This is going to come as a surprise to many, but I don’t remember a thing about my nursery from childhood.
Not one thing.
I can tell you a bit about what it looked like from a handful of 1980s photographs, and I could call my mom to ask her and report back, but my own recollection of the space is nonexistent. Can you imagine?
As I flit about from place to place when time permits, adding a new frame, a table lamp, or an accessory to our baby’s nursery here or there, I wonder what drives me to want to create a themed, idyllic space for baby to rest in. Although there’s likely to be photographs, he or she will not remember.
So is it baby that’s driving me? Or the excuse to decorate a space anew? Is it Pinterest, or pressure from some external source, or the fact that I selfishly want a calm, pretty space to spend time in as I rock, nurse and care for our littlest?
Is it the sheer opportunity to do something tangible for baby before he or she actually takes up residence in our home? A way of nesting with flair that gives me something to put my energy into, that’s specifically for this baby, and that allows me a creative outlet and distraction as time passes by?
Yes.
I actually think it’s a little bit of all of these things. Nowadays, we’re one click away from images of drop dead amazing spaces created for babies, so it’s hard not to want a piece of that ourselves. It’s also hard to crave caring for the wee people we’re growing inside without being able to do something tangible about it. Maybe creating a space for baby is an absolutely helpful part of the process of pregnancy, even though he or she will most likely want to just snuggle mom and not care much at all about the colors of the walls or the artfully crafted decor.
It finally feels like it’s time to get moving on baby’s space around here, and I think putting it off until now has been both helpful and hard. I love how change and progress in that room make baby feel closer than ever. I love dreaming about who he or she will be and trying to figure out how my inclinations for decorating the space this time could reflect parts of baby’s character and personality.
It’s fun to see a vision come together and to feel like you’ve had a direction all along, even when you didn’t yet have it in plain view.
And while decorating a nursery is somewhat superfluous and actually unnecessary, I think it can be a healing, hopeful, forward-moving exercise that reflects our natural inclinations to prepare for baby and birth.
There are a million ways you could deck out a dedicated space for your little one, as Pinterest can attest. But it doesn’t have to be complicated, over the top, or expensive to make it your own. It just has to feel like it’s right for your baby. It has to be a place you can tuck away to–one that preserves the very nature of your own new motherhood in its earliest days.
What simple words or pictures can you put on the walls that will inspire or uplift you when you see them? What colors create calm and openness and a feeling of rest for you? What can you repurpose or refurbish without too much trouble that would give a piece of furniture (and baby’s nursery) new life?
Lately I’m tossing around all kinds of ideas about a room for the Bean. Most of all, I know that I want it to feel calm, inviting and restorative, without frills or crazy expenditures.
We’re going to do a lot of life in the nursery in days to come. Granted, much of it may be in the dark in the wee hours of the night, but it’s still going to be the place where we get to know each other outside of my womb. I want it to be hospitable for baby, and I want it to be lovely for all who enter there.
I may not remember what my nursery looked like as a baby, but I do know there was a lot of care tucked inside the walls. I think if I decorate with that in mind, the rest will fall into place as it should.
a little goes a long way, but I’ve got to remind myself of it. there’s no competition as we decorate our babies’ spaces. there’s only room for love.
mm
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