Woah, it’s kind of trippy looking back at these photos we took when I was pregnant. We were setting up Oliver’s nursery and would dream of him sleeping and playing in this room. It felt so far away at the time. Now our little guy is almost three months old. Man, does time fly by!

Baby Sleep essentials

Let me start off by saying this is not a sponsored post, but I felt really compelled to dedicate a blog entry to some safe sleep essentials for baby. If you’ve been following along with us throughout my pregnancy, or caught this post here, you know we’ve been really dedicated to safer choices for our family; that includes everything from skincare to food to household products.

Here are some baby sleep essentials we couldn’t do without.

HATCH BABY REST

You might have caught me chatting about the Hatch Baby Rest sound machine on our IG stories a while back. It’s definitely one of our most used baby items around here. It doubles as a night light too. I use it as a regular sound machine during the day for Oliver’s naps and then in the evening for Oliver’s bedtime feeding, we use the red light option dimmed with the waves sound. He loves it and we have all of his sleep times scheduled on the timer via the app.

NEWTON BABY MATTRESS

Oliver is still sleeping in the SNOO bassinet in our room, but before we know it we’ll be transitioning him to his crib and it was vital he was sleeping in a safe space. Finding a safe and toxic free mattress was super important to us. After a lot of research, we decided Newton Baby would be our best bet. It’s a little on the pricey side, but it’s non-toxic, hypoallergenic, and 100% breathable. I know transitioning to the crib from the bassinet comes with a lot of anxiety, but knowing he’s sleeping on a safe mattress made from good materials, helps ease my crazy mom thoughts a bit.

NANIT MONITOR

The Nanit Baby Monitor has been everywhere with us these days! Above you could see it set up in Ollie boy’s nursery, which is usually how we have it set up during the day for his naps, but at night time we use the mini stand and place it next to his bassinet in our room. It hooks up to WiFi so we can watch from any room and anywhere. You can bet your bottom dollar that on our first date night to a concert, I was watching his Nanit, monitor obsessively making sure he was sleeping okay. The app gives you notifications if your baby wakes, moves, or makes any sort of sound.

I like that it also shows the temperature and humidity levels in the room. If you have Nanit’s Breathing Wear you could also pair that with the app and keep an eye on your baby’s breathing. It looks like a swaddle and is super simple to use with the monitor.

PEHR SHEET SETS

Pehr is one of my favorite baby brands. They have the prettiest neutrals and have been my go-to for crib sheets. I like their simple designs and that everything is super soft, organic cotton.

SWADDLES

We always swaddle Oliver before his naps and bedtime. I think it’s his sign that it’s time to rest and settle down now fir sleep. All of the muslin and cute swaddles are fun for photos and cuddle time, but we’ve found a few swaddles that are easy and more efficient to use, especially at night. Here are the few we rotate in between:

–Ollie Swaddle: this one is a super stretchy material and uses velcro to keep everything in place, so you don’t have to tuck any access fabric. It’s super easy and the closest to an “old school” swaddle blanket.

–SNOO Sleepea Swaddle by Happiest Baby: The Sleepea is just like their sleep sack, but it doesn’t have the clips to snap into the SNOO with. I like the SNOO ones because they have a velcro band around the chest but leave the leg area free so their hips aren’t restricted. Then you just zip up the center.

–Anna & Eve Swaddle: Oliver runs on the warm side so this swaddle is great as it is just band around the chest area, with minimal material. After joining a few forums on facebook, (such a lifesaver as a new mom!) I found this one. It’s very secure, so if you’re baby is a little Houdini and breaking out of their swaddles, I highly suggest this one.

SNOO SMART SLEEPER

There’s been so much hype about the SNOO, but it really is a little miracle worker. We have the SNOO bassinet next to our bed in our bedroom and Oliver has been sleeping in it since we brought him home from the hospital. If you’re unfamiliar with the SNOO, stay tuned, I’m going to be doing a full review with our experience, but it’s a great sleep aid that helps rock your baby to sleep and has a built in noise machine. If it recognizes your baby fussing, it will rock a little bit more and increase the white noise sound to help soothe him/her. I love that you can control everything from the app on your phone and set limits for the rocking mechanism. It also logs all of your baby’s sleep cycles, so you could see how they’re progressing over time. It’s also the safest bassinet out there, with a swaddle (they call it a SNOO sleep sack, how cute!) that clicks into the bassinet, ensuring your baby doesn’t end up in an unsafe position overnight. Oliver has been doing 8 hour stretches in the SNOO for the last month or so. It’s going to be a sad day when we transition to the crib. Ha!

I added all of my sleep & nursery essentials for baby on my Amazon page HERE, if you want to check out more.

*Disclaimer: This post is all about sleep essentials and making sure your baby is safe, so I want to note that the blanket and stuffed animals in the crib were for decor purposes only. Our baby is still very young, unable to roll over, and is not in his crib unattended. When it is time to transition him into the crib, all of these items will be removed. Please make sure nothing is in the vicinity of your baby’s sleep space that could potentially be a breathing hazard.