Baby A.'s First Nursery

As we prepare to move to our next stage of military family life, I keep getting nostalgic about little things, like how I felt when I found out I was pregnant, or the first few days of Baby A.'s life. One of the things that makes me a little sad is that he won't get to spend any more time in the room that I designed for him! So, I thought I'd do a post about his sweet little room :-)

When we were still in the first trimester, hubs and I kept wondering about just how adorable our little girl would be, and what she'd be into, and how we would raise her. Then we learned we were not having a girl at all, but a boy. Even though we were soooo sure we'd be having a girl, I'd tried to keep to keep my mind open to the possibility of a boy, and when it came time to start thinking about all the STUFF you have to get for a baby, I thought neutral. I like greys and clean lines, and I have always believed any room you sleep in should be very calming in tone and color; so, even if we'd had a girl, the nursery wouldn't have been that bubblegum pink explosion that annoys me so much, anyway.

I had to re-tool a few of my original nursery desires, like the daydreams of placing my little princess in a round crib with a halo-like canopy curtain falling gently around it, and apparently, my birds-and-feathers-and pops-of-jewel-tones theme wasn't going to cut it for my husband's son (I argued, it's not girly, it's for a BABY!!). 

Another thing I had to keep in mind was the very thing that makes me a little sad today, which is that we aren't at this house forever. We rented for our time in Alexandria, and while the home we've been in is lovely and charming, it's not ours to keep and I couldn't do anything too permanent.That being said, I hadn't changed anything in this house to suit my own style, and my nesting instincts told me that this was my chance to let my Inner Designer shine, haha.  Luckily, the room I wanted to use for the nursery, which is the smallest of our guest rooms, didn't have any real furniture in it and was already painted a subtle grey. 

I'd started where we all do- on Pinterest- and I found that room on the left, above, and I just really liked the feeling of it. I half-heartedly attempted to copy it exactly before I realized that I wanted the room to still be my own, and something more original. A lot of the essence I wanted to bring to the room was rooted in a slightly vintage, more natural look, so we did some antiquing and found some interesting stuff like the adorable bird drawer pulls (which I found cleaner, cheapers replicas of on eBay) and that cool copper duck. I ended up with a sort of woodlands-flow, with lots of cool little animals everywhere, like a fox handle on the closet, bunny sheets, and a mix of warm woods and cool neutrals- even though I think I was trying to get in a bird theme that my husband was not into! He drew a sweet little bunny for the room, though, and it matches his cottontail sheet from Boll & Branch. 

                       

I had gotten this kind of strange frog prince at the beach in Delaware with hubs a long time ago, and it felt right after we learned we were having a boy to let him have a place of prominence among the shelves in baby's room. Also, I still adore the rain cloud mobile I got from an Etsy store called Nifty Neat, even though Baby A. only just recently started to notice it!

Once we got his crib set up, I really felt like the room was coming together. We went pretty plain so that we could make other details stand out more easily, plus, like I said earlier, I don't like bedrooms to be too eye-catching or distracting. We found this cool, no-numbers clock to put above his crib, and the gentle tick-tock is very soothing while I'm rocking Baby A. to sleep. 

I don't know what it is about me, but even though I love gallery walls, I can't design them for my life! Seriously, it must be something about my need for absolute symmetry and order that makes it hard for me to get that look where all the photos don't sit along the same line, but it still looks so good. I took so much time rearranging items like the ones above, adding and paring down the amount, measuring and re-measuring the space I had, and tons of second guessing myself before I finally got what I felt worked... and of course now that Baby A. is getting older, he's getting pretty handsy with the items that hang low enough for him to touch while we change him! So we'll definitely have to re-work the gallery part at some point. I have always been obsessed with keys and lighthouses, so keys did make it into the design, but sparingly and only when they were vintage-looking. The feathers canvas didn't make it and is still in our basement with our other un-hung artwork from the old house. I also asked hubs to paint that coral owl a taupe that falls in between a grey and a tan, depending on the light. 

Gallery wall final product- phew, it was tough for meI

I have also always enjoyed blanket ladders, but couldn't find one I liked for cheap enough, so we just made one ourselves. It's definitely not functional as an actual ladder, and we never got around to painting or staining it because I liked the regular wood look, but it does a fine job of holding a few of his MANY blankets! He was given a lot of receiving blankets, plus some Aden+Anais muslin swaddlers which were his exclusive coverings for months. We also had a dear friend hand-knit us the softest, thick, grey throw that I keep on the chair because it's so lovely and soft. Baby A. loves to touch it and I can't wait to tell him about how it was made just for him.

The carpet was from Home Depot, and it was one I'd had my eye on for a while because the color is called Ethereal Grey, which I'm all about! It is so soft, but very difficult to vacuum because it is so high-pile, it's practically a shag. It's totally worth it, so I have been working to enforce a no-shoes, not-a-lot-of-dog policy in that room to preserve the carpet and to minimize the amount of dog hair that Baby A. consumes. We found a pretty basic grey glider on Wayfair, and it works well because it's small enough to fit into our smallest bedroom. 

Fortunately, the homeowners had outfitted all the closets with amazing Elfa organization systems in them, so figuring out his closet space was super easy. I bought a few cloth cube bins that now hold smaller toys, extra bottle and pump parts, and bath supplies. I'm an organization nut so the closet was ideal, especially since his dresser doesn't hold that much. Recently, I moved in a plastic, three drawer stand in the corner between his dresser and crib to house his excessive cloth diaper stash. His dresser holds mostly clothes that fold easily, and of course his changing station on top. His closet has all of his dressier clothes and jackets that didn't fold as easily, as well as his shoes, hats, extra diapering accessories, crib sheets, towels, and wash clothes. It definitely took some time actually using his room with him actually in it for us to arrange all of his stuff in the most efficient way (we didn't move him from our bedroom until he hit 6 months). What's so funny is that now we have a good system in his tiny [but cute] room, and we're only a few months out from having to pack it all up and move. I'm excited to have a new space to spread out in and possible redesign based on Baby A.'s interests, but I will certainly miss his very first home, where we first brought him home and learned all about this amazing little guy who we love so much!

A panorama of the room as it was mostly complete (check the drill!)

Well, I hope you enjoy checking out my nursery as much as I enjoyed putting it together!

-Big A.