Nursery Chat

willashbaby

Now that we're at the end of the first tri and moving on to the second   Time for nursery chat. Ask questions, share ideas, go for it!

notvincent

Now that I'm looking at my third baby and third nursery, I'm getting lazy and cheap. I think we're going to get stuff from IKEA (or similar). Cribs all have to meet the same standards, so a cheap crib is just as safe as an expensive one. I'd like to get a changing table, too. I had one with my son but not with my daughter, and I found having one to be pretty convenient. So, crib, changing table, dresser, 2x2 storage cube thingy from IKEA. Painting the walls a color that will hopefully work for several years.Curtains. Lamp. Pull the glider from my daughter's room into the nursery. That's about it! Done and done.

gh1219

For the BTDT moms, has anyone foregone a nursery?  Or for those who had a nursery, was it used a lot in the first few weeks?  I'm going to have one but I don't think it will be ready in time, based on how we are spreading out our new house furniture budget over time to soften the blow.  I was going to have the baby in a bassinet in our room for the first few weeks anyway.  Lots of my friends in NYC with small apartments are not having a nursery and just wanted to see if it is going to be absolutely necessary to have it done in time. 

karmba

We'll be using DS's old furniture (crib, changing table/dresser, glider) in the nursery.  It's all dark wood, so if this baby is a girl I'll need to lighten up the room a bit with linens and decor.  Our spare room will need to be painted and the spare bed moved out.  If it's a girl I really want to do an accent wall with wallpaper - but it's going to take a lot of convincing to get DH to help me put it up, he's not a fan.  I'll buy curtains, a few decorations, and knit a blanket.  That's pretty much it!

willashbaby

@gh1219 The only part that really matters for an infant is a safe sleep space. We live just outside of NYC and our "kids room" is actually a small office with NO closet. And I mean SMALL, it's about 7x9". We originally had DS in our room in a pack n play at night but he was so noisy sleeping that he constantly woke us up, and I don't mean crying, just grunty and noisy. After 2 weeks we moved him into his room so it was nice that it was done. No matter what, if your kid will eventually sleep in their own room it doesn't hurt to have it ready enough for them to sleep in, you never know when you'll want to try it! For this go we will keep the baby in our room longer since we don't want the baby to wake up our Son. We're getting a Snoo and we'll sleep with ear plugs if we have to. We will move the Snoo into the "kids room" ASAP. 

willashbaby

@notvincent TOTALLY. We generally just buy from Ikea anyway, kids DESTROY furniture. Even for our first we didn't spend much, maybe $200 on a crib with a changer. It was white, he chewed the shit out of that crib all over. We dumped it and went for the unpainted Ikea Sniglar this time around! It fits right under his Ikea bunk bed. The room has no closet so we made open shelving to hang clothes with Ikea shelves and a kitchen rail. Done and done. 

karmba

@gh1219 DS slept in a pack n play for about 5 months after he was born before we moved him to his room/crib.  For this baby - we'll paint the room before it's born, but won't move the spare bed out and set up the crib until further down the line.  I want my mom to come help and need somewhere for her to sleep haha.

BmcD2016

@gh1219 totally reasonable to not have a dedicated nursery space for a while. All of my kids have roomed with us in a pack n play/ bassinet setup for the first few months. 

I’m not sure I’ll get a chance to decorate our nursery until after baby is born since we don’t know when our build will be complete. 

JBcakes08

This is our 3rd and we live in a 3 bedroom house. So right now my daughter (2) and son (1) each have their own room. Sometime late summer/early fall we'll move my son into my daughter's room (it's bigger) and they'll share while the new baby gets my son's current room. I'm pretty apprehensive about the transition to room sharing! They're both good sleepers usually, so fingers crossed. 

My son's room is painted a light blue and we will not be finding out the sex of this baby so I'm going to make it a stars and moon theme so I don't have to repaint LOL. My kids are both still in their cribs so I'll have to get another but that should be my only furniture purchase. Going to move the glider back in there and keep the dresser in the room/re-assemble the changing table. I have some major closet organization to do since my kids will be sharing.

@gh1219 I can only speak for myself but both of my kids slept in their cribs in their own rooms the night after we came back from the hospital. (With lots of getting up in the middle of the night on my end, but their room was only a few steps away - we live in a 1 story) That is just what I chose to do personally, but I have friends who definitely had their babies sleep in bassinets next to their beds for awhile before moving them to a separate room. 

@notvincent I love having a changing table. I had several friends who told me it was a waste of money when I was having my first baby but I bought one anyway and was glad I did! I'm a fan. 

laurenspdx

@gh1219 We’re in a somewhat similar boat. Our current house is full with the other kids (two teenagers so there’s no way we’re combining them now) so we don’t have a room for baby. We’re going to turn our walk in closet into a little sleep space for the first few months (we’ll probably take the door off to start. Any suggestions for fitting the essentials into a tiny space are welcome!

