Summer Infant Mother's Touch Deluxe Baby Bather

I was pretty nervous about bringing Pickle home after she was born.  Our old townhouse had three levels; I was afraid I was going to drop her while walking up stairs.  I was afraid I was going to hurt her while taking her shirts on or off over her head.  I was afraid of sleeping situations, and everything else.

I was also a bit afraid of giving her baths, because what if I dropped her?  I had a sprayer in my shower/bathtub, but would it be too harsh on her sensitive little skin to spray her with it?  

I had been discussing this all with my great friend Amanda prior to Pickle's birth, and she let us borrow their infant bathtub (which we still have for you, Amanda!).  It was sort of like this model (LINK), except theirs was nicer and looked less flimsy:

It had a sprayer for a baby shower, a bathtub, and so on.  You put the water in the little bathtub, then used the sprayer, which was incredibly gentle.  I LOVED this bath in concept, but the problem was that I never realized we could have done this all by putting the bathtub inside of the regular bath - we were filling the tub, taking it out into the middle of our bathroom (which was too small for this whole setup), giving a bath, then lugging the tub back to the big bathtub to dump it out.  Since my husband was working second shift then to minimize our daycare needs for Pickle, and I was post C-section trying to do this by myself often, this wasn't an incredibly ideal situation.  

I did some research, and found the Summer Infant Mother's Touch Deluxe Baby Bather at Wal-Mart or Amazon (LINK):

It ran about $16 or so, which was a lot cheaper than most of the bigger tubs on the market.  The back reclines to three different levels (sort of like a La-Z-Boy for the bathtub), so you could recline it more for newborns, and then raise it as the baby got older.  Even though that mesh on the sides is pretty sweet, I probably wouldn't recommend using it after the baby can sit up on his/her own, even if you can keep a hand on the child at all times.  

The back was mesh, so basically you can just set this in the big bathtub, fill the tub, and water will come up through the mesh and warm baby's back and butt.  Any water you need to pour on the baby just drains down through the mesh instead of needing to be drained/wiped down later, which was convenient.  I just would leave the chair in the bathtub for a couple of hours to dry after each bath.  It folds in half to store without taking almost any room, too, which was also incredibly convenient in our small space.

I didn't find this incredibly convenient to lean over the tub and do, however, as we had a bathtub with the rails for sliding doors in it - so that ended in a lot of sore armpits.  So, here's what we had to do:

(You may notice the strong family resemblance.)

I don't care if it seems weird that I drew myself in a swimming suit, I don't even want cartoon nudies of myself on the internets.  Anyway - I ended up having to crawl into the bathtub with Pickle and bathe her that way.  It also felt more secure safety-wise to be lifting her head up to wash her hair from the front, rather than from the side, while she was so slippery.  Also, I think I made less of a mess this way, which was also nice.  (Side note - I sort of wish our old tub had been this modern looking, I would have liked it a lot more.)

So, all told - if you would prefer not to put a little tub into a big tub, or you're not smart enough to figure it out until three years after your child is born (or, more practically, you want to save some money), this is a really solid solution.  I think we still have it hanging around somewhere, and would likely use it on another child.  I liked the fact that it was a chair, and that the baby wasn't just lying on the floor of a tub.