A little girl's nursery

I am starting to have a few mini panic attacks about having everything ready for baby girl. When I was pregnant with Colton, I had a plan. I researched nursery "themes" and looked for hours upon hours, and settled on a nautical theme fairly quickly after we found out the gender. Of course, I had much more time to research and choose, back when I had no job and no child, and we lived in a new place where I barely knew anyone at first!  I knew which exact bedding I wanted, Blake by Nautica. We are renters, and so I knew his walls would be plain colored, which helps a lot when deciding on what to get. By the time I was 31 weeks along, which is how far I am now, I pretty much had everything figured out. We had purchased or been given everything we knew we needed, or had a plan of when to purchase it. I did spend the last month doing all of the finishing touches, but that was completely intentional. We moved during the last two months of my pregnancy to North Carolina, and Brad almost immediately left for a month of no contact training, SEER school (Survive, Evade, Escape and Rescue school - basically POW school). But I had a complete plan. I was calm, mostly, and extremely excited about getting everything ready and perfect for our upcoming bundle of joy to change our lives forever.

The bedding we picked for Colton's room. Isn't it adorable?!

This time, I have a bit of a different perspective. I do not have hours upon hours to sit and research what exactly I want to do in the nursery. I have a sweet little boy who keeps me more than busy, and hates when I sit down at the computer. The limited amount of time I have spent trying to research and decide, has left me frustrated and discouraged. Needless to say, I keep putting everything off. But I now feel like I am at the point where I just need to make a decision and stop stressing. As much as i want her nursery to be absolutely perfect for her, as great as it makes me feel to have everything "ready" to welcome her into our hearts, arms, and home, I know it just isn't going to happen. The nursery I pictured whenever I would think about having a little girl is NOT coming together. I completely understand that not having everything perfect will definitely not change how much we love her, want her, and are excited about her. But I still want her room to be planned and prepared for her!

My favorite fabric for baby girl's room

So here is my dilemma. We moved into this rental home, that we absolutely love, and have a two year lease. To paint a room, we have to pick a color, submit the color and plan to the property management office, and they will pass it on to the home owners. The home owners then have the option of agreeing to the paint plan, or nixing. The owners live in Germany currently, and don't seem to be the easiest people to get ahold of. Also, we really just don't want to paint. So baby girl's room color is: light pink. And yes, all of the trim in her room is dark pink, including the two closet doors and the hallway door. It is a pink overload! I am all about pink, honestly, but I don't know if that room can handle any more pink without feeling like the inside of a pepto bismol container! So I need to find bedding that incorporates the pink, while not BEING pink, if that makes sense. My thought has been to not buy a bedding set, as the AAP now recommends no bumpers anyway, using a plain colored crib sheet, and picking the fabric I want to make the crib skirt. Also, I want to make the curtains to either match the crib skirt or coordinate with it. But I just can't find material I like, in my  price range! Here is a sample of the one I am absolutely in love with, but at $30/yard, it is definitely NOT practical! Plus a 2 yard minimum on each order, I just can't get it. Not even for a little "pop." But I love that it has the two colors of pink from the room, plus a pop of tiffany blue in it - I love tiffany blue in a little girl's room!

So I am on the search for fabric. Cheap, sweet, not entirely pink fabric.


But I did find a crib mobile I love that I think I can recreate (it's from Etsy).  It has the birdies that I love and want in her room, with enough dimension and contrast to be very visually stimulating. I imagine it will take quite a bit of time to cut all of those birdies out, in two or so different card stocks each, but this may actually be a project I can work on while Colton is awake. If he is coloring at the table next to me, he is usually fairly content with me doing something a bit different than him, as long as I am next to him. So as soon as I pick fabric, I will get the paper to match and start on this cute bird mobile!

Can you tell I am trying to do this nursery on the cheap? We are using the dresser/changing table from Colton's room and purchasing him a new dresser. The crib that matches the dresser will also be in baby girl's room. We purchased Colton a new crib that converts to a toddler bed, so he will be in that. Actually, we didn't purchase it new - we purchased it from someone, but it looks brand new. Their baby decided to be a complete co-sleeper, and now that she's 3 and has slept in it less than a handful of times, they decided it wasn't worth it to keep it. Score for us though! We will be using the glider from Colton's room, we have his old swing and vibration chair for her as well. She gets to use his car seat, luckily it's gray and green so no worries about it being too "boyish" :) Really, we haven't had to purchase very many things for her at all so far! My mom's sister has a daughter who is turning 2 soon, so we have been given all of Mayli's hand-me-down's from when she was tiny, so baby girls wardrobe is pretty set. :) We will probably purchase a few things, since I have never gotten to shop for a girl before, but it's nice to know that we don't have to! So really.. I don't know why we are stressing. Lots of little things to get (girly paci's, blankets, swaddle blankets, maybe a few girly toys, etc.) but none of the "big stuff" besides bedding and curtains. And I have right under two months.

Two months.

Oh gosh, if I am going to be sewing something, I better get on it. I only have two months.

If you're still reading this, give yourself a pat on the back. You have just read my repeated rambling thoughts for the past week. Sorry it's so long and not that interesting!

Loves, Jessica