hooray!  we finally took the plunge this week and purchased a diaper bag!  there was much harrumphing about it on my part (sorry, honey) because I’d originally had my heart set on a DIAPER BAG diaper bag and not some other kind of gender neutral bag that could be co-opted to behave as a diaper bag for as long as we need it to, then put to good use when we no longer need it for that purpose.  this harrumphing of mine was born of long years of “oh, that’s so CUTE!” that I’d done over Peter Rabbit themed bags, then sleeker (but still specifically for diapers) more chic models, and more recently all of the cute diaper bag patterns that Amy Butler and others like her have created.   Plus, I’d found these awesome bags as I was poking around online.  COME ON!!  SO CUTE!! I’d always dreamed of owning and carrying one of these bags and this felt like just one more “dream” I had to give up.  Despite my grumbling, I could see the wisdom in not having a diaper bag that was so girly looking that J would refuse to carry it (or change the baby in public–can you imagine him carrying that Amy Butler bag into a men’s restroom at a rest stop on the toll road?  ha!), and so we went to REI with me stubbornly dragging my feet.  When we got to the bags, I had to admit (although, come to think of it, I may not have admitted this out loud to J.  sorry, honey.) that some of the bags were pretty cute and under normal circumstances I would have jumped at the excuse to buy one.  But we soon realized… we had no idea how big of a bag we’d want.  I was pretty sure I didn’t want something enormous (I have a tendency to fill bags up, no matter how big or small they are and that can get really heavy, really quickly), but on the other hand, I didn’t want a bag so small that the items would only fit in if you put them in JUST so with no room for growth.

We ended up purchasing two bags to take home and stuff full of baby necessities to see which one we liked better.  That made the decision easier.  I think we both leaned pretty heavily toward the same bag.  Of course, it was the more expensive of the two, but when we realized that we’d likely be carrying this bag a LOT for a number of years to come… the extra cost seemed insignificant.  In case you’re curious, this is the one we got.  It even has two outside pockets on the sides perfect for carrying bottles (my one secret, probably silly wish).

Now for the poll part:

For those of you who have children of the diaper bag age, what’s in your diaper bag?  ‘Fess up–are you the type who packs for every eventuality (4 extra pairs of socks, a snack for mom, baby Tylenol AND Motrin, 20 binkies…) or have you pared down to the essentials (diapers, wipes, butt cream–do you need anything else)?  Is there anything in there that you added after some incident taught you that you should carry it?  Would your list look any different if you were packing for a newborn?

I”m not necessarily looking for “you should definitely pack this” advice (everyone will have their own opinions and I’ll just get befuddled) but I’m curious to know what has worked for you.

For those of you who don’t have kids yet–leave me a comment if you’d like for me to publish a comprehensive diaper bag packing list when I’ve heard back from people.

p.s.  it’s oddly nice to realize that this particular dream is one that I probably would have had to give up no matter how a child came to join our family.  Hooray for non-adoption-specific angst!