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May 2017 Moms
kat81
member
help me figure out where the baby will go
kat81
member
I could use some advice on how to arrange our house for the baby. Our house is big enough (thanks, Dad, for asking "do you have enough ROOM?" when we announced the pregnancy) but we are trying to figure out the best arrangement in the short and medium term.
We have a 3BR. Downstairs we have a smallish living room, a good sized dining room, a smallish kitchen, a playroom and a half bath. I don't want to change anything about the downstairs, but the playroom can be a bedroom in the future when everyone is much older and wants their own bedroom.
Upstairs we have the 3 bedrooms and one full bath. Two of the bedrooms are pretty big. One is the master bedroom and the other one is an office with both of our desks in it plus some other kid-related stuff, like a trampoline, train table, and bookshelves. The third room, which is significantly smaller, is a shared bedroom for DD and DS. Their stuff -- two beds, two dressers and a small bookshelf -- fit well but snugly. They started sharing in September and we never really made our office (DS's old room) the perfect room, hence why it is a bit of a hodge-podge.
In the immediate term, we can put a pack and play in our bedroom for easy overnight access. But I'm torn about where the rest of the baby stuff will go (changing table, crib if we want to set it up right away, dresser/clothing, nursing chair/glider that has yet to be purchased.) We absolutely have room in our bedroom for a crib, but I don't think we can fit the rest of that stuff. The baby could take the office, but should we move the office stuff out or would it be some weird combined room? We have room in our bedroom for one desk. We could also make space in the kids' room if we get a bunk bed (which they REALLY want anyway), and then there would be room for something like the trampoline to go back in there...or, if we're crazy and once the baby is a bit older, there would be room for all 3 to be in one room, though we'd give them the bigger current office room.
I'm currently thinking this is the most likely arrangement, but let me know if you have further thoughts:
Master bedroom: move one desk in, plus pack n play but no other baby stuff. Pack n play would possibly be awkwardly in the middle of the room, but this would be just a short arrangement until the baby goes to his/her crib overnight.
Kid bedroom: leave as-is, or get bunk beds and move in some of their lingering toys that are currently in the office.
Office: put in the rest of the baby stuff -- crib, dresser, changing table. Move out any lingering kid stuff and put it in the attic, playroom, or kid bedroom.
I could also use advice on how to manage the downstairs once the baby is somewhat mobile. When our older two were at this stage we lived in different spaces in which we could set up a giant baby cage play area. Our current home doesn't have a large space like that except in the office room upstairs (the playroom is kind of small and the older kids use the whole space). I'd prefer a downstairs place for the baby to be so I can be close while I'm doing things like getting breakfast or dinner ready and/or I'm with the older kids in the playroom. The best would be the living room but we like that it's sort of a kid-stuff-free zone, and it's kind of small to begin with. It's also the first room when you enter the house. With the cage thing set up, it would literally be hard to walk around it. We love that our home has separate rooms for living, dining and kitchen unlike the open floor plans that are so popular today, but for this particular purpose it makes things really tricky. We are super excited for this third kid, but I am NOT looking forward to the first 2 or so years while this child is a crawling/walking hazard.
We have a 3BR. Downstairs we have a smallish living room, a good sized dining room, a smallish kitchen, a playroom and a half bath. I don't want to change anything about the downstairs, but the playroom can be a bedroom in the future when everyone is much older and wants their own bedroom.
Upstairs we have the 3 bedrooms and one full bath. Two of the bedrooms are pretty big. One is the master bedroom and the other one is an office with both of our desks in it plus some other kid-related stuff, like a trampoline, train table, and bookshelves. The third room, which is significantly smaller, is a shared bedroom for DD and DS. Their stuff -- two beds, two dressers and a small bookshelf -- fit well but snugly. They started sharing in September and we never really made our office (DS's old room) the perfect room, hence why it is a bit of a hodge-podge.
In the immediate term, we can put a pack and play in our bedroom for easy overnight access. But I'm torn about where the rest of the baby stuff will go (changing table, crib if we want to set it up right away, dresser/clothing, nursing chair/glider that has yet to be purchased.) We absolutely have room in our bedroom for a crib, but I don't think we can fit the rest of that stuff. The baby could take the office, but should we move the office stuff out or would it be some weird combined room? We have room in our bedroom for one desk. We could also make space in the kids' room if we get a bunk bed (which they REALLY want anyway), and then there would be room for something like the trampoline to go back in there...or, if we're crazy and once the baby is a bit older, there would be room for all 3 to be in one room, though we'd give them the bigger current office room.
I'm currently thinking this is the most likely arrangement, but let me know if you have further thoughts:
Master bedroom: move one desk in, plus pack n play but no other baby stuff. Pack n play would possibly be awkwardly in the middle of the room, but this would be just a short arrangement until the baby goes to his/her crib overnight.
Kid bedroom: leave as-is, or get bunk beds and move in some of their lingering toys that are currently in the office.
Office: put in the rest of the baby stuff -- crib, dresser, changing table. Move out any lingering kid stuff and put it in the attic, playroom, or kid bedroom.
