I am not a fan of most of the nursery decorations that fill up Babies R Us and other places where jungle, princess and a bear riding in a hot air balloon themes abound. That is why I totally ripped off the design of the baby's room my friend Maggie designed for her first-born. When I visited her and her newborn, I remember feeling calm and happy in the nursery and so I ran with that, choosing the same style of crib and color of paint when I was pregnant for my son. No lamps that match the bumper that match the mobile that inspire the rug that coordinate with the diaper caddy. Just sweet colors and good feelings.
These good feelings have also inspired many other couples preparing for the birth of their children and not wanting to go the traditional nursery-in-a-bag decorating route. This, I get. These parents-to-be want to evoke some bigger wish or message for their babes, something revealing about the family they've been born into, something to create the first inklings of hope and creativity and calm, something to inspire them as they grow (or at least once they can see beyond their own little hands). This, I also get. These parents with an eye for detail want symbols and modern furniture and a place they feel is a haven for their infant who is awake every night from 1 am to dawn. Again, totally understandable.
What I don't get is why all of this needs to have a price tag of up to $15,000? I'm all for investing in great baby gear, especially sturdy and shapely cribs and sumptuous gliders and yummy sheets. But does a room that will soon house piles of talking plastic toys and cardboard tubes and Dora stickers forever adhesed to the satin-coated low-VOC painted walls need that much of an investment? Just in case the answer is a whole-hearted, curb appealing "yes!," then shouldn't the well-intentioned parents just admit that the decorating endeavor is really for themselves, even if it is in the name of the barely-born baby?
