what do these terms mean? (in baby checklist)

the salespeople at the shops have ONE purpose only... to SELL you things.

the only NECESSARY things a new born NEEDS:

1) somewhere to sleep (i have heard that people in the past even used an empty drawer from a chest of drawers)

2) clothes, what and how many is up to you and how much washing you want to do

3) diapers, cloth or disposable

4)bottles etc (if you are bottle feeding)

EVERYTHING else is a luxury. some people find somethings indispensible (i LOVED my breastfeeding pillow that i had for my 2nd, but got by just fine without it for my 1st). some people swear by muslin clothes. i just used a hand towel that i already had.
 
From birth until 3 months, my son slept in a bassinet in our room and we didn't need any wedges or pillows to keep him in place as he was swaddled and the bassinet itself wasn't that big so there was really no room for him to turn over (nor did he know how to turn over then). When we moved him into his own cot in his room when he was 3 1/2 months old, we just used rolled up towels, but only until he was about 5 months and then we just removed the towels and now he doesn't need anything to keep him in place. So I don't think there is any need to buy a wedge. However, I do have one of those really long bean pillows that I bought when I was pregnant. That is actually usefully for breastfeeding - but as carang mentioned, is definitely not a necessity.

As for black out curtains - we also don't have those. I preferred to train our baby to stay asleep even without blackout conditions. In fact, in the beginning, for the first two months, we would keep the bathroom light in our room on so that it wasn't pitch dark. We were afraid our son would be scared in the pitch dark!
 
LOL! that's so funny... afraid of the dark... i wonder how much light actually gets into the womb? (i'm not being sarcastic, actually wondering....)

i think it is so funny how we all (myself included) put our own fears onto our kids...believe me, i know i've done it myself.

as for being afraid of the dark, i've found that with my two kids that didn't develop until they were old enough to discover monsters, aliens, dinosaurs etc. (around 2 yrs)
 
Well, I'm sure no light gets into the womb....but for the first few days of his life, my son was in a room with light 24 hours a day as they kept the lights on all the time in the hospital nursery (guess I never went out to check but I am assuming the light was always on). So I just thought that when he gets home, I should try to keep similar conditions so he is not too afraid of being in a new place. And I also kept the light on so that I could easily see him when I looked from my bed into the bassinet.....
 
not to worry futurehkmom. AFAIK the hospital keeps most of the lights on in the nursery (at least at QMH).

ps> my kids still sleep with the light on in the bathroom.
 
no - i didn't have any wedges...just used rolled up towels,

and no - I didn't black out the room since I didn't think it was "natural"...my baby sleeps well anywhere now -light or no light, if she's tired, she'll sleep! she will also sleep with a barking dog in the background! I've conditioned her to sleep with the "unconventional" way I guess...works well for me now! I don't have to worry about going home at certain times for her to nap / sleep!
 
I did use a wedge with my son because he was so small when born (2.4kg, just over 5lb) and he was sleeping in a hammock. I only used it for about 6 weeks till he was big enough.

I only swaddled up to 12 weeks, for the first 8 weeks he was fully swaddled and then I swaddled him with one arm out. As babies gain control over their limbs they like to be free. I then put him in a gro-bag as his arms were no longer flailing around when he slept. Some babies may resist swaddling and they always seem to escape so get yourself a good swaddling blanket with velcro. A good one is the Kiddopotamus.

Kiddopotamus: Products: SwaddleMe
 
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We used black out curtains to try to mimick the darkness of the womb and it ended up with the extra plus that our baby would sleep until 8am until he was more than 1 year old. That's a massive blessing! He also never had a problem when we would travel and there weren't black out curtains though he would get up a little earlier.
 
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