I could also use advice on how to manage the downstairs once the baby is somewhat mobile. When our older two were at this stage we lived in different spaces in which we could set up a giant baby cage play area. Our current home doesn't have a large space like that except in the office room upstairs (the playroom is kind of small and the older kids use the whole space). I'd prefer a downstairs place for the baby to be so I can be close while I'm doing things like getting breakfast or dinner ready and/or I'm with the older kids in the playroom. The best would be the living room but we like that it's sort of a kid-stuff-free zone, and it's kind of small to begin with. It's also the first room when you enter the house. With the cage thing set up, it would literally be hard to walk around it. We love that our home has separate rooms for living, dining and kitchen unlike the open floor plans that are so popular today, but for this particular purpose it makes things really tricky. We are super excited for this third kid, but I am NOT looking forward to the first 2 or so years while this child is a crawling/walking hazard.
Re: help me figure out where the baby will go
How old are your older kids? we bought bunk beds for the boys, ages 5 and 2 and the minimum age requirement for the top bunk is 6, we ended up splitting the beds into 2 twins for now because even if DS1 is close enough and capable to get up top, DS2 wants to do EVERYTHING that big bro does and we knew he would want to climb up top all the time.
Is the play room downstairs big enough to add the office furniture?
ETA: I somehow forgot DS2's age, oops.
11.2011 - DS1
02.2013 - loss at 6 wks
06.2014 - DS2
10.2015 - loss at 12 wks
03.2017 - DD
What if you moved the 2 kids into the larger bedroom that is the office. Move office stuff into master and pack and play. Turned kids bedroom into baby's room.
Do you have a basement?
DS2 5/17
#3 Due 9/20
1st Baby 5/12/17, Henry
I recently had had to get rid of our playroom space to make room for the nursery. I was worried I wouldn't be able to find room for all the toys but I got those under the bed storage containers that have wheels and I was able to put three under each of my girls beds! It holds so many toys and is still organized!
Sweet Baby H 12.21.11
Sassy Baby P 03.26.14
Little Brother Due 05.22.17
I would either put the office stuff in the downstairs playroom or if you guys have room in the master maybe place some office stuff in a corner in there.
1/7/2015 Twins born @ 34 weeks
@nda_roxybabe @chickyclg --
The playroom definitely CANNOT accommodate any more furniture or office stuff. It will be tight to figure out how to have it accommodate baby toys alongside bigger kid toys and trying to figure out how to keep the bigger kid stuff safe from the baby. We like having a smallish playroom so we don't have bloat of toys, but yeah, the room is definitely way too small to fit something big like a desk.
We have one tiny finished room the basement. I think our office desks are too nice to go down there...like they could get messed up or something. Right now that room is kind of filled with junk but I want DH to clean it up (mostly his) / move the junk to the attic so it can be a more useable space. But even then I only see it for my tap dance board and stuff like that. I'm not yet sure how to fit it in with the rest of what we're considering.
That is interesting about changing table supplies on all levels. I have enjoyed using a table in the past for the surface of it, and was one of those people who used a table longer than most (a lot of people give up after their kid is toddling around but I always liked it until the kid was totally out of diapers.) I think I will still want a table. But we will probably want supplies on in other locations, too.
Master with pack n play, no office stuff (maybe changing table for middle of the night changes?)
Make office the kids' room with extra baby stuff, so kids' room is the bigger room, and get bunk beds to maximize space
Move office into smaller room but keep it just office stuff so you have more livable space in your master
We also have a partial finished basement with one room that is mostly finished. We moved all of our office stuff down into that room. It allows us to still have room for our stuff even though it's not the "nicest" room. I'd rather have our office stuff separated from the kids rooms.
We have DD1 and DD2 in the larger bedroom with two twin beds and their play kitchen, and small dresser. Their room is really not big at all but it works. My two are 5 and almost 3 so i wasn't comfortable with bunk beds. I've also used under the bed storage containers to house barbies, dolls, dress-up, Legos, anything that was going to be too small/fragile for new baby. Like I said above, I could fit a total of 6 under the bed boxes in their room so it freed up a lot of the toy storage.
New baby will be in the smallest room (10x9) We will have a crib and a dresser that doubles as changing table. We also have a daybed in there that is going to double as our guest room (we live 2000miles away from all family). Since we need the guest room space, the nursery glider wouldn't fit so it's in our master bedroom.
Sweet Baby H 12.21.11
Sassy Baby P 03.26.14
Little Brother Due 05.22.17
I think we could put one desk in the master and then either punt on the other desk (leave it in the same big room with the baby stuff and keep the kids where they are) or go with your idea and actually get rid of one of the desks (or put it in the basement or attic where it might get hinky from weather.
This isn't far off from DH's idea, but his is much less realistic. I asked him for his opinion and he said, "why don't we just keep the kid in our room for longer than we typically would?" I said, "yes, I agree, but where do we put things other than the crib (or pack n play)? We need to have the crib/pnp, changing table, diaper pail, and glider/nursing chair, and that's not including a dresser for clothing." He was like, "that will all fit in our room!" I was like, "HOW?!" I'm convinced he has no spatial reasoning!