What's in my Home Birth Kit? | Getting Ready for Baby!

Baby #4’s birth is quickly approaching and it’s time to get set up for our home birth! Yep – we’re having a planned home birth this time around! (You can read about our unplanned home birth last time here) Obviously this requires a little bit different set of preparation from having a hospital birth so I’ve been researching, reading blogs, watching YouTube videos, making lists, and getting all my ducks in a row. I thought my list of info might be helpful to others so here’s what I’ve purchased and/or gathered for our home birth kit.

(Prefer video? Scroll to the bottom to see a video of me sharing what all is in my home birth kit)

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First, my midwife has a preselected birth kit for us to purchase from In His Hands Birth Supply so I started with that for the basics. That includes:

She also gave us a list of additional things to gather from around our house or to purchase wherever we wanted. That included:

10 towels (I already had plenty of old towels around the house so I didn’t have to buy any more)
10 washcloths (I bought a super cheap pack at Target that can be used and thrown away if needed)
vinyl tablecloths (the kind that are vinyl on one side and flannel on the other – she said they were good for protecting the floor/furniture/etc. while still being relatively soft for mom and baby; I found some at Michael’s in the picnic/party supply area)
hydrogen peroxide
a thermometer
cleaning wipes (I’m using Thieves wipes)
trash bags
a birth pool liner (I am borrowing my midwife’s birth pool – not sure yet if I’ll actually use it, given how fast my previous labors have been, but in case I do I have the liner ready to go)
a lead-free hose to fill the birth pool
vinyl mattress cover (Target was sold out when I went so instead I grabbed a shower curtain liner that we can put under the sheets if we don’t get a mattress cover between now and the birth)
birth sheets (the plan here is to have one set of sheets on the bed, then put the vinyl mattress cover on…or in our case maybe the shower liner…and then put another set of sheets aka the birth sheets on top; you give birth then strip the dirty sheets (if they get dirty) and plastic liner off and voila, you have a clean set of sheets under there! I am not particularly attached to either set of sheets that I already use for our bed and so I’m not designating a set of “birth sheets” – we’ll toss on whatever set is not currently on the bed when I go into labor and those will be the birth sheets. If they get ruined, no big deal.)
2 baby hats (I grabbed two cheapies to use right away while he’s still wet and gooey and stuff, that way I won’t care if they don’t come clean, then I have some nicer, cute hats for later)
2 receiving blankets (I have plenty of receiving blankets from our previous kiddos that I don’t mind getting stained or ruined so I grabbed a stack of those, but I also bought one of the “traditional” hospital blankets from In His Hands just for nostalgia)

After watching several other home birth kit prep videos and reading blog posts I made a list of additional things I wanted to have in my home birth kit. When I ordered my midwife’s birth kit from In His Hands I also added on:

AfterEase tincture (I got mine from In His Hands but it’s also available on Amazon here, this is an herbal supplement that is supposed to help with uterine cramping after delivery)
3 peri cold packs (I plan to use these the first day along with the mesh undies and pads that came with my midwife’s birth kit, then switch to Depends + my DIY padsicles after that)
Arnica (a homeopathic remedy to help with pain and swelling)
comfrey root (I watched a YouTube video where she made a “tea” of sorts with comfrey root and put that in her peri bottle instead of just water – it looked really easy and it’s very inexpensive so I thought I’d give it a try)
8″x12″ cloth tea bags (to strain the comfrey root herbs when I make my peri bottle mixture)

Then from other places I bought or gathered:

Bio-K-Mulsion (vitamin K drops for baby)
all cotton pads (to make soothing padsicles – basically a maxi pad with soothing ingredients that you freeze like an ice pack)
witch hazel (for padsicles)
aloe (also for padsicles)
Frida peri bottle (while my birth kit did come with a generic peri bottle, everyone RAVES over the Frida peri bottle and how amazing it is so I decided to get one of those as well)
Depends (to use after I use up the mesh undies from my midwife’s birth kit; I got some at Target but there are some sizes on Amazon too)
A laundry hamper (I will line this with a plastic trash bag and use it in our bedroom during the birth for us to toss wet or dirty towels, sheets, etc. into; then after delivery I’ll use this in our bathroom with a trash bag to put my pads, Depends, etc. since our normal bathroom trash is very small)
Snacks (for during/after labor for myself, Michael, and/or our midwife – a variety of granola bar-type things and individual trail mixes)
Ningxia Red and Ningxia Nitro (I like to drink these during labor for energy plus lotttsss of Ningxia Red in the hours after delivery to help my body recover from the blood loss)
Tylenol/Advil (Yep, I am a “all natural as much as possible” person, but I do have pain reliever in my birth kit. I have only used OTC medication 3 times in the last 8 years: after my 1st baby, after my 2nd baby, and after my 3rd baby. I can handle a lot of pain and have had 3 non-medicated deliveries, but those after birth pains combined with the pain of breastfeeding in the early days is a bit more than even I can handle and so I have used Tylenol (or whatever pain reliever was available) for a few days until that part passes and I’m totally fine with that!)
shower curtain liner (another one like the one I bought for our bed but this one is to put under the birth pool as an extra layer of protection in case of leaks)
Thieves cleaner (I have the Thieves Wipes on hand but also have mixed up a spray bottle of Thieves Cleaner in case we have a lot of cleaning to do)
paper towels
Reusable underpads (My birth kit comes with a lot of the disposable chucks pads but I also bought a set of reusable ones. These serve a couple of purposes – I get insane night sweats the first few days after delivery as my hormones regulate so this will hopefully help protect my sheets so that we don’t have to change them every day those first few days. I also may start sleeping on one toward the end of my pregnancy as a safe guard in case my water breaks. They’ll also be good for putting under baby for spit up and diaper accidents. And they can be used when potty training too! So lots of handy uses.)
Squatty potty (I originally had this on my list thinking it would be good postpartum to deal with those first few bowel movements that are a little scary, but then I also heard some people say it’s good to use in labor as well so who knows, maybe I’ll use it for that too)
Heating pad
Fasciablasters and tennis balls (if needed for massaging my back during labor)
Claraderm spray (a fantastic essential oil infused spray to use on the perineum after delivery)
Labor roller (a roller of specific oils to use during labor)
Other essential oils (since we’ll be at home we’ll have easy access to my full arsenal of oils, but I did go ahead and grab a few of them to have there handy: helichrysum, Dragon Time, Valor, Surrender, and Grounding, to name a few)
Nursing access gown (to wear either while laboring or right after)
Postpartum underwear (once I’m past the mesh undies + ice pack phase and the Depends + padsicles phase I’ll switch to regular underwear and cloth pads; typically I just use my normal underwear but heard really great things about the high waistband of these postpartum underwear and how comfy/supportive they are so I got some to try out)
Stool softener substitutes (when you give birth in the hospital they give you a stool softener to help with the first post-deliver bowel movements. I have a variety of things here already that I can use so I’ll likely use one or a combination of those – Comfortone, Swiss Kriss, and/or ICP)