Newborn Care and Routines: Sleep, Feeding and Everyday Care

Before baby

• Pick a pediatrician before the due date, and know how to reach them after hours.
• Install the car seat before the birth; rear-facing, and have it checked if you're unsure.
• Set up one safe sleep space (a bassinet or crib with a firm flat mattress and a fitted sheet only).
• Stock the basics simply: diapers and wipes, a few sleep sacks, a thermometer, and feeding supplies for the plan you have, with a backup plan that's okay to use.
• Line up help for the first weeks: meals, night support, and someone who can take the baby while you sleep.

Everyday infant care

• Umbilical cord stump: keep it clean and dry until it falls off, usually within a few weeks.
• Baths: sponge baths until the cord falls off, then a few baths a week is plenty.
• Temperature: a rectal thermometer is the most accurate for young babies. A fever of 100.4 °F (38 °C) or higher in a baby under 3 months means calling the pediatrician right away.

Sleep

• Newborns sleep in short stretches around the clock. Day-night confusion is common and fades over weeks: bright, social days and dim, quiet nights help.
• Safe sleep every time: alone, on the back, in a crib or bassinet.
• Watch for sleepy cues (yawning, staring, fussing) and the short awake windows of the early months.

Feeding

• Feed on cue. Early hunger cues are rooting, hands to mouth and lip-smacking; crying is a late cue.
• Wet and dirty diapers and weight checks at the pediatrician are the best signs of enough intake.
• Burp during and after feeds; spit-up is common and usually harmless when the baby is growing well.

Routines

• A predictable order of events (feed, awake time, sleep; a short bedtime routine such as bath, feed, song, bed) helps more than a strict clock in the early months.
• Routines are a scaffold, not a test. Growth spurts, illness and developmental leaps change them.