Baby Must-Haves:Swaddling Blankets-Aden + Anais and Ideal

Aden+Anais muslin blanket

Ideal by Aden+Anais

      While I was pregnant, people were always giving me advice on what to do. Some of it revolved around swaddling blankets. Doing research on blankets, I found a bunch of different brands. However, I was given a ton of blankets for my baby showers to use. We live in California and it gets pretty hot here (this last summer hit 107+ degrees), so a lightweight blanket would be best.

    One person gave us the first blanket pictured and it was perfect! Nice and big, plus super soft and light so I didn't have to worry about Baby A getting too hot.

Aden+Anais blankets

         I really wanted back up blankets in case something happened to the first. I searched and found them, but we are on a pretty tight budget since we are saving for a house. So I did my research and found this:

Ideal by Aden+Anais

         I found the Ideal by Aden+Anais at Walmart and immediately snatched them up. I thought there would be more similarities, but these are pretty different blankets. Both lines are lightweight and fairly big. However, the original Aden+Anais blankets are significantly larger than the Ideal line. The quality is similar, but in this case, you get what you pay for. Baby A can't tell the difference, which is great! She is happy with any of the blankets and loves to chew on them .

       In the end, if you want a higher quality blanket, go with Aden+Anais. However, if you are fine with anything, Ideal will save you some money.

Graco Baby Swings: A Review

a bit blurry but a better view of the whole thing

           My parents gave us this wonderful swing for Christmas! Baby swings are a must have it seems. There have been a few instances where Baby A has an explosion and I can just stick her in there while I clean everything up. It's also nice when she is fussy. 

           She hated it for a while until Calvin figured out that you can switch the direction it swings and now she loves it! She loves staring at the teddy bears on the mobile and the music option. 

Pros:

+I picked this one mainly because it has the highest weight limit of any other option of baby swing that I found. The weight max is 30 lbs when most swings were 20-25 lbs. 

+It swings in two different directions.

+You can take off the seat portion and have it as a little rocker, which is nice if you want to keep an eye on the baby while you are getting ready.

+It comes in a gender neutral color, so you can use it for a boy or a girl.

+It has 6 different speeds of swinging. 

Cons:

+It takes up a ton of space. I have no clue how we are going to store this once Baby A is done with it.

        We got it at Babies R Us, but you can find a similar one here at Amazon. 

        Does anyone have a baby product that they really love?