Last Saturday was an unheard of event for us. We went to 4 different stores in one day, crossing a variety of things off our shopping lists. This may not sound like much of a feat but my husband is not a shopper. He would usually rather die than go into 4 different stores in one day. I have no clue what kept him interested, but we managed to get through everything in about 4 hours which was not bad at all.

One of the stops was to a store in Weiterstadt called BabyOne. It’s one of the larger baby store chains here in Germany and the closest store to us is about 45 minutes away. But because there were quite a few other stores over there that we wanted to visit (we used to live close to there so know the area well), we decided to hit them all at once. His Freelander has rarely had so much stuff packed into it!

We’ve been knocking stuff off our extensive checklist since April…and have made quite a good dent so far. Which is good because at some point we have to figure out where to put all this stuff!

So what did we buy?

For one, this cool Sack N Seat travel high chair. It’s a do-dad that you fit over the back of a chair for your child to sit in. I think this idea is great since we’ll certainly travel with Mack from time to time…and it folds up to fit in a little pouch which is ideal. Naturally we won’t be needing it for a few months but I love the concept.

We also bought travel play pen which may not look pretty but only cost us €30. We bought an insert for it as well that raises the height of where Mackenzie will lay so she’s not so far down in there…and also to make changing easier if we do it in there. And we also got a thicker mattress since they always say that the regular pad that comes with these is terribly uncomfortable.

We also picked up a Diaper Champ which I happily see got pretty good reviews from Consumer Reports – even though it wouldn’t matter much now since we have it here. Probably should have gotten the biggest size but this one was marked way down and I figure having an incentive to empty it out more often isn’t a bad thing. I’m still hoping to do elimination control with Mack from day one – just need to figure out the best way to go about it. No diapers, only cloth diapers, disposables…a combination of things. Yeah, I know – running out of time to decide these things. But we did pick up a Baby Bjorn potty chair for €25 while there so at least I have that part of the process figured out!

The only other interesting thing we got was a plaster belly cast kit which we will have to do one of these weekends soon…otherwise there won’t be a belly to cast anymore! I’ve always thought these were really cool and can’t wait til it’s finished. No idea where it will find a home yet in the house, but it will be a great memory of this time…where I can look back and think, “Wow, I was really THAT huge!”

Only about 2 months to go now. The official “guess date” is November 23rd…which is thankfully the first day that Mackenzie can be a Sagittarious. Why do I care? Well, I’m a Libra and they generally clash with Scorpio so I really don’t want that happening..although we now have two family members weighing in and saying that she will be early. So we’ll see. In the end, as long as she’s healthy, everything else can be worked out!