For those of you who don’t know, our journey to parenthood took a little while (IVF, miscarriage, etc etc – you can read about it here and here), and in my desperation to fall pregnant, I researched the heck out of stuff and got the shock of my life when I realised how many chemicals we’re exposed to in our everyday lives. News flash – a lot! So, I set about researching and ensuring we had the most low tox nursery we could achieve on a reasonable budget.
Our journey to becoming parents was also what catapulted me into a plant based diet, but that’s a story for another time.
Anyway, after many a night spent googling while I had pregnancy insomnia about low tox nurseries, these are some of the items we purchased for Chloe and her nursery.
Cot
Chloe’s cot and mattress were the number one items that were non-negotiable. Babies can spend up to 18 hours a day sleeping (don’t worry if yours doesn’t – Chloe has never slept 18 hours in her entire life!), but modern cots are a cocktail of paints and fire retardants and gloss. Originally I was going to buy a second hand cot, as it then would have had time to off gas a little, but I ended buying the IKEA SNIGLAR Cot and it’s super cheap! It’s made from solid beech wood and it is unvarnished. In fact, many people recommend this online. If I had wanted another brand that was as low tox, it would have cost me a small fortune. We bought the matching change table too. Many people don’t realise but IKEA spends a small fortune on ways to be more sustainable, produce products that are recyclable or made from recycled goods, and lower in chemicals.
Mattress
Oh, I ummed and ahhed about what mattress to get Chloe, and I decided on the Tetra Tea Tree mattress. It’s breathable, antifungal, antibacterial and organic. Instead of a bassinet, we also got the snuggle bed. Our arrangement was this: Chloe slept in her snugglebed in her cot for the first 3 or so months until she outgrew it, and then we just took the snugglebed out and she slept in the cot, where she’d always been the whole time. We moved the single bed into her room from the spare room, and I slept in there for the first 6 or so months so that Rosco could get decent nights sleep He is dealing with machinery and scaffolding all day and if anything happened to him I’d have kicked myself, and it was oh so easy to just get up and put my feet up on the bed and feed her, and just put her next to me on restless nights. I won’t lie – when she was sleeping in the cot but not moving around, I did have to bang the mattress out a bit to flatten it back down when I was changing the sheets, but now that she is moving about, the mattress stays completely flat.
Mattress Sheets
I bought Chloe’s sheets and mattress protector from Amazon as I didn’t think that the IKEA cot was a standard size. In fact, I’ve still never bothered to find out, but I LOVE these sheets. They’re organic and made from t-shirt like material so they just always feel so soft.
Here are links to what I bought:
American Baby Company Twin Pack 100% Organic Cotton Interlock Fitted Crib Sheet, Natural*
Play Mat
I searched high and low for play mats, and settled on the Dwingular play mat. Our house is all tiles, so we needed something to cushion Chloe, and one big playmat means that you don’t get stuff in the gaps. It’s a fairly decent price, but I guess we saved on the cot! This playmat is meant to be environmentally friendly and tested to contain no harmful substances.
So those are the main items that we’ve used and bought for Chloe’s nursery. It’s so hard trying to balance the budget and make sure you’re doing the best for your bub too but I do feel like we made the right choices.
I learnt heaps from these two books, and am still referring back to them constantly:
The Honest Life: Living Naturally and True to You*
Other things
You can see from my baby shower presents (Oh man, I was spoilt!) that there are a number of organic things in there – it’s all about balance and doing the best you can. I’ll write a post another time about the things we just can’t live without.
Please leave a comment below if you have any other recommendations, or any other questions as to what we have bought/use for Chloe B.
P.S. If I’ve marked something with a *, it means that at no extra cost to you, I’ll receive a commission if you purchase via the link.
