5 Parenting Tips I Wish I Had Figured Out Sooner
Brooklyn and her tattoo at the Monterey Bay Aquarium a few months ago.
There's a reason that there are thousands of published books on the topic of parenting. It's a complex undertaking that's different for each of us based on our style and the specific kids we have in our lives. The logistics alone are daunting.
Even with some incredible friends to model parenting for me before we had kids of our own, and all of the things I learned before my first was born in books and on the internet, there are many things I would have liked to have known about much sooner in my parenting journey. Today I'll share 5 of them.
Temporary Tattoos. Now that we have two kids and my daughter is old enough to be more independent, the number of times we have stopped to ask, "Where's Brooklyn?!" when we're out in public is much higher than I'd like to admit. Staying inside with kids all weekend is not an option for us (we will all lose our minds), so we choose to get out into the world. That often means navigating crowds. Enter kid-friendly temporary tattoos with our phone number on them: Safety Tats. We put one on Brooklyn just about every weekend. It stays on her well, and we feel just a little better than if she were to get out of our sight, someone could help get her back to us much more easily than without them. We keep a baggie of them in our diaper bag. They're easy to apply out in the world - we just pour some water on a baby wipe and 30 seconds later, she's tatted up for the next few days. They come off easily when we're ready by just rubbing with our fingers or a washcloth in the bathtub. I didn't see any coupon codes to share, so I asked and the team at Safety Tat let me know that anyone reading this can use code "safetyjess" until September 16 to get 10% off! Not bad. See Brooklyn rocking her tattoo in the picture to the right.
Gym Childcare. Finding time to workout is hard when you're a parent. It took me way longer than ideal to start getting a system down for working a gym with childcare into my week. I recently switched gyms, in fact, to move to one with a better childcare situation (we are now members at the Downtown Oakland YMCA). This morning, Jon and I took both kids to the gym with us. We walked the track together as some easy exercise (which also gave us a chance to talk to each other uninterrupted - a rare luxury) while the kids played with other kids in a room full of fun toys. For the last 9 months, I've been pretty consistent with picking kids up one day a week from preschool and daycare and driving us to the gym. They eat sandwiches and fruit that I've packed for them for dinner, do some playing and coloring and sometimes watch a Disney movie while I get in a workout and a shower. Meanwhile, Jon has those few hours off on one night per week where he can go for a run, catch up on his work, or do house-related tasks that need to get done. I highly recommending finding a gym that offers a kids' program and letting your kids enjoy some time to play while you get some time to take care of yourself.
A Great Diaper Bag Organization System. It was only 8 months ago that I found out about sugarSNAP organizer insert bags for your diaper bag. The concept of bags within bags is not new to me, but these particular bags are fantastic for a diaper bag. They are quality zipper bags marked with things like "Dipes and Wipes" and "Lotions and Potions". Now that we have our diaper bag organized better inside, I spend much less time digging around the bag to find the thing for which I'm looking. I wish I had known about these when my first was born.
Backpack Diaper Bag. I picked out a cute diaper bag for my baby registry with my first, and it was OK. In practice, it always felt like it was overflowing and the design meant that I had to take everything out to get to something at the bottom. I tried the one that we were given at the hospital. It was better (a messenger bag style), but still less than ideal. I finally started paying attention to what the smartest parents I knew were doing and noticed that they had all moved into backpack diaper bags. Boom. I've never gone back. We are currently using a free backpack I got at a work conference (#Dreamforce), but there are lots of great ones available on the internet. SweetHome (my fave review site) says that this one is the best diaper bag backpack, but it's pricey. Could be worth it if you have years of diaper bagging-it ahead of you. Some friends of mine use a very affordable backpack meant for a DSLR camera and it works great for them.
Membership Card Wallet. Even before we were parents we had various loyalty and membership cards, but since we've had kids the quantity has ballooned. Zoo membership. Fairyland membership. Zoo ride tickets. Picture People membership. The list goes on. It required a lot of mental energy to make sure that we had the right cards with us for the right outings, so we had to improve our system. I picked up a cheap ($6) card wallet and we consolidated everything into it. It lives in our glove compartment, so that if our car is with us, so are our membership cards. It has saved us many times when we would have otherwise not had what we needed with the right parent at the right activity.
What did you wish you had known long before you learned it as a parent? Tell us in the comments!