We’re looking to move into a bigger space by the time baby is old enough to need their own room.

readermom1

We’re planning on moving 2 yo dd in with 5 year old dd and getting the old toddler bed out of the basement for her. The 5 yo has been asking to share for a year, so she’ll be very happy! If the baby is a girl, we’re done. If it’s a boy, DH will repaint the nursery and change out the wall decor and bedding. The benefit of having had a boy and two girls is that we already have everything we need either way!

readermom1

@gh1219 All you really need for baby is a place to sleep, a place to change a diaper, and a place to feed the baby. Consider where you want to do those things. Some people don’t mind changing the baby on the floor or feeding baby in the bed. Others are more comfortable with a changer and a chair (like me since I have a bad back). If you’re short on space, but want a changing station they have pack and plays with a bassinet feature and a changer. 

readermom1

Sorry for the triple post, I keep remembering things I wanted to add!

@karmba if your DH doesn’t want wallpaper, would he consider a stencil? I ordered one off Amazon for my 5 yo dd’s feature wall and my husband painted it when we did her “big girl room” last time I was pregnant. Sorry it’s sideways!😂

thankfullyamama

I have a 4 bed two bath home and it’s just DH and I so I’m going to have some fun decking out the nursery! When we moved in last year we totally renovated the place so it’s a blank canvas! I am however a minimalist so I just want a few basic things like a crib, dresser (that I’ll put a change table top on), and a rocker recliner as well as blackout curtains and an area rug! 

dreamscapes_

We’re on a budget and have a 2br apartment, and might be moving when the baby is about 3 months old. So we’re basically just going to be combining our office/storage/craft room with the baby’s stuff. We’re planning to just get a crib (convertible, with the kit) and a wide dresser, maybe a bookcase. All things considered, they don’t need much in the way of furniture yet, so that’ll help given the space and budget constraints. 

dreamscapes_

Oh, I forgot, sorry for the second post. The bedding we want is a classic Pooh Bear theme. It’s unisex and adorable, and we’re both big Disney fans 🤣

jchpg

I didn’t have a nursery for my first, we were in a small apartment. I wanted to have her sleep in our room as long as we could stand it. I used a Chico Next to me crib and LOVED it. I’ll get something similar for this one. We will also get an IKEA changing table. We just change DD on the floor now, but it helped a lot to not have to bend over with a baby, so I’ll do it again this time. Otherwise that’s it.... I love the idea of painting and decorating, but I just don’t have the bandwidth to do it now.  In the end it’s more for us then baby, so I’m going to hold off. Maybe as a treat when it’s time to have DD and baby share a room we will let DD pick a paint color and go from there. You’d think I would be more excited to decorate now that we have the space- but the drive just isn’t there! 

shelmcclel

We are in a house with fairly small bedrooms in a 3br/2ba and turning our guest room into a nursery and my office into a combined office/guest space with a day bed. The nursery is really just so we have a place to store everything at first because our plan, at least, is to have a bassinet in our room for some time. I wfh full time (even with coronavirus isn’t around) so I need some dedicated work space when I go back to work, but giving up some of it so we have that extra bed. Going to try to sell some of the furniture we currently have to put toward the new stuff. 

Our house is 96 years old and we’ve been waiting for a reason to have to redo the ceilings in both extra bedrooms - they are in rough shape and estimate we got says they’re from the 1940s or 50s. We always said we’d do it before a baby, so this is time to get some necessary renovations done also. 

Plan is to get a convertible crib, changing table/dresser combo, and a glider with ottoman so I think I can do the baby’s room for a fairly reasonable price. 

I just signed up to use Havenly for a virtual interior design - have always wanted to do it and so thought this was as good a time as any. It was $99 and supposedly they give you ideas within your budget. We’ll see how it goes. I have a lot of ideas and just want to have a baseline to kind of work from. If it doesn’t work out well, I think they have a money back guarantee but figured this wasn’t much more expensive than a night out to dinner with a couple of drinks (which we aren’t doing right now), so could splurge a bit on something fun.

