Shoulda Woulda Coulda: Advice for New Moms

>I've been learning a few new lessons lately and I figure I otta share this great wisdom with all my mama friends. The following list is of all the shouldas and wouldas I have learned lately. I hope it helps someone!

1. Cloth diapering: I love cloth diapering. I really do. We don't have to pay our water bill where we live so CDing is not a big deal. We use disposable liners for the poopies and there is no spraying or swishing. Really, it is so easy. I wish another mom out there had told me to not go cheep on CDs. I tried to do the most cost effective route and it is now kicking us in the arse and we are officially giving up on CDing altogether because of it. Originally, we bought a Bummis diaper kit. It was great except that the prefolds seemed to irritate Logan's skin and they were the small infant size so when he grew out of them around 4-5 moths old we had to invest in new diapers. We went with gDiapers. I have never been in love with either brand, but we rolled with it. I bought the 13-28 pound medium size, 12 to be exact, and for whatever reason Logan is leaking out of them at least once a day. This is such a PITA. OMG. Seems that his little body is just not fitting into the diaper right so we're done. So, I wish I woulda spent the $350-$400 on the really good AIO one size cloth diaper. Like Bum Genius. Yeah, I will be doing that next time for sure. 
2. Car seat: Before I had Logan, a friend was ready to get rid of her car seat and stroller travel system and offered it to us. Of course we said yes and that was it. Now, I shoulda had a lot more sense to check out all the ins and outs of both the car seat and the stroller before taking on this mess. The car seat was over 3 years old. The padding on the seat was worn and hardly what I would consider comfortable. It worked out okay for awhile, but eventually the handle mechanism stopped working and Logans long legged genes had him grown out of it by 8 months. We coulda had the Graco MyRide 65 as a gift from my parents, but nooooooo we had to go with the freebies. I don't even want to waste space here for how bad the stroller was. Please, dear readers, know that I am very grateful for someone to offer these pricy items to us. But there is a different kind of price attached to those kinds of things sometimes so going cheep is not always the best route, especially on something safety related. Today, I bought the Graco MyRide 65 and can't wait for Logan to try it out!
3. Stroller: As I said above, we started out with a pretty terrible stroller. It was big and heavy and the car seat did not fit onto it properly. So I went the cheep-o route again and bought a dinky stroller at Target. The push bar was not tall enough for us, there was no storage, and it was flimsy and not so safe. We shoulda bought a better stroller, on that fit our lifestyle (ie: tiny apartment=compact items). Thankfully, we got a new stroller for Christmas from B's dad. It is awesome!
4. Bottles: Again, with the thrifting of things, I have learned that there is a time to say no to some things. A friend gave me a ton of Avent bottles without nipples. I bought the nipples and all was well but the bottles leaked. A lot. And now they are too fat for Logan to hold himself. I ended up buying all new bottles, Playtex VentAir and I love them!
5. Clothes: This is def well we have scored in the thrifting department. I have a friend with 3 older boys and she passes all of their stuff down to me. It's amazing and I am sooo thankful for her! Without it, we would be spending a ton of money on clothes. So thank you!!
6. Toys: You do not need a lot of toys. At all. Now, or ever. This is something I have been pretty frugal about and most of the toys Logan has have been gifted to us. I really try to avoid anything that requires batteries, although Logan does love his alphabet train! B. is a brand that makes some awesome wooden toys that are sold at Target. They are not cheep, buy neither is the toy.
7. Swing: My parents gave us a swing that Logan hardly ever uses. He'll sit it in for 10 min and is done. It takes up space in his room and I am in no way getting rid of it. However, I would suggest taking your baby to a store where you can find out if he even likes to swing. This was a huge life saver when Logan was new. It was the only place he slept and spent most of his time.

The moral, for us anyways, has been to not go the cheep-o route. That includes craigslist, etc. I bought a jogging stroller and the current car seat we have been using off craigslist and they both suck. Which means I'm not even going to try to resell them. It's pointless. Hope this helps any of you new mamas out there!