Luke’s Nursery

I love Luke’s nursery.

Before he was born, I would just sit in here and look around, smiling and praying for him and daydreaming of holding him.  It’s such a sweet, peaceful space.

It’s the smallest bedroom in the house.  And the darkest.  (These pictures were taken on a particularly sunny morning with the blinds pulled up…and some camera trickery).

It’s the perfect little place for a nursery.

Before we knew the gender, I was convinced we were having a girl.  And I had her nursery all planned out in my head.  I decided on white furniture because dark furniture in a small room just makes a room look smaller and darker.  There was also going to be pretty floral patterns and touches of gold accents.  I could “see” it all perfectly in my mind’s eye.

Theeen we found out we were having a boy😉  And I couldn’t “see” a boy’s nursery design the way I could see a girl’s.  I was stumped but then decided to simply replace whatever I had originally intended to be floral with gray.  Good ole faithful gray.  And it all came together pretty quickly after that.

I still kept much of the furniture white but decided on a classic brown dresser to “boy-i-fy” the room and to tie in with the brown frames above the crib and the lamp behind the chair.  I use the dresser as a changing table too.  It stores Luke’s clothes as well as diapers and works great in this small space.  I also like that it will grow with him when he is no longer a baby.

I would like to replace the pictures in the frames with pictures of Luke.  For now, we have some maternity pictures up and one of Matt as a little boy.

My dear friend and college roommate Kelly asked me what Scripture I had been praying for Luke and made me this lovely print.  To see more of her work, you can check her out at Chickadee Art and Company.  She does great work and is one of the sweetest people you will ever encounter.

I also love Ephesians 3:17-19 — Oh, that Christ would dwell in Luke’s heart and that he would be rooted and established in His love!  That’s my biggest hope for him.

I didn’t care to have a theme (like sailboats or sports).  But I did know that I wanted his nursery to have lots of books.  As a teacher, I cannot overemphasize the importance of having many books available and read often to little ones from an early age everyday.

I remember learning in one of my elementary ed classes in college that the main predictor of a child’s later reading proficiency is how often he was read to before the age of 4.  Isn’t that interesting?!  That has stuck with me.

To the mom who is reading that same Dr. Seuss or Mother Goose book for the gazillionth time and is getting tired of it, take heart!  There is great purpose in what you’re doing! (besides the sweet bonding time)  Rhyming helps build phonemic awareness and is an important pre-literacy skill that I would check for with my incoming first graders at the beginning of each school year.  If one of my 6-year students had difficulty producing rhyming words or identifying and manipulating (adding, deleting, or substituting) individual speech sounds in one-syllable words like “cat”, reading was often an uphill battle for that sweet child for the rest of the school year.  But there’s always hope!  Learning challenges are certainly not dead ends.  Children are persons after all, and each progresses at his own pace.  And for some, it just “clicks” later.  And then they take off!  Soo exciting to see.

That said, rhyming and reading aloud often to young children is invaluable and not fruitless, and I wanted Luke’s nursery to be filled with quality books:)   Nursery rhymes!  Fairy tales!  Poems! Books!  Books!  Books!

The large basket by the chair is perfect for holding the nursing pillow, extra blankets, and stuffed animals.

What’s in the other baskets, you ask?  For now, toys (some he can use now, others for later) and burp cloths.  In the future, I foresee those baskets holding different things like matchbox cars and army men, maybe a baseball mitt?

As for burp cloths, MY GOODNESS we go through a lot of burp cloths in a day!  Luke is what they call a “happy spitter”.  Spitting up doesn’t seem to bother him, but it sure keeps me washing burp cloths regularly.  A friend of mine suggested using cloth diapers as burp cloths.  Nice and big and absorbent.

Speaking of my happy spitter, here he is!  Mmmm…I just want to squeeze him and kiss those cheeks!  He recently transitioned out of our room to his crib.  I’m so proud of him.  Good job, buddy!

So that’s it!  That’s Luke’s little nursery!  Thank you for visiting us!

Where things are from!

• Chair and ottoman:  Babies R Us
• Pillow:  Ikea
• Large basket by chair:  HomeGoods
• Bookshelf with baskets: Ikea
• Curtains: Ikea
• Crib: Pottery Barn Kids
• Frames above crib:  Target
• Dresser:  Amazon
• Mirror:  Target
• Box used as diaper caddy:  HomeGoods
• Wipeable Changing Pad:  Amazon (Keekaroo)
• Book ledges:  Ikea
• Letters banner:  Land of Nod
• Rug:  RugsUSA
• Sweet Baby:  God 🙂