Five more things to have on hand: Preparing for childbirth

You can find lists of things to pack in your hospital bag for when you have your child. Or lists of things have ready in the nursery (or wherever the baby will sleep) for when your child comes home.

Here are five lesser-known things to prepare for the first days.

1. Coconut oil, vegetable oil, olive oil (thanks, anonymous commenter!), or vaseline, for putting on the diaper area so you can get the meconium off easier. Otherwise you spend about 5 minutes rubbing their poor sensitive bums. Bring this to the hospital (put it in your for-baby bag). Apply liberally after every diaper change until the meconium is gone.
2. Disposable diapers, even if you plan on using cloth diapers. Use disposables during the first few days, while meconium is coming out. You do not want to scrub tar-poo in the sink... plus, the vaseline may stain cloth. Some birth centers provide organic disposable diapers, and the local hospitals provides diapers for the stay (and you can ask to take some home), so you should not have to purchase any. Otherwise, a pack of diapers is fairly cheap. Anonymous commenter (below) suggested asking for a cloth diaper service as a baby shower gift, if you are set on using cloth diapers.
3. Disposable breast pads, even if you plan on using cloth ones, because you do not want to have to wash your bras or breast pads in the first days. The first days are for laying in bed with the new baby and having people bring you food.
4. Lots of changes of t-shirts for you to sleep in. You will sweat like a pig at night (because all of the pregnancy fluids are finally getting out), and will likely want to change shirts when you get up to feed your lil'un.
5. Rags, rags, rags for spraying breastmilk. One side feeds the baby, the other side hoses down your bedroom. Your body thinks it is feeding octuplets. I like receiving blankets and kitchen towels. What comes out is mostly foremilk, which is low on fats, and comes out in the wash.