One of the questions I get asked A LOT is “does your nursery have a theme?” To which I respond: “Oh, we don’t have a nursery for him.”

My husband and I live in the sweetest, most wonderful two bedroom, one bathroom apartment. And while I could demand he shut down his office and we turn it into the nursery: that would ultimately be the worst decision ever. Anthony is a filmmaker and spends at least 6hrs a day in that office, even when he goes into his 9-6 ‘day job.’ To have him, and all that equipment, out in the living room would make me insane. One of the things I love and admire most about Anthony is his absolutely unwavering work ethic. So for me to dismantle a space he spends more time in than anywhere else in the house felt completely wrong. Regardless of how much he offered.

Plus: here’s the thing with babies: THEY ARE SMALL AND DO NOT NEED MUCH.

I worked as a childcare provider for over 15 years, and I can tell you: what your baby needs is not some giant toy animal, or their name painted on the wall. What your baby needs is for you to hold them, food to be fed to them, and love showered upon them.

We won’t be co-sleeping with the baby: but let me make it clear that I am not at all against that. It’s just that well, let’s just say when we were dating, I would sleep pressed against the wall to avoid getting accidentally punched or elbowed throughout the night. And when we moved in together my ONE demand was a king size bed. So while I am NOT one that feels co-sleeping is dangerous…it is definitely safest for our son to not share a bed with his sleeping father.

I remember when I got pregnant and people started asking me about the nursery, part of me felt a little ashamed that we didn’t like have this BIG room with this BIG crib and this fantastic rocking chair and all these like paintings and toys and stuff. And then I remembered: none of that matters. What matters is our son is loved. I’ll probably say that a few more times in this post, because it’s important for us as new mama’s to be to remember that fact.

So, as my pregnancy progressed and it got more and more real: I did what we all do when looking for inspiration on how to have a space for baby, I went online: Instagram, Pinterest, Google, and every single example I saw was one in which their “small space” was…not small. They had a big closet they could take the door out of and put a crib in, or a huge area they could place a changing station and a crib in, or even a corner of a room with a big cozy chair and a bassinet and a changing table. That isn’t the reality of the space we have: and so I was left to kinda just figure it out on my own.

So what do we have in our room? A small closet that is all mine (hubs keeps his stuff in his office), a gorgeous king size bed, two beautiful dressers(one next to my side and one at the front of the room), and a little nightstand on Anthony’s side. Just enough room to open my drawers and the closet and walk around our bed comfortably. It is a room for sleeping, and other married things. No tv or any of that: I have always made sure that energetically our room is a place that fosters relaxation, love, and rest.

One huge blessing was that we didn’t have to think of buying a bassinet because my best friend has a Snoo she lends out to new mama’s. And, I had those two dressers: so really, once I looked at our room: I realized we had MORE than enough space for the first 6 months of our little man’s life.

Since there is no way we are the only couple on earth with a less than massive space for our newborn, I wanted to share with you how and what we did to create a sweet area for our little man in our space.

The first thing I did was pick one of my two dressers to give to my son. As I mentioned: there’s a dresser next to my bed, and one at the front of the room: so I decided for night time changes and stuff, it would be easiest on me to just use the dresser next to my bed: which I’ve had since I was 15! So, one day when I was home placing orders for an Arbonne special release and we broke the internet (new fizz flavors are no joke), I was hit with a Marie Kondo Nesting Surge and I completely emptied my closet and both dressers out onto our bed, and spent about 6 hours letting go of the things that didn’t bring me joy anymore and making sure my baby had his own dresser for clothes/diapers/baby things, as well as a space for me to clean his little buns!

It felt SO GOOD to get that all sorted out. I found the measurements of the changing table we registered for, and placed a pretty printed towel where it would go just to help me visualize it in the space.

