Ooh, I just stumbled across a handy coupon code for babystuffgifts.com. The coupon code is march10, and it knocks 15% off of your purchase (provided that it’s being shipped to your home via ground shipping!). Sweet! With that discount you’ll definitely be able to afford personalized baby gifts, or whatever other baby item you have in mind for you or someone else!

Babies and toddlers, especially those babies that are just learning to eat and those toddlers that are more interested in playing with food than eating it, can create quite a mess at the kitchen table. And underneath it, and all around it. Normally the clean up involves paper towels and a broom, or turning loose the family dog.
You know, we have a family dog, but for some reason her stomach is sensitive to things like hot dogs, pop corn and French fries, and she turns her little Pug nose up at green beans and peas. And I admit, even though it’s not that difficult to sweep a floor, it gets rather tedious and annoying when it’s something you have to do day after day after day.

So, where am I going with this? Well, let me tell you about the Wupzey. Wupzey may have a silly name, but its purpose is quite practical. It’s a food catcher designed for use with high chairs and booster seats. A durable plastic/vinyl food catcher enhanced with Velcro and elastic enables the Wupzey to be situated underneath and around your baby’s high chair or booster seat, and keeps it securely in place.

I had the opportunity to try out a bright blue Wupzey with my son’s booster seat. My husband installed it for me a few weeks ago (don’t get me wrong, it’s easy enough to install, but my husband is better with spacial perception than me, so I let him have at it with the Velcro!), and it’s working pretty well. Any food that my son drops (or throws) falls into the Wupzey, rather than onto the floor. The food catcher can then be easily removed, shaken over a trash can and then washed and dried just like my pots and pans.

The Wupzey is $19.95, and is available in ten different colors, including a few bright patterns. You can purchase a Wupzey from Sears, Babies ‘r Us, at any of the local stores listed here, and from wupzey.com!

or…

You can win a Wupzey!

Wupzey and I have teamed up to offer one lucky In My Bag reader a Wupzey in their color/pattern of choice!

How do you enter the giveaway?
You can enter the Wupzey giveaway by commenting on this blog entry. Tell me what food you hate cleaning up the most!
You can gain an additional entry by posting on your own blog about this giveaway!
You can gain yet another entry by posting the following to your public Twitter account:

Win a Wupzey at In My Bag! http://tinyurl.com/wupzey

All together, you have three chances to win a Wupzey!

Giveaway details:
• The giveaway begins on March 16th, 2009 and ends on March 23rd, 2009.
• A winner will be randomly selected on March 23rd, 2009, and then contacted and announced on In My Bag.
• The giveaway is open to U.S. residents only.
• Only one entry per person!

Good luck to everyone who enters!

Target has carried the Method product line for several years now. I’m used to seeing — and passing by — the household cleaners, but when I saw that Method had extended their line to include baby products, I stopped and definitely took notice. Method baby products include baby hair & body wash, bubble bath soap, lotion, diaper cream, kids shampoo and kids body wash. Since my daughter is four and my son is only two, I took advantage of the baby products, and picked up the baby hair and body wash, bubble bath soap and lotion.

I have to say, I love the scent of the Method Baby products that I have. They all smell slightly milky, almost like rice, and are definitely appropriate for babies and small children. I wish I could have used these for my daughter and son when they were infants. But hey, better late than never, right?

I do have two minor critiques about two of the products: Method Baby baby hair & body wash seems to have a rather thick lather, and it takes a lot of rinsing to fully get it out. Also, Method Baby bubble bath soap does not lather or bubble very much at all.

Overall though, I like Method Baby products, and will continue to use them.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

The nice thing about cloth diapering is that it’s good for the environment and great on the wallet. I have probably spent $300 total for the cost of pre-folds for both Alyssa and Ryan (obviously Ryan is now using the larger pre-folds I had for Alyssa; she has been out of diapers since September of 2007) and cloth diaper covers. Prior to switching to cloth, Daniel and I would spend close to $80 per month on disposable diapers. Covering Ryan for disposable diapers in the last year would come to well over $400. Probably more, since he pees a LOT and thus goes through a lot of diapers.

The bad thing about cloth is the tendency to leak. Also, being in cloth diapers overnight means waking up wet, or possibly sleeping in a wet diaper. I would often go in to change Ryan in the middle of the night, because I hated the thought of him sleeping in a wet diaper and waking cold and uncomfortable.

Enter into the equation Happy Heiny’s. This cloth diapering company makes special cloth diaper covers that hold the pre-fold inside a lining. This type of diaper is knock as a pocket diaper, and is great because it pulls wetness through to the pre-fold that is tucked inside the lining, while leaving the fabric that is against the baby dry. The secret is the material that the inner lining is made out of: milled fleece. It sucks wetness through to the pre-fold, soaker or doubler that is tucked inside the lining, while it itself remains dry!

The best thing about Happy Heiny’s pocket diapers is that they come in larger sizes. Many companies that create cloth diapers do not have sizes that will accommodate babies who are larger than 30 lbs., or maybe 35 lbs. if you’re lucky. Ryan just turned two a month and a half ago, and he is less than two pounds away from 40 lbs. Obviously, this presents a challenge for me, since he is showing no signs of being ready for potty training.

The sizes for Happy Heiny’s run true to size. Currently Ryan is wearing XL, which covers 30-40 lbs. Believe it or not, there is even a XXL size, which covers 40-60 lbs. Needless to say, we’ll be buying those pocket diapers soon enough!

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

My daughter is almost four years old, and in the last three years I have tried out a lot of sippy cups. Hands down, my favorite sippy cup is the Gerber Fun Grips Color Change Spill-Proof Cup.

This sippy cup is my favorite for several reasons:

• The narrow top and wide base make it easy for little hands to hold
• The valve is a hard piece of plastic that is very easy to insert and remove
• The interior of the cup doesn’t have a lot of hard to reach nooks and crannies like other sippy cups, so it is much easier to clean and disinfect

Best of all, the cup holds up to the repeated tosses and chucks it gets from my youngest, who enjoys throwing his cup across the room or from the top of a shopping cart.

The color change (our cups go from pink to purple, blue to purple, and green to orange) feature is something all toddlers, mine included, enjoy.

The only disadvantage to this sippy cup is that its wider-than-usual base makes it hard to tuck inside standard diaper bag pockets.

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

I am officially swearing by HUGGIES Little Swimmers Sun Care Lotion, both for my kids and for myself! I picked up a bottle of this 50SPF sunscreen last year, and it has worked flawlessly. My son, who is extremely fair skinned, has never gotten even a hint of a burn or tan. My daughter does have some light tan lines, but using HUGGIES Little Swimmers Sun Care Lotion has ensured that she has never burned. This stuff feels good to the touch, goes on easily, smells nice, and is very good at repelling water. I re-apply it to my children every hour and a half, but often forget to re-apply it to myself — yet I have never burned.

This stuff definitely gets a five star rating, because it works THAT well!

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Between my half brothers, who are thirteen and eleven years younger than me, and my own two toddlers, I have tried my share of sippy cups. And by far, the one that stands the test of time, liquids, dishwashers, car rides, tosses from strollers and shopping carts again and again, and then again some more, is the original, simplistically designed Playtex Spillproof Sippy Cup.

These cups have hit the floor, ground and objects countless times, yet have never, ever cracked or sprung a leak. I highly recommend these sippy cups!

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars