Image from Babies’ Rooms: From Zero to Three by Winfried Heinze.

While I absolutely love blogging I, unlike many other bloggers, am sort of reluctant to share a lot about my personal life. Which is why I have failed to mention up to this point that my husband and I are expecting a baby—a girl in fact, who is due to come into our lives early next year. We are beyond excited about our first child and I decided to announce the pregnancy on theSCOOP now because of 1) said excitement and 2) baby-centric thoughts that will likely affect some of my post subjects over the next several months!

I promise not to overdo it, and for my own sanity and yours, I will keep my “regular” posting in the majority…but I’m also hoping to get feedback from you dear readers on nursery décor, announcements, baby items, books, etc. All the design-related things we normally discuss, but with a baby in mind!

And so we begin with the nursery design evolution. Now in my second trimester, this is the perfect time to begin “putting together the nursery”. This task is easier said than done—partly because I can’t make up my mind about the room’s color palette. So I’ll walk you through the process of my thinking, then ask for your thoughts.

Room designed by Angie Hranowsky; featured in House Beautiful March 2007. Photo by Timothy Kolk.

My inspiration began with the image at the top of this post (walls and furnishings in a girl’s room featured in the book Babies’ Rooms: From Zero to Three by Winfried Heinze) and the image immediately above (color palette in a room designed by Angie Hranowsky). I loved the pale lilac walls and the framed out molding in the first image, and in the second the additions of the golden yellow, coral and pinks. I found this Florian Sand fabric from Lewis & Sheron, and pink leather pouf from Tazi designs, and decided to incorporate the fabric into flat Roman shades and a tailored crib skirt, and have the ottoman for the baby to climb/roll around on down the road.

So with a basic idea of color palettes and textures, I began investigating furniture options. Most people build a nursery around a crib, but I found this Luca Glider by Monte Design with which I fell in love (I think, because not a store around me carries it, and I will have to wait until my next Chicago trip to test drive the actual glider in the store). The pink pillow I found in Jonathan Adler’s collection for Bed Bath & Beyond, but it appears to be no longer available, so I have to find something like it. I thought the little Moroccan side table shown in the Babies’ Rooms image was adorable, so I found this Garnet Hill table that fits the bill (perhaps, because the avocado color doesn’t fit with my initial color palette, but it might still work).

Finally we approach the topic of cribs. I have narrowed down my decision to the following two, a classic Jenny Lind from Babies “R” Us and the modern Loom by Nurseryworks from Giggle. Two very different yet simple styles, and yet I think they would both work. Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on the crib you prefer) the Jenny Lind costs about $400 less than the Loom, which will likely factor in to our final decision.

This brings us to the DIY furniture projects. The Luca Glider is going to exhaust almost all of the budget and so rather than buy a lot of additional pieces, I would rather work with some that we already own. The rendering of the dresser above represents the “finished” version of an old Ethan Allan dresser that was handed down to us and is currently out of use. I plan to give it a coat of high-gloss white paint, trim the edges of the drawers in black, and switch out all the pulls with these Anthropologie Chain handles. Put a changing pad on top, and some kind of sleek container filled with diapers, etc. next to it, and we’ve got a changing table with storage!

White/green chair photo from Turquoise.

I love the vintage chair in the Babies Rooms image, so I found this chair (above, right) on Craigslist for $20. The white chair next to it somewhat represents what I plan to do with it: paint the frame high-gloss white, then have the upholstery updated without tufting and with piping added. If I decide to go with the avocado Moroccan side table, I might even stick with a green tone for the upholstery because it looks so fresh against the white frame.

Now the really FUN part…the accessories and real “baby” stuff. The shop Giggle carries lovely wooden toys such as the Baltic rocking horse, pastel giraffe and sheep mobile. Stationery designers Binth created this beautiful numbers poster that might tie all the colors together. And the simple Ikea Lack bookcase offers a ton of storage for all the books I am hoping to accumulate for our daughter’s library, plus a few other accessories.

Now, to pull it all together…what do you think? I suppose the major unanswered question revolves around the color palette. Does what’s shown here (lilac, golden yellow, avocado) work, or should I aim for the inspiration photo’s palette (lilac, golden yellow, coral, pink)? It would require finding another side table, perhaps Ikea’s Lack table in pale pink, and choosing an alternate color for the vintage chair’s upholstery. Thoughts on that or the scheme overall?

Thanks for bearing with me throughout this extraordinarily long post, by the way!