I want to take the time to say a bit more about our, if not first, then flagship product - our Baby Milestone Cards. Because getting this product to market marks a milestone in itself for Nested Fox.
We are a relatively new business and a very small one. We started out in January of 2018 with me, Kristen, as the Director, my husband acting as the accountant, 2 freelance graphic designers that I use on a regular basis, and of course we've been nurturing our relationships with the factories where are goods are made.
Although we managed to get some of our Nursery Decor items up and ready for sale as our first products it was really the Baby Milestone Cards that started it all. I had of course seen a number of these sets around being used by other mums I'd met since having my son in January 2017. I liked the idea of them but I was never totally in love with the design of any of them. Some of them I found a bit too cutesy, and juvenile for my taste. Obviously you could say that's being a bit harsh given we are talking about a product for babies so there is every reason for them to be juvenile! But that was how I felt anyway, I also thought too many of them fell into the classic blue for boys, pink for girls dichotomy which I have a problem with anyway. The Nested Fox Milestone Cards are stilled obviously illustrated for babies and children but I hope they appeal to parents too, at least that was part of the aim in designing them.
I noticed as well when looking through the list of cards available in the different sets that there always seemed to be something missing - for example most of them had a card for 'I rolled over!' but do you use that when your baby rolls on to their back - which usually comes first? Or when they learn how to roll on to their front- the harder of the two accomplishments? I also figured if I was going to use a set of these cards I would probably want some more personalised options. So basically I dithered for quite a while until my son had passed a lot of these milestones and I hadn't bought a set of cards...but it had left me with a lot of ideas.
I started sketching out ideas - my son loved spotting the birds with me in the garden and I have always loved trees and hot air balloons as motifs, so that was the start and the rest of the ideas sort of flowed from there. I really liked the idea of having a tree grow from a tiny sapling at 1 week old to a full leafy colourful tree for My first birthday.
I ended up collaborating with a graphic designer who was amazing at listening to all my ideas, notes and endless edits and colour changes to get the cards exactly how I had envisioned them. This process took some time but in the end it was finding the right printer and going through various samples of paper quality that took the longest time, especially as all of this was done while looking after my son full time.
But 8 and a bit months later here we are and I've finally got my precious milestone cards up on our website for sale and also on sale on Amazon UK (whoop whoop!). Just in time for me to use them for baby no. 2 (due in late December this year - gah!).
One of the cards I was most excited to include was a special personalised one '___weeks in/___weeks out'. 
This one needs some explaining for some people but it came from a number of posts I was seeing on social media of mums posting a picture of their babies when they were 9 months old with the caption '9 months in/9 months out', I liked the idea of this (although I never saw a card like this in any milestone card set on the market), but in my case I felt it would diminish how long I was actually pregnant - my son was 2 weeks late, so he was born at 42 weeks and a day in the end, which meant that actually I'd been pregnant for 10 months! And of course I know plenty mums who had their babies early, some quite early so the cute 9 months in/9 months out caption wouldn't quite work from them either. So this card is my answer to this. Most mums count how old their babies are in weeks for a lot longer than they admit to and this is just a fun age to commemorate with a photo whenever that week comes up for you that your baby has been out in the world for as long as you carried them.
The set has 50 cards, the largest offering I've seen on the market so we think it has all the age and development milestones, holidays and other firsts you would expect, but we've also included some other unique cards we haven't seen anywhere else:
- I rolled on to my back
- I rolled on to my tummy
- I started cruising
- My first flight
- My first time in a restaurant
- My first playdate
- My favourite toy (with space to write in)
- My favourite book (with space to write in)
and some personalised cards so you are never stuck without a card when a moment arrives that you want to remember:
All of the cards are printed on a lovely matte laminate surface. They are perfect for using a sharpie and some regular ball point pens (if you press firmly) to write the date on the front and lots of space on the back to write a message to your baby or notes about what you remember from that day. When you've taken all the photos you can pack the cards away in the keepsake box and bring them back out when your baby is all grown up to read to them about all their exciting firsts and achievements.
The box also includes space under the lid to write your child's name and key info about where and when they were born:
We've also included a handy table of contents so you know what cards you have still to use.
This post is already longer than intended so I'll just end it with a photo of all of the cards laid out so you can see what is on offer. I hope these will appeal to some parents as much as they do to me.
x Kristen
Director, Nested Fox Ltd