Planning Your New Baby's Room

Designing your first nursery is an exciting challenge. Whether or not you know the gender of the baby, you're bound to feel torn between many different items of baby nursery decor. For most parents, the hardest decision is "How cute do we really want the room to be?"

Baby nursery decor runs the gamut from cute and cuddly to super-modern and minimalist. Deciding on the design of your baby's room is only the first of many decisions you'll make for your child. The aesthetics that surround children have the potential to influence their future selves. Keep in mind, too, that whenever you think back to your child's early days, you'll likely experience a reminder of the baby nursery decor you chose.

Keeping Your House Cohesive

While the homes of professional interior decorators and furniture-makers often have carefully chosen pieces of furniture, obviously made to fit into a set together, your ordinary household doesn't usually show as much attention to detail. However, most homes do have an underlying theme, whether or not the homeowners themselves realize it. You might notice your furniture shares colors or shapes, or that you've incidentally chosen appliances of the same color. Determining the common features shared by the rest of your house, you can easily design a nursery that fits your home's style.

An ultra-modern house, for example, should have an ultra-modern nursery. Choosing minimalist and high-contrast colors and shapes for your baby nursery decor will make it feel like a logical part of the rest of your home. Imagine baby nursery decor covered with teddy bears and pink butterflies, inside a home filled with bold color and abstract shapes. Keeping your home's design cohesive - choosing baby nursery decor that shares features with the rest of your home - will help both you and your new child share a sense of logical belonging in one home.

Choosing Baby Nursery Decor

Nurseries don't usually contain much furniture, so most of your planning in the design of the nursery will be focused on the baby nursery decor. Paint colors, the arrangement of the furniture, and various decorative knick-knacks or wall decor all figure into the full design.

The baby nursery decor should be based off of one central theme or decorative item inside the room. If your child's cot blanket has a giant picture of St. George and the Dragon, you could easily base the rest of the baby nursery decor on knights, dragons, and towers. By defining the shapes and colors these focal pieces contain, you can build the rest of the baby nursery decor to match. It's that simple!

Once you've decided on a central theme, the hardest part is forcing yourself to stick to it. There are so many beautiful and whimsical pieces of baby nursery decor out there, it's difficult to limit yourself to the few you've chosen. If you find yourself re-imagining the room's baby nursery decor every time you see a piece you'd like to add, relax. You'll have a chance to re-design the baby nursery decor just about every year, as your child grows and begins to develop opinions. By the age of five or six, your child will be old enough to start picking out his own baby nursery decor.. for a "big kid" room.