Gifts for a Friend Who Just Had a Baby

Almost every gift at a baby shower is for the baby. Here is what to send the mother in month two.

Walk into any baby shop and count the things that are for the adult. You will find a lot of tiny socks and one shelf of nursing pillows.

That imbalance carries on for about a year. Everyone buys for the baby, because the baby is the news, and because a gift for a newborn is easy to get right. Nothing about that is wrong. It just leaves a gap where the mother is.

I think about this a lot, because the box we sell for this situation has nothing baby-related in it, and it is the one people thank us for most awkwardly. They usually say something like, I did not expect to be the one crying.

Month two is the hard month

Week one, the house is full. Week two, people start to leave. By week six, the doorbell has stopped completely.

That is the point at which the actual work begins. Not the birth, which has a script and a hospital and a lot of hands. The part after, which has no script and happens at four in the morning when the other adult is asleep.

So if you are buying in month one, buy for month two. And if you are reading this in month three and wondering whether it is too late to send something, it is not. It is better, actually, because nobody else is sending anything by then.

Buy for her, not for the baby

This is the whole method, and it is harder than it sounds. Hold the object and ask whether it is for the person who gave birth or the person who arrived.

If it is for the baby, it needs a size, and sizes are wrong half the time, and now she has to return something while recovering from a birth. If it is for her, none of that applies.

There is one more layer. Most new mothers have been reduced to a function by about week four. Their inbox is full of advice. Every conversation starts with how is the baby. Nobody asks how she is, and when they do, they mean the baby.

A gift that is only for her, with nothing about the baby on it, does a specific thing. It says, I remember there is a person in there.

What to send: things that need no energy

The mistake people make with tired mothers is buying something that requires enthusiasm. A craft kit. A journal with prompts. A book about baby-led weaning, which is homework dressed as a gift.

What works is the opposite. Things she can use while horizontal, half asleep, with one hand.

Something for her hands. A small wooden comb for the scalp is the one nobody thinks of. Ours is African padauk, and the point is not grooming. It is that a tired person can sit still and do one physical thing for two minutes. That is a different kind of rest than lying down and failing to sleep.

Something with a low learning curve. A 17 key kalimba can be played badly on the first day. That matters more than it sounds. A tired person cannot start a hobby that requires lessons. She can tap five notes and get a sound out of it.

Something to hold at 4am. A thumb stone is 40mm across with a groove for the thumb. It lives in a dressing gown pocket. Nobody at a baby group will ask about it.

A card with no advice on it. No sleep tips. No schedules. One line about how she is doing an impossible job is worth more than a hundred suggestions.

What to skip

Newborn clothing. She has forty of them, half still in packaging, and they will be outgrown before they are worn. If you must buy clothes, buy 6 to 9 months, which is the size nobody gives.

Anything with a slogan about the joys of motherhood. On a bad day that object is a small accusation.

Parenting books. Each one is a quiet suggestion that she does not know what she is doing.

Herbal teas for calming. Well meant, and they tend to sit in the cupboard. Tea requires boiling a kettle, which requires putting the baby down.

The card

Three sentences that work, and one that does not.

Do not write enjoy every moment. It is the most common line on a new baby card and it is a trap, because some moments are not enjoyable and she is not allowed to say so.

Instead, write that you remember she exists. Something like, I know everyone is asking about the baby, and I wanted to ask about you.

Second, offer something specific. I will bring dinner on Thursday, no need to tidy up. A general offer of help gets declined ninety percent of the time, because accepting it requires her to plan it.

Third, lower the bar. Say that it is fine if she does not reply. She will not reply, and knowing that is fine removes one small debt.

If she is not a first time mother

Everything above doubles.

Second babies get almost nothing. The shower happens for the first one. The photographs are fewer. The assumption is that she knows what she is doing, which is true about the baby and irrelevant to how she feels.

She also has a toddler now, which means she is working two full time jobs and cannot lie down when the baby sleeps, because the older one is awake.

If you are only going to send one thing this year, send it to the second baby.

What about the partner

The other adult in the house gets nothing, and usually needs something.

They are also awake at four. They are also being asked how the baby is. They have also been told, mostly by older relatives, that their job is to support her, which quietly removes them from the list of people who might need support.

Fathers are less likely to say any of this out loud, which is why it largely goes unnoticed. A second small thing in the same parcel costs very little and is remembered for years. If you can only do one, do not do this. If you were going to add something anyway, add this.

What it costs

Around $15 to $30, one small object and a card. That range is genuinely enough, and a comb and a card in month two will land harder than a large gift at the shower.

$40 to $80, a piece of jewellery and a card, or two small things that go together.

Above $90, people start buying a box. Our four piece overwhelm kit is $92. A padauk wood massage comb, a 17 key kalimba, an amethyst bracelet, an amethyst thumb stone and a printed card. Nothing in it is for a baby. Packed by hand, no receipt inside, free shipping with no minimum.

If that is out of budget, the honest alternative is dinner on Thursday and a text that does not ask for a reply. That combination has a higher success rate than most gifts on this list.

One thing to do this week

Text her one sentence that does not mention the baby. Nothing else.

Watch what she does with it.