When is everyone planning to put the room together? I was thinking of starting the renovation stuff beginning of September so that I could start putting in the furniture by early October. 

thankfullyamama

@shelmcclel I was planning on buying/ ordering everything in September too so I can have it done by October! Then if baby comes early we are ready 

dobiemom11

I think we might do a space theme.  Gender neutral and something we both like!  We have a little room right off our bedroom, but thinking we will probably have the baby sleep with us for a while.  Although we will have to see...my husband is grumpy when he doesn't sleep.  

conni0205

My 16 month old DS and this new one will share a bedroom. The first 6+ months new baby will be in a bassinet next to our bed but we will be getting another crib for new baby/maybe giving new crib to DS since his has the changing table attachment which we wouldn’t get next time. His theme is under water so that theme is gender neutral even if the room is blue. If it’s a girl I’ll just make her side more girly if it’s a boy it will match DS side exactly. 

mom_of_the_vogels

We moved in November and decided to put sons 1 & 2 in the same room right away so we had an extra guest/future baby room. Also, all 3 bedrooms were *awful* with cat pee carpet and terrible paint jobs in visually offensive colors. We got the master & boys room updated by Christmas and I finished the third one in February. All the same neutral wall colors with nice plank flooring.

So, between now and the end of October we're going to transfer son 2 from a crib to a toddler, then a big kid bed with rails to free up the crib for baby. Not so much because we'll need it right away, more so kiddo 2 doesn't see us giving "his" stuff to baby. If he's out of it before there is less chance of jealousy.

I already picked up a second hand changing table because the table we used before has been repurposed. Hoping I can finally get the family heirloom rocking chair from my Mom she offered up before kiddo 1 was born. Big closet means no dresser, and possibly making some simple wall art. We stay pretty neutral for sleep spaces so there isn't much to do.

The biggest challenge: cleaning out the third bedroom which quickly became the catch all for my craft supplies immediately after being finished 🤦‍♀️

Room sharing note: our boys (4 & 21 months) enjoy sharing a room and get to sleep pretty easily at bedtime after a few minutes of "whisper" time BUT they straight up goofed around and refused to nap. We ended up hanging a single hook on either side of the room at fairly inconspicuous locations (next to the window behind the curtain and beside the closet) and at naptime we hang up a "dino curtain" (shower curtain from the old house) to prevent toy tossing, peek-a-boo, and other nonsense. Worked like a charm 😊

willashbaby

I like neutral backgrounds with pops of color. The walls are a light beige, floors (just redid those a few months ago) are kind of a greyish beige plank, I just ordered new frames for the art. We already had some navy so I'm adding lime green into the mix. Everything else is natural unstained wood or whitewashed wood. My 4YO LOVES Marvel so there's a whole wall with marvel decals, oh the joys of room sharing!

danife

We’re going furniture shopping today with my MIL! Right now I kind of like the gender neutral animal theme with pastel colors, husband also likes that idea. However, if it’s a boy we will probably go space themed, that’s his preference.  We bought our house a year ago (4 bedroom) we have our master, guest room, and office set up. The 4th room is FULL of everything from the move that we didn’t know what to do with, we’ve been slowly clearing it out and will have to add poles/shelves to the closet because there’s nothing in there.  Right now it’s a neutral gray so we may add an accent wall. Hoping to have more energy in the second trimester!

sejica

@gh1219 for both of my previous 2 pregnancies I prioritized painting so that the smell would dissipate before the baby came home. As to furniture, we used a pack n play in the family room for naps for our second, mostly to keep big sis away, but they are pretty useful, and portable, and not super $$. We have done montessori style floor beds for both since about 4 months, so never used a traditional crib. We do have a bassinet that they sleep in the first 4 months, but put that wherever is working for everyone. The flexibility is nice, because all babies are different.

As for us, I don't know if this 3rd baby will get their own room. The 3&1 year old are struggling to go to bed in the same room, but the 3 year old demands to sleep with brother, so idk. We have another bedroom, but I like to keep that as my mom's room when she comes over. If we redo it, it will be rocks and boulders below the chair rail and a blue sky above. DD is the Forrest/meadow. DS is the 'water' room.

antera23

We live in a tiny 2 bedroom apartment. This baby doesn’t get a nursery, lol. We will have him or her sleep in a pack n play next to the bed. I need to figure out how to arrange our room to fit the rocking chair that is currently in my sons room. We hope to move to a house soon so when that happens this LO will get their own room. 

willashbaby

@antera23 if you find yourself staying longer you might want to do a crib under a bunk. That's what we're doing!

charmedlifex3

We are going to do a nursery in master for the first year. I will probably set up a nursery in our spare room for after that, but I am torn on what to do. We have my son's room (12x12) and the current guest room (12x20) - I wish we could easily cut the guest room in half, and have a nursery / keep a guest room. A baby does NOT need that much space. The kids will be 4.5 years apart, so just a little too far to easily share I think. I thought about doing a room divider in the larger room, and having the kids share the bigger room, but I jut can't come up with a good solution. 

willashbaby

@the_road_to_oz our gap will be nearly 5 years, they're sharing, lol. You can always give it a chance and switch later if need be. 

hham10

This is our 4th and I’m actually looking forward to doing something new for this baby. My first and third are both boys and I used everything from my first for my 3rd. We will use our hand me down crib and dresser but plan to paint and do some board and batten in the nursery. My plan is to do an all around the world theme because we love traveling, exploring, and adventures. I’ve never had a changing table but thinking about getting one, although this bedroom is definitely my smallest. 

