Essentials for Creating a Diaper Station in Your Home
One of the best things that we had set up before our first son arrived was a diaper station on our main floor. We live in a two-floor home and all of the bedrooms were set up on that top floor.
I knew, from conversations with friends, family, and my ob/gyn that constantly trekking up and down the stairs after I was freshly torn open was not going to feel great. Or, generally speaking, be the smartest move. So we set aside a space that would be specifically for changing out little one and letting him sleep.
I’m a big fan of products that a dual purpose, which played a major role in some of selections. Depending on the space in your home, you may be able to spread out a bit more, or make your space more condensed!
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Here’s what I built my diaper station using:
For our main floor – A Pack N Play
We specifically used a Pack N Play with convertible infant changing pad/infant sleeper, but there are lots of different ways you can set this portion up. For our home, this was basically what we used as the foundation for our diaper station. Not only does it give you a safe place for you to put your infant down for a nap, but it also gives you a place to change him or her. The infant changer/sleeper that attaches to the Pack N Play flips between an easily wipe-able changing pad and an indented basinet.
As a note, I chose to set up out main floor using a Pack N Play because I knew it was going to only be used for a short period of time. Especially because our son would be heading back into daycare after my maternity leave ended. Plus, it was easy to assemble and disassemble, so having it on our main floor made for easy packing if we wanted to bring it on a trip with us.
For the Upstairs Nursery – A Silicone Changing Pad
I love this silicone changing pad . Its so easy to clean and fit perfectly on our son’s dresser. When choosing your changing pad, there are a lot of options, but I do highly recommend going with a changing pad that is silicone as opposed to a cloth diaper pad. There will, inevitably, be things that end up on the changing pad that are easier to be cleaned up by a quick wipe down rather than having to strip it down and do laundry each time.
A Diaper Pail
I used to thing that a simple trashcan with a lid would cut it for those dirty diapers. Let me tell you, I was wrong. Embarrassingly so. I know I’ve shared this before, but our first Diaper Genie was purchased for us by a friend who came to visit after the baby came. He left our house and then CAME RIGHT BACK with a Diaper Genie. Obviously, our house smelled way worse than we had realized.
3 Tier Rolling Cart
A 3 tier rolling cart is a great addition to a diaper station. The rolling feature makes it easy to access diapers, wipes, rash cream, Vaseline, or anything else you may need to have on hand.
Your diaper station needs some diapers, wipes, diaper cream, and diaper pail refill bags
Honestly, everything you might need at your fingerprints during a diaper change can easily be stocked on your rolling cart. Obviously, these items should include diapers and wipes, but you should also include a stock of diaper cream, and bags for your diaper pail.
Spare Clothing
Let’s face it, your kid will definitely make a mess out of some of their clothes. In the event of a blowout, you definitely want a change of clothes.
A Laundry Basket or Bag
You’ll need somewhere to place those dirty clothes without having to go very far (especially if they’re REALLY dirty). We used a small, decorative basket as our laundry basket
Some things to Keep In Mind:
When creating a diaper station for your home (or multiple!), try to anticipate where you and the baby will spend most of your time. That will help you in determining whether or not you need more than one changing station.
You can add most of these items to your registry, and some of them may be easily purchased (or gotten for free) second hand.And finally, keep in mind that you don’t really know how things will work best until after your baby arrives. So if you need to play around with the accessibility of certain things (or you decide to add or remove certain items), that’s a perfectly normal part of any baby prep!
