Activity Gym - Necessary/Recommendations

MadHatter17

Hi!  I had a question about activity gyms.  Is everyone registering for one of these?  Do babies really use them?  Any recommendations out there? 

CrazyToast

I was told to register for one - and I did - and no one bought it (which was weird because it was fairly cheap!).  We bought it for ourselves w/ gift cards.  I have no idea if you actually need one, though.  This is our 1st child.

blondbomber23

For us, yes it has been a must have. There's not much available to keep your LO busy at the 1-3 month age because they often times can't hold their head well enough to use things like jumperoo or exersaucer until 4 months. My LO never cared for the swing or bouncy chair, but always wanted entertainment. The playmat has been a great purchase for us, as she still uses it daily at 4 months.
We have the Fisher Price Rainforest activity gym and LO loves it.

amstep

We definitely used ours for DS1!  For DS2, we have bought the FP Rainforest one, and love it.  BRU/FP had a buy one get one half price sale a few weeks' back, and we bought that and a mobile and got free shipping from BRU, as well.

Coleslawcat

It's one of the few toys your baby can really use for the first few months. I loved having ours, if only because it kept the baby happy for a few minutes while not in my arms so I got a short break. I never used it for more than a few minutes at a time with either child, but those few minutes were very helpful. I have the Baby Einstein gym with the light up music star.

karen42779

This is the one we got, the Baby Einstein Ocean Adventure Gym. LO isn't here yet, so I can't say how fun it really is, but it looks like lots of fun to me and DH! There are lots of explorable features and seems to be very entertaining. Clicky below picture.

Baby Neptune Ocean Adventure Gym

kinger06

We got SO much use out of the play gym in the earlier months.  I recommend that you get one.  The one we have is made by Bright Starts and it was about $35.  It is very portable, we brought it from room to room and over to grandma's house a lot.  Now that she is older, I removed the toys and she enjoys teething on them so I guess technically she is still using it.

JayKay2387

DD loved the playmat we bought her. It had lights, and music, some toys attached and more hooks to attach more of your own. I could lay her down for 10 minutes while I did the dishes or whatever, and she was perfectly content. We plan on getting one for #2 too.

Lux_Diva

Coleslawcat:

It's one of the few toys your baby can really use for the first few months. I loved having ours, if only because it kept the baby happy for a few minutes while not in my arms so I got a short break. I never used it for more than a few minutes at a time with either child, but those few minutes were very helpful. I have the Baby Einstein gym with the light up music star.

I have this one too and it is hard to find (only at Walmart that I know of).  What I love about it is that this one and the Ocean one comes with a pillow that is great for tummy time.  We REALLY struggled with tummy time and this made the difference.  But as my mom said  :"we used to just get down on the floor with a blanket and some toys..."  So I agree, there are ways to get around this.  You can buy a good play mat which might be cheaper.  as far as linking toys, your baby could use his bouncy chair or you could hang linking toys above your car seat.  I think this is a nice to have.