We actually use our nurseries basically from day one so we will have to have it fully ready! I’ll probably start projects around 20 weeks or so! 

knottie1577b3941fd2a2c3

If you want to design and visualize your nursery I recommend designwithfriends.com. It's super easy to use and totally free!

akoros

We moved in March and had the house freshly painted and somewhat renovated before we moved in, so no big changes. The baby's room (currently an office/den) is a golden yellow and will stay that way, so I'll probably just buy some cute wall stickers to decorate. Probably animals, my husband really wants the forest animals from South Park but I don't think they quite make those. The room itself is large, so initially we may see about keeping my husband's desk in there and have them share until that won't work. He/she will definitely be sharing their closet with our overflow clothes until they're old enough to notice/complain, it's a huge closet. Kid can sleep in a bassinet or pack'n'play in our bedroom when he needs to use the computer. We'll need to rejigger the furniture arrangement a bit, because he plopped his huge desk right in the middle of the room for some reason (bugs me because it's not an efficient use of space...but I'm never in there so I let it go). I mostly want to do this because I know my parents will want to come and stay for a while, using up our 3rd bedroom/family room, and he'll need a place to escape. Beyond that haven't done any solid planning but most likely getting some sort of dresser, convertible crib/bed, and shelving for books/diaper supplies. Ideally either the dresser or shelves would have room for a changing table/area on top. Will probably also get some blackout curtains as it's bright in there, even at night since it overlooks a lit courtyard. I'd like some sort of rocker/glider, but we'll see as that's a lower priority. I have a lot of friends with little kids, so once we share the news I'll reach out and see if anyone has stuff they want to get rid of.

@sejica, I love those walls!

antera23

@willashbaby I love that idea! It’s such a space saver. I wish we could do that but my son will only be 18 months when the baby is born so it will be awhile before he’s ready for a bunk. 

akoros

Oh man, just realized I could really go with the forest theme. Some of our current decor includes hiking maps my husband hung up on the wall. With tree decals, and perhaps a mountain decal we could leave those maps up and go all in. With the gold wall it could be a "sunset"/dusk mountain scene

willashbaby

I finally was able to go to Ikea yesterday! I got the shelf, trones, and changing table. My 4YO built the changing table with me yesterday so he could "practice" with his baby doll. It's basically what we did all afternoon. I think I changed 5 cloth diapers on a doll so he could watch and learn, lol. I also ordered a ruggable for the floor in the kids room. I learned my lesson toilet training him, get something you can easily wash!

jbal918

We were hoping to rent a 3 bedroom by now but we signed the lease for another year because I’m afraid to go look at places with all that’s going on. DS has his own room and DD will be in our room and then next August, we will look to rent a bigger 2 bedroom for then or a 3 bedroom. We also want to buy but we might wait so that if something breaks, the landlord is to fix it and then once DD is out of daycare, buy so we have more of a cushion. However, if the market crashes like it may, we might scoop that up to buy a 3 bedroom.
Long story short (LOL) - Her nursery will be in our bedroom for the time being. 

gingkomama

@jbal918 We had our oldest in our room until about 15 months and hadn't set up the nursery at all! She won't even miss it 🙂

We have kind of an odd house layout. We have one bedroom (currently a guest room/office) and the first floor and two bedrooms (master and toddler's room) on the second floor. We know baby will be in our room for awhile, but we haven't decided what to do after that. Moat likely we will be looking at them sharing a room and trying to figure out how to fit that furniture in there. We will also probably have to clear out half of the dresser space for baby. 

thankfullyamama

I feel like most mommas here are doing the sleep in same room thing! Anyone going to go all out and do a full on baby room!?? 

shelmcclel

@tryingktogku we are doing a full baby room mostly as a space for her things and as her room, but she’ll be sleeping in a bassinet in our room to start. 

bearmomma1

@tryingktogku we are doing baby’s own room. We had DD start sleeping in her own room after 4 months. Before that we had her start taking naps in there to warm up to it. We’ll probably do the same for this babe. Babies can be loud sleepers! Not just from crying, but just generally grunting and noise making. Plus around 4 months they start to become more aware of their surroundings so other noises/lights can easily wake them up. Makes getting into and out of bed difficult or trying to get ready for work if there’s a sleeping baby in there ☺️

thankfullyamama

@bearmomma1 @shelmcclel that’s good to know! I’m not sure if I should have baby sleep in our room or not now and I’m having the hardest time putting together a nursery in my head! I had a solid plan for a girl but now that I know it’s a boy I just can’t see it!