The Schloss lab is growing! Ok, not really. For the first time in the history of my lab it isn’t me that’s having more kids, it’s members of my lab that are having their first kids. Of course, I’m very happy for them. I have been doing my best to not give any advice beyond my standard advice to new parents - “Don’t take anyone’s advice too seriously.” It has been interesting to watch the other people in the lab react to their colleagues news. Naturally, people want to get their colleagues a present for the newborn so that they can share in the excitement.

The problem with having your first kid is that you are dealing with an N of zero. Perhaps you’ve had siblings or friends have a kid. Until you go through the experience yourself, you really don’t have a clue. When I was in grad school (and pre-kids), my advisor and his wife had a baby. My lab mates and I thought it was a brilliant idea to “buy a star” for this new bundle of joy. Our advisor was a Trekkie and general science fiction fan so it fit. I now appreciate that this cute and utterly worthless gesture showed we cared, but not much more. Now that I’m sitting on my N of eight, I thought it might be helpful to some do have some advice from someone that had three kids while in grad school and as a postdoc living on a single salary.

Some preliminaries… Because of our culture or whatever, you (i.e. mom) generally get showers for kid #1. In academic speak, this shower is your start up package. I can assure you that this startup package may or may not cover everything you need and you will often get stuff that you don’t want or end up needing. If the parents to be are students or postdocs, it’s safe to assume that they are probably on a tight budget. Harkening back to the star, that would be pretty superfluous to a couple that is looking at the prospect of spending big money on day care, diapers, and/or formula. I realize this isn’t always “cute” or “fun”, but try to be practical. Also, if the parents to be are expecting kid N>1, feel free to help out regardless of our cultural norms regarding whether mom gets a baby shower for subsequent kids.

What do I recommend? Here’s a list of the best presents we ever received.

1. Meal train: This web app helps you to create a schedule where people can signup to bring meals to the happy family or to have meals delivered. As an organizer you should talk with the couple about foods they like/don’t like, what days they want meals to come, and what time food should be delivered. The app also lets the parents fiddle with the settings. With N=1 we were pretty lost and wound up eating apples and caramel dip and ice cream for a solid three months. For the last four kids we’ve been blown away by the generosity of people bringing us meals. Even if it’s a rotisserie chicken from the deli section or pizza, the family will be grateful. Get the family nutritious, fresh food and they will love you forever.

2. Gift card: You might imagine that the family could always use more of some baby-raising commodity - think disposable diapers, blankets, onesies, towels. But the thing about babies is that they grow fast and the family might be good for birth to 3 month items but have nothing for when the baby is 3 to 6 months. In addition on the occasion when we have used disposable diapers while traveling, my wife has had very particular tastes in disposable diapers that no one would know a priori. The solution? Buy them a gift card to your local grocery store, Wal-Mart, Kids-R-Us, Amazon, etc. Yes, gift cards are horribly impersonal, but for a cash-strapped family having a gift card to spend on whatever they want is really useful.

3. Betting pool: This is a fun activity for a group of friends that is targeted more to future baby than present baby. Have everyone in the lab donate some amount of money ($5? $10?) and put in a bet on the due date that the baby will be born. Alternatively, bet on the baby’s weight. Technically, the person that wins the bet gets the money. But then you get to think they’re an a-hole if they don’t give the money to the baby for their college fund. I have kind of mixed feelings about these games and giving money to the kid at birth. Yes, I’ve taken 8 semesters of calculus and beyond and so I understand compound interest. But, I also recall family giving us a few hundred bucks for #1’s college fund and needing that same amount of money for a U-Haul to move to my postdoc because we were broke.

4. Baby registries: Some items can be rather expensive - strollers, cribs, high chairs, car seats. These make great gifts for a group of people to buy for the parents. Like a wedding registry, the parents can set up a registry at a store telling people what they need. This is generally a pretty safe and traditional approach. Our lab chipped in together to buy some crib bedding off a registry for one of the postdocs and supplemented it with some giant microbes. Practical, cute, fun, a little creative. Again, because so much emphasis is placed on the first baby, registries are typically only created for #1.

5. Diaper service: Yes, I know, we’re weird (see the N=8), but let me add to your perception of our weirdness. For all of our kids we’ve used cloth diapers. We’ve long since stopped caring whether it’s cheaper, more environmentally friendly, or healthier for baby to use cloth diapers. It’s what we do. This also means we do a lot of laundry. A lot of laundry is not what you want to do when you have a newborn. Thankfully, many communities have businesses that will give the family a hamper and week supply of diapers and will take back a week’s worth of dirty diapers. These services get pretty pricy if you’re in it for the long haul. They are an amazing gift for the first month after the baby is born since it’s one less thing to worry about. They’re also a great set of training wheels for the parents that are entertaining the idea of cloth diapers.

Finally and most importantly, be a good friend. Having a baby is a very stressful time. Compound that with someone who is in grad school or doing a postdoc and the stress-o-meter might break. The parents may get super flaky and be half asleep at times. They may forget to wash their glassware or turn off the timer in the lab. Be kind and forgive. Also, don’t feel slighted if you aren’t invited to the hospital room to see the newborn; you probably shouldn’t even ask. Two day old babies don’t do much (and they kind of all look alike) - give the parents time to bond with baby and figure out their new life. Be a friend for the long haul by supporting them and listen to them complain about parenthood and smile for them when they tell you the latest insignificant milestone that the baby has met. I don’t remember many of the gifts people have gotten us over our numerous births, but I do remember the great friends who have encouraged us and told us that we could do it.