Planning for Bump to Bassinet: Must-Have Resources for Expecting Parents

Embarking on your journey to parenthood is an exciting and transformative time, filled with anticipation and so many decisions. Whether you’re just starting to think about expanding your family or are already expecting, having access to comprehensive pregnancy planning resources is essential for navigating each stage.

From understanding fertility and early pregnancy health to exploring pregnancy tips that support your well-being, making informed choices about pregnancy food, and integrating pregnancy exercises into your routine, there is so much to consider as you prepare for your baby’s arrival. In this guide, we’ll cover some of our tip tips that you’ll need to ensure a healthy and happy pregnancy.

We’re going to go over each of those areas with some in-depth articles where you can learn more!

Fertility

Looking to get pregnant? You’re not alone. Remember the AVERAGE time to get pregnant is 9 months, so good things are worth the wait, right?

I have a few articles that can help:

• The Journey of Infertility: Struggle, Success, and Spearmint Tea
• Why Can’t I Get Pregnant Again?
• What Does it Mean When One Pregnancy Test is Positive and the Other is Negative?

My best tips are to:

Find a doctor you trust – this may take a few tries. You can learn a lot from the office and their staff, but often a visit is what you really need to see if you click.

Decide what you want to try – do you WANT to try fertility treatments, or do you want to just your body in a place where it may get pregnant naturally — I think this is an important point to have with your partner.

You’ve got time – I know it feels like you want it NOW but sometimes just relaxing and hoping things will happen in the right timeline helps you be less anxious (and anxiety isn’t helping anything). Sometimes I just tell myself “I’ve got all the time in the world” (even though, I know, it doesn’t feel like that).

Pregnancy Health

Health is so important to focus on during pregnancy. You want to allow your body to feel it’s best and also give baby all the things they need to grow properly.

We’re going to go over FOOD in the next section, but here’s a few articles you might find helpful:

• Pregnancy Calendar by Week: What to expect from prenatal care
• Is it OK to Sleep on Your Stomach When Pregnant?
• Marijuana Use During Pregnancy
• Routine Ultrasounds in Labor with Marybeth from SonoEyesUltrasound
• Questions to Ask Your OB on Your First Pregnancy Visit
• Self Care During Postpartum & Pregnancy
• Considering a VBAC: What to do
• To the Mom Who Thinks She’ll Go Early.

Here are my favorite tips for staying healthy during pregnancy:

Go to your prenatal check-ups: It can seem useless (honestly, that’s awesome if that’s the case). BUT it’s so important. Those check-ups are placed at vital times to watch baby and your health, they can often catch REALLY big things that can be a big problem!

Keep Working Out You’ll want to check with your provider to make sure it’s OK and what the best kind for you are (or what you should stay away from) but being active can help baby come easier by expanding those muscles in squats and other labor exercises, and studies show with less birth trauma. Crazy, right?

Pregnancy Food

Here’s some great articles on food in pregnancy:

• The Best Soups for Pregnancy: 21 Soup recipes for prenatal nutrition!
• When to start Eating Dates During Pregnancy?
• Can I Eat Hot Cheetos While Pregnant?
• What are the best drinks during pregnancy?
• Can You Eat Sour Cream While Pregnant?
• Can You Drink Wine When You’re Pregnant
• Why Does Eggplant Induce Labor?
• What Deli Meats Are Safe to Eat During Pregnancy?

While those posts cover much of my favorite pregnancy food tips — my favorite tip is to:

Balance Carbs and Proteins. Food is the key, and I always felt better when I balanced carbs and proteins. This is actually how they teach you to eat in the diabetic diet, but I think most pregnant women can feel better if they follow that advice as well.

I think food is SO important (and frankly, not my strong point) I have a bonus video in here with a dietician that I think you’ll love!

You may have heard that there are foods that induce labor… and while I haven’t found TOO much evidence about that (besides dates — and that’s for a few weeks of eating them) — I have some articles that might help:

• When Should I Start Drinking Raspberry Leaf Tea?
• Why Does Eggplant Induce Labor?
• Is Midwive’s Brew Safe?

Of course, there are some foods you should avoid — so grab my safe eating guide here:

Pregnancy Stage

There are several stages that are good to know about:

Pregnancy Timeline: Having an idea of what to expect both from your body and from your healthcare as you go through pregnancy is so important.

I actually have my posts all split up to exactly where you are:

• First Trimester (weeks 0-12)
• Second Trimester (weeks 13-27)
• Third Trimester (weeks 28-delivery)

Labor Stages: This can also extend to actual labor. Knowing how your body will progress through the stages of labor can be really helpful as well. I have a whole post on the labor stages that I think you’ll find helpful.

Remember everyone experiences labor on their own timeline. No need to compare with a friend, but knowing what you’re going to likely go through can help you know what to expect.

If you’re one of those people who really does like to know what to expect, can I recommend this? It’s for people just like you who want to be prepared!

Pregnancy Tips

There are a LOT of tips that can make pregnancy easier. While friends might share something that worked for them, I always recommend learning from an expert.

Here are some of my favorite tips & pregnancy hacks:

• Sleeping During Pregnancy: Tips by Trimester
• Top Tips for Your Plus-Size Pregnancy
• Tips To Saying No To Your Provider
• Birth Tips for First Time Moms!
• Tips for Young Mothers
• 3 Things to Do At the End of Your Pregnancy for a Faster Labor
• Signs of Labor (labor signs & symptoms)
• Early Labor Contractions

Here are a few quick tips that might help you right now:

Be CLEAR when you want an answer from your provider — do you want to know if it’s normal or get it fixed. Unfortunately, many providers just say something is “normal” and don’t ask if it’s affecting someone’s day-to-day living. When you’re clear about what you’d like done, they can be more clear with what they give you (I hope).

Physical Therapy Is your Friend — While they can be sometimes hard to get into, if the aches and pains of pregnancy are hurting you over all — ask your provider for a physical therapy consult. It can be a game-changer for pregnancy pain (if you find the right one).

Make a Birth Plan Together — Preparing for scenarios you may encounter in labor can be SO helpful. Honestly, just thinking about them puts you ahead of the game. Get my tips to doing it right here:

A lot of you may want the tip of WHEN will you go into labor (or HOW to go into labor)? Honestly, no one knows — so try to get prepared and remember the biggest myths of pregnancy is not helping you out.

Pregnancy Exercises

I’ve mentioned exercise above just to get it in early, but staying active during pregnancy has a whole load of benefits. I love Kaleigh Cohen — her workouts are free on Youtube and I just enjoy working out to her. She is a pregnancy-certified trainer (and has been pregnant in some of her workouts):

Here is her pregnancy playlist:

I actually work out with Kaleigh myself, as a woman approaching menopause I know how important bone growth (and muscle growth) are — and I just like her workouts, so I hope you like them too.

Before you work out:

• Be sure to ask your provider what’s best for you to be doing
• Get the rest, sometimes working out gives you more energy, and sometimes it takes it out of you (but it’s worth it, and you’ll gain stamina with time)
• Make sure you’re not using too heavy of weights — monitor it as you work out
• Be SURE to stretch afterwards (Kaleigh has some great stretches too). Prenatal stretches for my hips felt so good!

Preparing for Baby

Preparing for baby has two sides of it:

Preparing for the ACTUAL baby. You have a brand new human who’s going to live at your house.

This can feel overwhelming. My pregnancy planner has lots of checklists to make sure you’re not missing something.

I also have a newborn essentials checklist that can get you started:

I should say you also want to be prepared for YOUR body after birth — I have postpartum checklist for the supplies you’ll want to have on hand too

And, if you’re wanting to look for delivery nurse gifts for your labor nurse << I have a post on that too!

Preparing for Delivery – this is a whole other bag of chips, and childbirth education sometimes doesn’t feel as “cute or fun”.

I recommend The Online Prenatal Class for Couples — in just a few hours you can feel prepared for your hospital birth.

• In under 20 minute “birth bites” you won’t be overwhelmed (and can easily fit them into busy days)
• Created to be done with your partner so they’re prepped WITH you!
• Made by an expert so you don’t just have it “checked off” but you’re actually prepared!

I want that for you — come join me!

Want to do a vibe check before diving into the whole thing with me? — check out my free labor pro tips. It’s your first step toward getting in the driver’s seat of your birth.

So, what are YOU doing in preparing for baby to come? What phase are you in and what more do you want to know about? Tell us in the comments.