Our Baby Shower — Friends

Sleeps right up against our bed with one side dropped, so he is close enough to reach in the night without either of us properly getting up. The first few months happen here.

The workhorse of the entire list. Swaddle, burp cloth, pram shade, sun cover, changing mat on somebody else's floor. Four is not too many.

Tightly woven cotton, which holds a swaddle without working loose the way muslin does. Newborns startle themselves awake, and being wrapped firmly is what stops it.

A padded nest that gives him the snug edges of being held while he naps in the day, and moves from room to room with us. For supervised naps, so it never replaces the crib.

Handwoven in the Klein Karoo. This one is for the photographs and for keeping, not for the burp cloth pile.

For expressed milk, so feeding is not only ever mama's job. Even when breastfeeding goes perfectly, a bottle is what lets somebody else help at 2am.

Lets mama build up a small store of milk so someone else can take a feed and she can sleep more than three hours in a row. Probably the single biggest difference to how the first months actually feel.

Pre-sterilised, lie flat, and stack once frozen. These are what make pumping worth the effort, instead of a fridge full of half-used bottles.

Worn almost constantly for months, and feeding one-handed at 3am only works if it opens one-handed too. Two, so one can always be in the wash.

The rigid ones for the fridge, for milk that gets used within a day or two rather than frozen. Easier to wash than bags and they do not tip over.

Disposable, but bamboo rather than plastic. For travelling, for night-time, and for the weeks when nobody has the energy to run a wash cycle.

A wipeable padded mat so nappy changes happen in one dedicated place instead of on whatever surface is nearest. Sounds minor, saves the bedding.

The reusable system, which pays for itself several times over and keeps a startling amount of plastic out of the bin. This is what we plan to use day to day.

The bag that quietly becomes mama's handbag for the next two years. It needs to hold nappies, wipes, a change of clothes and a bottle, and still be something she wants to carry.

A small tub that props him at the right angle, so bathing a very slippery newborn takes one person instead of two.

Hooded so his head is covered and warm the second he comes out. Two, because one of them is always still damp.

For the first fever, which always arrives at night. Having a reliable one already in the drawer is the difference between a calm phone call and a panicked drive.

For much later on, but it is on the list because we would rather be given it than remember to buy it. Low enough that he can get on and off it himself.

They come off constantly and disappear in the wash. Five pairs is a starting position, not an extravagance.

A soft beanie for the first weeks, when he cannot hold his own temperature yet, and a proper wide-brimmed sun hat for a South African summer.

Non-negotiable: the hospital will not let us drive him home without one. An infant seat that clicks into a base, so he is not woken up every single time we arrive somewhere.

Ideally one the car seat clicks straight onto, so a sleeping baby goes from car to pram without waking up. Worth a word with whoever takes the car seat so the two match.

Keeps him against a chest and leaves two hands free, which is how anything else in the day gets done. Any of these styles works, so pick whichever you find at a good price.

Someone whose entire job is looking after mama in the first weeks. She cooks a proper meal every few days, holds the baby while mama showers or sleeps, and knows what is normal so we are not guessing at 4am. It means dad can go back to work and come home to a household that is coping, and it means mama is not doing the hardest part of this on her own. One pot, shared across both showers — if you would like to put something toward a single thing on this list, we would quietly ask for it to be this one.

Somewhere for all of the above to actually live. With the changing mat on top it doubles as the changing table, which saves buying a second piece of furniture.