Making Room for Baby

With Christmas less than a week away and the new year right around the corner, I can hardly believe that in about 5 months we will have a newborn in the house!  It seems that this pregnancy has been flying by, and May will be here before we can blink.  I have to admit, the thought of having 2 little ones under the age of two is a little scary.  It feels like we just started to get the hang of this parenting thing, and before we know it we will be starting again from square one. 

We just started to plan out the logistics of the bedrooms and the nursery, which has started to make it very real that our new bundle of joy is coming.  With Dylan we must have looked at a million and one crib sets and went back and forth on whether or not to do a "convertible crib."  I of course, wanted the beautiful sleigh crib that converted to a full sized bed...which in my naive pre-baby mind, envisioned him using throughout the years.  Luckily in the end we decided on a regular Graco crib that looked nice, but didn't cost us an arm and a leg (under $150).  Good thing, because as soon as my son could pull to stand, he started gnawing on the sides of the crib, scraping the wood off with his teeth!  We have since covered the sides with plastic protectors.  Anyway, I am pretty sure that even if the crib converted to Lamborghini, Dylan wouldn't be using it anytime after the first few years.

As for the changing table, I had never been fond of the design of a traditional changing tables.  After being married to my husband for 3 years, I have learned practicality is the spice of life.  And we decided on an IKEA dresser (under $80) that was a good height to put the changing pad on top.  The best part is that we will use it long after he is out of diapers. 

I had always wanted some sort of rocking/gliding chair in the nursery so that I could have a comfy place for nursing or rocking baby to sleep.  Well if you have ever looked into the price of new arm chairs or gliders they are pretty pricey.  I knew that I couldn't justify spending $300-$400 on a new rocking/gliding arm chair.  So luckily I was able to find a gently used arm chair with a rocker bottom on craigslist for $50.  It was red and blue plaid, which I have to admit was hideous, so I bought a armchair cover online for $30 and for about $80 I had a perfect chair for the nursery.

So if we learned anything from the first time around, it is that you can plan for the perfect looking nursery to bring baby home to, but after a few months, it really doesn't matter how much or how little you spent on the furniture or the bed linens.  Oh by the way, we never even bought a crib bedding set.  You can't use the quilt unless you are planning to hang it on the wall, and the bumper needs to come out before baby starts rolling.  I bought two cute valences from Pottery Barn Kids on clearance for $10 each, and a matching crib skirt for $15.  So if you are willing to shop around and get a little creative, you can put together a cute nursery without compromising your little one's college fund.