This post was made in collaboration with Chase Freedom Unlimited. All of the opinions are my own and the project costs were not paid for or provided by any brand mentioned.

Well, last month we reached the end of our journey! And with that, our entire baby checklist was complete. It was so great partnering with Chase on this project – I can’t tell you how nice it is knowing every one of these expenses and purchases made throughout the process earned us 1.5% cash back since we used our Chase Freedom Unlimited card. This cash back will definitely come in handy for things like diapers, wipes, and formula after the baby arrives.  I remember in my early twenties I was using a debit card for everything and let me tell you… money wasted. Why not earn when you spend if you can? Just be sure to make purchases within your budget and pay that balance off every month and I’m telling you, a cash back credit card is the way to go.

The last item on our to do list was actually a bunch of little items and purchases… all the final touches to get our home ready and make our lives a bit easier as we transitioned from one to two little nuggets and traversed the newborn journey again.

If you want to refresh, I shared the full to do list here.

And now… the final items…

 

1. The Great Bassinet Debate

You may recall a while back I shared that I was really struggling with what bassinet to get for Charlie. Well, we ultimately settled on renting the Snoo bassinet. It arrived – I planned delivery a couple of weeks ahead in case he was early like Henry was – and Dan and I just had to laugh at what an absurd upgrade it was from what we used with Henry… with Henry, at first we used the bassinet attachment with his pack-n-play… which totally worked but it had to be quite far from our bed because it couldn’t fit next to it. Not the best-looking thing to add to our bedroom and was quite large. But then it almost got worse. We then used a different bassinet (which was great) but instead of buying the $200 stand that came with it, we literally had it plopped on a bench pulled up next to our bed. Like a giant upholstered bench. Insert hand-to-forehead emoji here. But hey – it worked for the few months we needed it!

Charlie however has been using this uber fancy bassinet… and because it’s rented it will end up costing us about what the price of the bassinets I was looking to buy would be. And then we return it when it’s done.

When I wrote this before Charlie was born, I had said: ten bucks says Henry will be the better sleeper and this won’t work (haha) but I heard too many amazing things about it from y’all on Instagram, and at this point, sign me up for anything that might help getting our baby sleeping early on! This fits perfectly in the corner of our room or next to our bed, so it really worked out great.

Now that Charlie is four weeks old, I can attest: that prediction was accurate. Charlie is not a fan and almost gets more upset as the settings increase to calm him. I’ve been DMing with some of you who swear by it asking for tips, so we are going to keep trying for another week or two but if nothing changes, it’s going back and we’ll just use the basket we have in our family room.

We are implementing everything we learned from the Taking Cara Babies newborn course which worked wonders for Henry – but even those aren’t working great. Charlie just doesn’t love being laid down; he wants to be held or worn and requires VERY loud white noise like our oven exhaust fan.

As I mentioned above, we also have the Moses basket and stand which currently lives in our family room but he has slept better in this so it might be moving up to our room soon.

 

2. Changing Stations EVERYWHERE

Another thing I was sure to set up were changing stations everywhere. I had VERY little mobility the first two weeks at home and with two floors in the house, it was important I make life as easy as possible. Enter: changing stations everywhere. I’m talking in our bedroom where he’ll sleep, in his room, and in the kitchen on the first floor. Running up and downstairs to grab diapers? No one has time for that.

I bought these little baskets on sale at Container Store and filled them with newborn diapers, wipes, diaper rash cream, an extra changing pad cover, and an extra onesie for messy accidents – all the essentials.

Oh in the photo above you’ll also see the travel Blackout Curtain we use in Henry’s room; I bought an extra to put up in our room since it gets really bright and for travel purposes!

 

3. Post-partum Station for Mom Upstairs and Downstairs

Post-partum recovery is no joke. C-section recovery is no joke. I stocked baskets in both our master bathroom and first floor bathroom with all of the things I relied on the first time around… pads, nipple gel soothers, my favorite post-partum mesh underwear that sits nice and high above my incision, and lovely Tuck pads and Preparation H pads. Motherhood… ain’t it glamorous?

 

4. Meal Delivery

Back when Henry was really getting into eating solids we used a baby meal delivery service called Nurture Life. Well – I restarted our subscription which started arriving a couple of weeks ago and MAN what a game changer. Henry usually eats at 5:30 so RIGHT after we stop working and having his dinner ready was really becoming a struggle. I cannot recommend this enough for busy working parents.

I ALSO signed Dan and I up for meal delivery with two different companies. One is a Chicago-based company that actually sends homemade, uncooked meals to you, and comes with a smart oven that you use to cook the meals in. Home-cooked dinner is ready in 10-20 minutes. Grocery shopping, planning and cooking meals, and clean-up from said cooking three times a day was definitely one of our biggest pain points the first time around post-partum, and having healthy, well-balanced meals is SO important for any new mom, and also for Dan who is busy running around taking care of all of us. I’m hoping this will make the first couple of weeks much less stressful and save us some much-needed energy. A worthwhile investment and adding those recurring payments to our Chase Freedom Unlimited card means cash back every time the subscription charge comes through.

In fact this is my number one gift suggestion for any expecting parents you know!

 

5. Dog-sitting and Dog Walker Scheduled

Lastly, we have my little love. Tucker. Again, taking the pup on walks 3-4 times a day is a challenge as it totally falls on Dan who was also taking care me and our newborn baby those first couple of days at home when I could barely get out of bed without his help. Because we knew I’d be having surgery again, we had Tucker stay with a family member the first couple of days we were home with Charlie.

 

So that was our plan of attack…! Everything was in place; ready to go. 

Along the way we’ve been using our Chase Freedom Unlimited card and recommend it whether you’re getting ready for a new baby in your home or working on your own checklist. Chase is now offering new Chase Freedom Unlimited cardmembers a special bonus offer, available through Chase.com, and in Chase branches: get a $200 bonus after spending $500 in the first three months. 

So far life has been decently manageable! Unfortunately we’ve had a small health scare we could not have predicted with my recovery and now Henry has been super sick which means I’ve been fairly quarantined with Charlie, but we are getting by!

Thank you so much for following along in my Getting Ready for Baby #2 Checklist!