After that, I was trying to figure out where to put the Snoo, and a friend made a good point about not putting it in front of the dresser drawers because they could open up in an earthquake. Which then of course just totally freaked me out about anything hanging above him lol

Also: the Snoo wouldn’t fit between me and the dresser AND then I wouldn’t even be able to use the dresser. So, I got the measurements of the Snoo and realized it fit perfectly beside the dresser against the wall. At first I completely panicked “Omg I’m gonna have to get up and take 2 steps to get him instead of roll over?!” Then I realized I sounded like a crazy person, so the decision was made!

Once I knew what the placement of his bed and where his changing area would be, I knew I still wanted to make it HIS somehow. At first I looked at cute canopies we could hang from the ceiling over his bassinet, because while I wanted to find a way to designate his space, I also did not turn OUR room into a BABY room. Because it’s still OURS, we are adults, and we are married.

As I mentioned: my friend unintentionally freaked me out about things hanging above him because we get earthquakes, so I knew I didn’t want like shelves or frames on the wall. So I started looking into cloth options: and really all I could find were banners or cute felt mobiles…I wasn’t into the banner idea and we aren’t using a mobile with his Snoo. So I hit a bit of a rut and then IT HIT ME: Cloth tapestry! And I thankfully remembered this amazing website Society6 where they have so many different types of art and artists, so I went on and they legit have a “cloth tapestry” option when you search. Anthony and I really love nature and outdoors, and I am a HUGE animal lover and activist so I decided to search for “Nature.”

Eventually, I saw it: this gorgeous tapestry with a humpback whale and clouds and ships and it just was EVERYTHING I wanted for his space: dreamy, sleepy, filled with beautiful imagery and included an animal.

It was also HUGE which I LOVE because I knew it would go perfectly above his changing table (all about measurements). I added it to our registry immediately!

Once my friend was able to drop off the Snoo: it certainly made it even MORE real: seeing where he will be sleeping, knowing that it’s getting closer was truly surreal. Having the Snoo in it’s place also helped me look back at that space and wonder what I could do above it that would tie in with the tapestry: I wanted something simple and sweet.

I thought of maybe a gorgeous dream catcher, or those super trendy woven wall pieces. And let’s be honest: Urban Outfitters also has the coolest stuff that I usually won’t let myself buy, but this is my baby so I figured I’d look and see what they had. AND GUESS WHAT?! I found this very simple moon and star copper “banner” that I knew would be light and easy so it wouldn’t fall anywhere, wasn’t too distracting, and still felt very dream-like.

They also had this cool ceramic moon phase wall hanging. In my brain I figured I would like stack them above the Snoo, when they arrived: it was very clear the moon phase one was too heavy, but I didn’t want to get rid of it because it felt too empty with just the copper. And honestly, I really did love the combination of both the copper with the ceramic. As you can see: a lot of how I figured this all out has just been trial and error. I ended up placing the moon phase banner on the side of the moon & stars just to have it up, and realized that all I needed was another moon phase wall hanger for the other side! So I ordered it right away, and it happened to arrive around the same time as our tapestry! It’s the sweetest little area for him that ADDS to our space: it differentiates his spot, and yet keeps our room cohesive and not baby-like.

Once I had those things up, I realized I’d like to further differentiate his space with a cute little rug under his Snoo: and I live near a Home Goods, so I went down there with the measurements of the Snoo base, and found two cute little fur rugs to choose from and ended up picking an $18.00 soft faux fur rug that works PERFECTLY!

So no, he doesn’t have his own room. He doesn’t have a bunch of toys or decorations. But he has his own space that facilitates an energy of rest and dreaminess that also works in OUR room for US: and everything he needs.

Just remember: you don’t NEED all the bells and whistles. All your baby needs is YOU, your love, and food.

I haven’t had my baby shower yet, so this is our space for baby Fan Man so far: and to be honest: it’s perfect. But I will definitely do an updated post once we have all the stuff set up for him: changing table and cloth diaper pan and all!

(Oh yes, I said it…CLOTH DIAPER…post on that to come post bambino’s arrival)