this option. This wrap is also simpler and faster than using blankets and tetras. So if you want to buy something to wrap, we can recommend you GRO Company, because even if it does not work as a wrap, you will benefit from a sleeping bag ;)

And, there are weight restrictions on the wraps and ours is up to 5.5 kg, but we still use the sleeping bag even though that weight is far behind us ;)

You can read more about the lagger at grocompany.co.uk, and those eager to buy are referred, for example, here.

Contrasts

Anything with contrast works great! We have special contrast books and cards, which we increasingly spread around and show Philip. They are great, durable and compact so you can take them on the road.

At one time we were also looking for a crib carousel that would interest a toddler from the first months, and since we couldn’t find anything like that, we made a black and white version ourselves. All we had to do was buy a used carousel on OLX, cut off the beautiful teddy bears in neutral colors and attach the previously prepared pieces of felt instead. See the effect for yourself:

Is it possible to take it on the road? If you drive a car then yes, and even if you don’t, it’s a good idea to mount the squares in such a way that they can be easily untied and hooked up, for example, to the frame of a car seat or next to a stroller. We use ordinary ribbons, you just have to be careful not to tie too strong knots :D

Hygiene and health

Completing hygiene accessories can be a torment ;-) We, fortunately, have most of the things at home, it was enough to clean them properly.

However, if you want to complete such a set easily, then ready-made makeup bags with baby care accessories come to the rescue. We were particularly captivated by the Beaba company, because it has a toiletry bag ideal for traveling families, namely one with a hook that can be hung anywhere…. seemingly a cliché, but believe us, there is still a shortage of places in hotel bathrooms to lay out toiletries (and even more so for a family of four ;) ). On top of that, it is safer to hang the cosmetic bag higher, out of reach of little hands.

Even before the kids came along, we bought a folding, hanging makeup bag for us, which was heavily discounted. The floral design didn’t convince us at all, but it was about something practical. And so it has stayed with us to this day and we always take it on our travels.

The one we show is a good addition, because it has special rubber bands for small accessories (such as scissors, clippers, thermometer), so it goes to keep everything in order. Included are. thermometers (for body and water), a file, scissors, a brush, a finger cap for brushing teeth, but let’s not hide, you don’t need to take everything with you when you travel ;-) So, in the kit we have everything we need for hygiene, plus a practical cosmetic bag.

Let’s stop for a moment at the small nose aspirator. We showed it recently on our stories and several people were very interested in it, so we are rushing with information. It is also made by Beaba and fits in a cosmetic bag.

In the early days of our travels with the baby, we took the famous gruel with us (just in case), but you know how effective it is ;) It was ok, until the first decent runny nose came and we bought the famous Katarek connected to the vacuum cleaner. He was able to handle it, but let’s not kid ourselves, it’s not a good solution for traveling. It’s not even about combining with a vacuum cleaner anymore, but even cleaning. The Beaba electric aspirator is definitely a better option for travel. The power is really decent, there are fewer parts to clean, and there are several tips included so it’s also useful for an older child.

So far it works great for us and we recommend it!

You can read more about Beaba products on the manufacturer’s website: Beaba.pl

The aspirator can be purchased, for example, here, and the cosmetic bag here.

Carrycot for stroller

Our small and handy stroller has already been praised to the skies many times. The Babyzen Yoyo is the perfect stroller for traveling parents because it takes up little space, fits as a carry-on stroller, is sturdy, and has quite a large basket for its size. We have had it so far in the stroller version, which is for children already sitting up on their own.

When we already knew that there would be another little traveler in the world, we began to wonder how we would organize ourselves, how we would travel, after all, with two strollers it would be difficult.

So we came up with an idea: we bought a carrycot and an accessory for Yoyo :) We just happened to come across a promotion in Empik’s online store and bought the whole set right away, with the assumption that both the Yoyo stroller itself and the accessories lose little value, so if it doesn’t work out, we’ll resell it.

But it works great! Yoyo in the carrycot version is still a small, maneuverable and handy stroller. It takes up very little space, so even for weekend trips we’d sooner pack it than our long-deserted, big off-road Hartan. We even use the Yoyo on a daily basis, as it’s faster to unpack it under the store and easier to maneuver it between tight alleys.

The add-on is another successful purchase. This dedicated one for Yoyo allows the elderly to both stand and sit. Attaching it does not affect the maneuverability of the stroller, and we emphasize this because the universal extension we have with the Hartan makes the stroller heavily lose its maneuverability and the ride is no longer as enjoyable as it once was.

Sling

That is, since we are at the movement, the sling can not be missing! With the arrival of our little one in the world, we were happy and excited to return to slinging!

Already more experienced and seasoned, we started slinging from the first days of Philip’s life. Initially for a short time in a ring sling, and now we are carrying full steam in a beautiful sling from Tula.

We chose a woven sling, Surf Tourmaline pattern, 4.6 meters long (size 6), because we wanted both of us to be able to tie it easily. I only needed to use it two-three times and it became soft, and tightening it does not cause any problem.

We have written about the advantages of carrying in a sling and then in a carrier many times before, and each time we will strongly recommend that there is a place for a sling in your layette!

Summary

Are all these things needed? No, this is not a necessary accessory for a newborn layette, but only our ideas and recommendations that will make not only traveling together easier :)

On this topic, we also recommend our previous texts:

• How to pack for a trip with a small child?
• Toys for young children for a long journey

And for you, what worked especially well in completing the layette, and what turned out to be a complete misfire? Let us know in the comments! :)