Home Birth Supplies Checklist

Parents’ minimum supply list:

Six to eight (6-8) clean bath towels (more, if planning a water birth)

Two (2) sets of clean sheets (see instructions for making the bed, below)

Ten (10) clean washcloths

One (1) medium bowl for the placenta

Four (4) large black garbage bags

Four (4) kitchen-sized garbage bags

Five (5) infant receiving blankets

One (1) thermometer for you and baby

One (1) bottle of hydrogen peroxide

One (1) bottle of rubbing alcohol

One (1) unopened bottle of olive oil for perineal massage, if desired, it is also good for using on the baby's bottom for the first few days to keep the meconium from sticking to them

One (1) large cookie sheets or pizza pans (to make a portable birth tray)

Heating pad, microwaveable heat source, or hot water bottle

A complete baby outfit including: a warm gown, an undershirt, socks and a hat

Birth Supplies Kit

Your Water Birth Everyone having a home birth with us should order the Delphine Silvermoon basic birth kit.  For those who want a water labor or birth, you must also order the Delphine Silvermoon water birth essentials kit.  These kits are custom-made for families birthing with us. 

Click on the "shop by midwife" menu to the left of the page and find WV, Delphine Silvermoon.  Email me for the code to get a 10% discount!

Baby medications--If you choose to have erythromycin ointment for the baby's eyes, you can request that from your pediatrician or family doctor.  Here is a wesite where you can order a basic birth kit and add Vitamin K shot if you want that for your baby. www.birthwithlove.com It can be found under Silvermoon, Delphine.

All of your birthing supplies and kit(s) you order should be in your home and ready for your birth by our 36 week home visit.

Home Birth Registration packet--FREE from your county Health Department – Please be sure and go pick this up before your 36 week visit. This kit contains the birth certificate application, health information pamphlets and hearing screening info. 

Food for yourself and the birth team – it helps to keep everyone’s energy up during a long labor by having some good nutritious snacks on hand. Soups, sandwiches, salads, boiled eggs, cheese, peanut butter, crackers, and fruit are all good choices. Non-citrus fruit juice for mom helps keep the labor energy going. Gatorade is also an option. (Don’t forget coffee for the midwives!) It is also nice to have a meal in the freezer for after the birth. Birthing women are usually hungry after all that work so it helps to have food ready and on hand.

Important things to know and have:

By 36 weeks, have all the supplies gathered together in an easily accessible place. Please show your birth team where everything is, when we come to your house for the 36 week visit, so we can find things quickly if needed. We will also bring midwifery supplies, so think about where you would like us to set up our equipment, too. Some things (like towels and washcloths) you may not be able to spare from your household, so make sure you always have a clean supply on hand, ready for use at a moment’s notice.

Your bathroom and the planned birth room need to be kept as clean as possible after 37 weeks. Birth is not sterile by any means, nor is the home setting designed to be, but it does make for a much more comfortable, safe environment for the area to be as sanitary as possible.

Prepare your bed. First, use your better pair of sheets to make up the bed for your postpartum recovery. Then lay out the plastic-backed sheet (included in the birth kit) or a plastic shower curtain on top of your "recovery sheets," making sure to cover at least your side of the mattress. Last, re-make the bed again with an older pair of sheets (you may want only a fitted sheet) that you don’t mind getting soiled. After the baby is born, it is quick work to remove the soiled sheets and the plastic and have a nice clean bed for you.

The midwives need at least one clean, flat surface on which to set the birth supplies. That could be an extra little table, a dresser top, or some other similar surface. This is where the cookie sheets come in – we can set our supplies on them making a portable birth tray, and then carry them from room to room to follow you wherever you want to be for birth.

Make sure there is plenty of hot water available come birth day, whether in the hot water tank, or heating on the stove. For non-electric stoves, it is helpful to show the midwives how to start your stove in case it is needed.

In the wintertime it is a nice extra touch to have a blanket or two available for the midwives to use. Sometimes a long labor requires us to catch a little sleep and a warm blanket is always very welcome.

If you have older children that you plan to have present for your birthing, please be sure you have one person on your birth team (usually a friend or family member) whose sole job is to be tuned in to them.  Most kids do great at home births, but they should have the option of other activities in case they need a break from the intensity of birthing energy.  Prepare them for birth in the weeks before.  Consider watching home birth DVDs together and discussing them after. 

"You do not need permission to let your baby out.  You will know when it is time to push, because you won't be able to NOT."