4 Items You Probably Don’t Have in Your Nursery (But You Should!)

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You have the crib and the baby monitor, the comfy glider and dresser-slash-changing station — what else could your nursery need?

A lot, as it turns out. For being so small, newborn babies need a good amount of stuff in their rooms to keep them safe and happy — and to keep you sane during those first fast and furious months.

Not all must-have nursery items are obvious, and some parents neglect to get them because they don’t fit neatly on a baby registry. Still, you should seriously consider getting the following items for your baby’s room, to keep them more comfortable and safer during their first years of life.

Ceiling Fan

Babies aren’t terrific at regulating their body temperature; premature and low-birthweight babies might be unable to produce enough heat to keep themselves healthy, and even full-term, chunky newborns struggle to maintain the right internal temperature when their environment swings to temperature extremes. Thus, having a ceiling fan in the nursery could be critical in keeping the baby cool when the hot summer months hit. Ceiling fans come in all shapes and styles, so you can find plenty of rustic ceiling fans to fit the nursery aesthetic.

Regardless of temperature, studies have found conclusively that running a fan in a sleeping infant’s room lowers the risk for sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) by 72 percent. Researchers aren’t sure why this is the case; it could be the noise of the fan or the circulating air that provides some benefit. Still, any decrease in SIDS risk is well worth the investment.

Light Dimmers

The womb is not a bright place, but it isn’t completely black, either. Most sleeping babies are a bit disoriented in a pitch-dark room, where they can feel lonely and abandoned. In contrast, bright lights tend to keep babies awake, and when you are trying to nurse the baby back to sleep in the middle of the night, you want to keep that little one as sleepy as possible.

Enter: dimmer switches. Almost any light switch can be swapped with a dimmer switch, and as long as you use dimmable bulbs in your fixtures, you should be able to better control the intensity of light in the baby’s room.

If you don’t want to bother with dimmers, you might at least get yourself a red bulb. Red light isn’t as stimulating, so you can switch on a red fixture for midnight feedings without worrying about messing with the baby’s circadian rhythm.

Blackout Shades

In a similar vein to dimmers, you should consider getting yourself some blackout shades. Daylight streaming through nursery windows can be beautiful illumination in the early morning and late evening, but in the afternoon, that sunshine is likely going to keep your little one wide awake. Plus, light tends to increase the temperature of the room, which you might not want in the summertime.  

Any kind of blackout window covering will do, but many parents opt for a temporary blackout shade which can be removed when the baby is old enough to sleep with some sunlight. Some temporary window coverings are often travel-friendly, too, so you can take your blackout capabilities wherever you take the baby.

Humidifier

Baby spent nine months submerged in liquid, so when baby’s delicate, moisture-loving skin meets the air of the outside world, it is likely to experience some consequences. Having a humidifier in the nursery helps to alleviate some of the skin conditions caused by the relatively dry environment, and it can make the transition to earthside easier for the baby’s delicate respiratory system, too. In fact, humidifiers can reduce the likelihood of your little one suffering from allergies or catching a cold. Because the last thing you want is to witness your newborn sniffling, sneezing, or scratching at dry skin, you might as well buy a small humidifier.

Your baby isn’t as fragile as you might think; after all, babies have survived harsher environments than the plush, perfectly decorated nursery in your home. Still, if you want to make the experience of caring for your new little one as straightforward and simple as possible, you might as well invest in the items listed above before the baby makes its big debut.