With two of the FHR girls just having had babies, now is the perfect time to share my favorite products for keeping clean. For my final guest post, here is the roundup of my favorite products to keep those smiling little faces clean and those precious little fannies fresh throughout the new year!

#1 MVP: bumGenius Flip All-in-One Diapering System

This was the very first thing I started researching after I learned I was pregnant. I left the doctor’s office with a swag bag full of formula samples, diaper and wipe samples and some parent-focused magazines. I was thumbing through the pages of one of them when I came upon a bumGenius advertisement. I had never seen anything like it! The thought of old school cloth diapers didn’t appeal to me too much but neither did the thought of mounds and mounds of diaper waste on its way to the landfill. When I learned there was something like this that made cloth diapering much more convenient, I was intrigued. After pouring over pages and pages of online reviews, we decided to stock the nursery with these babies. My daughter was quite small when she was born—she wore premie clothes until she was almost three months—so we had to wait to try them out but when we did, we were thrilled. We had used disposable diapers until she was big enough for the bumGenius and we had leaks, diaper rash, and that unmistakable diaper pail smell wasn’t something I was thrilled about. Once we began using the bumGenius, leaks were far less frequent and diaper rash almost never happens anymore. I haven’t found them to be much less convenient than disposables and of course, the savings doesn’t hurt! We also invested in some doublers and the diaper sprayer—both must-haves, in my opinion, if you’re going to go the cloth diapering route.

#2 RLR Laundry Treatment

This is the product I didn’t know I needed until I KNEW I needed it. I read in most of the forums I consulted during my diaper research about products used to “strip” the cloth diapers. I was sure exactly what it meant but I gathered it was the remedy when the diaper situation got a little funky. I didn’t really need it at the time but decided I’d go ahead and order a few. I was glad I did because eventually, things did get funky. It’s kind of an inevitable situation when you opt for cloth diapering. This stuff does a great job neutralizing odors and brightening everything up.  We add one of these to the diaper laundry about every two months (unless we need it sooner) and almost a year later, we’re still running on the original set of diapers.

#3 Honorable Mention:  Boudreaux’s Butt Paste

I have tried MANY diaper ointments and honestly this is the only one I need. This stuff clears up diaper rash at lightning speed. Enough said!

#4 Mustela Foam Shampoo

After we came home from the hospital, my daughter developed a mild case of cradle cap. This stuff did wonders to clear it up. I tried several homeopathic remedies I read about online and nothing seemed to make a dent until I tried this stuff. Full disclosure—I received it as a gift and did not have to pay the relatively high price to buy it myself. I’d squeeze a bit of this on the baby’s head, massage, comb through and rinse and within a couple of weeks, her little head was beautifully flake free. I loved the fact that it was a nice, wet foam because I could apply it to a dry head and save a step. The cap was also great for rinsing!

#5 Burt’s Bees Baby Bee Wash and Lotion

I’m going to be honest. I know Johnson & Johnson baby is the standard. All the hospitals use it. I continued to use the little bottle I brought home from the hospital. But I’ve found that my sense of smell is tied very closely to my memory. Every time I cracked that little bottle open to give my daughter a bath, my mind was transported back to the day she was born. It was, for sure, one of the best days of my life for obvious reasons, but it was also one of the longest, most exhausting, most emotional days I’ve ever had and, frankly, I don’t need to be remembering every uncomfortable detail while I’m bathing my kid. I lived through it. Isn’t that enough?!! So I set off to find something that was gentle and natural, something that worked well but was easy to rinse and something that smelled amazing. This stuff fit the bill. The wash is super gentle and rinses clean, the lotion is rich and creamy but absorbs quickly and leaves my baby’s skin soft and supple. And it smells incredible (to me it smells a bit like honey and apricots). And of course, I don’t have any other memories tied to it in my brain which allows me to just be in the moment with my daughter. And that’s a VERY nice thing!

#6 Johnson’s Hand and Face Wipes

Let’s face it—you can’t give the baby a bath every day. But it sure seems like they can find a new way to get gross and sticky everyday! That’s where these wipes come in. In between baths, after meals and on the go, these babies are a handy, quick way to get your messy little munchkin reasonably clean. And they smell great! On those non-bath nights, I like to whip one of these out and do a quick little sponge bath from top to bottom.

#7 Baby Washcloths

This is one thing I really didn’t think I needed. Why on earth would this kid need her very own washcloths? Surely I can just use mine, right? Well, I tried, anyway. I don’t know why it didn’t occur to me that the fact that my washcloths were large enough to be blankets for this baby might be a problem. I tried once to use a normal washcloth and it didn’t go well. The real issue came when trying to wash her face, which of course is the first thing that gets washed. No matter how I tried to hold the washcloth or how I positioned my hands, I just couldn’t prevent all the excel cloth from falling on her face. As I was struggling to do a tricky, slippery job with one hand and the wrong tool, I thought to myself, “This is nuts! She’s so tiny and this washcloth is so huge! What I really need is a…” Yup. A baby washcloth. Turns out it’s not so useless after all. (Note: the Gerber baby washcloths are the ones I use. They’re nicely sized, lightweight and inexpensive.)

#8 American Red Cross Baby Oral Care Kit

Okay, you don’t really need an entire kit, but I would definitely recommend two things—a fingertip toothbrush to help you get started and a regular infant toothbrush. We started a tooth brushing routine as soon as we could detect little pearly whites pushing toward the surface and now it’s a regular part of our bedtime routine. Luckily, my little one has been quite fond of having her teeth brushed since the beginning. When you first get started, a water resistant bib is also a handy thing to have. She drooled so much that she’d soak through a normal bib and get slobber all over her jammies and a second wardrobe change is definitely not a part of the bedtime routine!

A Special Note of  Thanks

As I close out the final One Mom Roundup, I’d like to thank Cammie for having me on. It was a blast sharing my favorite things with all of you!

Jess

Related posts:

1. One Mama Roundup: One Mom’s Top Product Picks for Sleeping
2. One Mama Roundup: One Mom’s Top Eleven Product Picks for Feeding
3. One Mama Roundup: One Mom’s Top Product Picks to Take You from the First Nine Months to the Next
4. Baby Cakes…
5. Another fresh new year is here