My Unconventional List of Baby Supplies

My nephew, Jordan, at three months old,
gazing at a contrast board

Do you know what was the first baby thing I went out and bought when I found out I was pregnant?

Two large pieces of white foam board and a half dozen pieces of black poster board.

If you're a Doman parent you know exactly what I'm talking about.

If you're not I will just leave it as an inside joke for the moment. (hint: it has to do with the above picture)

Fast forward almost two months later, and I have finally finished scanning through my copy of How Smart is Your Baby? [the answer: very] I now have a shopping list of things to buy, make, or collect in preparation for baby's arrival.

The aforementioned Doman book is all about creating the ideal growth and development environment for your baby that helps them instead of hinders them. It is about intentional infant parenting practices, that recognize how to brain grows and caters to those ways on purpose rather than letting it happen by chance.

So, as such, my list of "baby supplies" includes strange things like black and white patterns for visual stimulation, a homemade crawling track, which is an ideal environment for tummy time and newborn mobility, a flashlight for developing pupil constrictions, and a wooden dowel for enforcing and growing the grasp reflex.

But, hey, what's wrong with a little unconventional?

So, my "nesting instinct" is filling my home with things like black, white, and brightly-colored poster board, large pictures, sound-making objects such as a xylophone and a triangle, grasping objects, fabrics of various textures, and flashlights.

I'm also working on making (some of) my own baby equipment. Instead of an exersaucer, bouncy seat, jumper, swing, play yard, walker, bassinette, and all the multiple other things that we contrive to contain babies in their pre-walking stage, we are going to simply have a (homemade) crawling track. And a floor. Much cheaper, and much better for baby's development. We might also have a sling for when the baby is being held.

For the bed, baby will most likely sleep with us (or sleep in the crawling track next to us) for the first couple months. Then I am thinking about devising some sort of Montessori floor bed with a mini brachiation ladder over it, for when the baby is a bit older, like we had here. Again, a little unconventional. But that's ok.

I'm actually really excited. About the new possibilities. The new understanding. The new adventure.

So, here's to the unconventional. 

Which just may be the new normal in 50 years.

"For the LORD giveth wisdom: out of his mouth cometh knowledge and understanding."

Proverbs 2:6

Baby #2 is 11 weeks, 1 day gestation