{A tour of Baby Whitley’s nursery…}

Hello there! Well, we are officially “ready” for our baby to arrive. I’m not sure what else there is to do to help us be prepared, so I’m declaring us officially ready to play The Waiting Game :) I’ve been excited to share photos of our baby’s nursery with you, and today is finally the day. Once we decided to move to Los Angeles I started gathering inspiration for decorating the nursery. Since we are keeping the gender a surprise until delivery day we wanted to keep the nursery colors neutral while highlighting our favorite color: orange.

When we were apartment hunting, back in September, we were hoping for a bright/spacious apartment to help each room feel as big as it could — especially our bedroom since it’s going to be a shared bedroom for the three of us.

And I think we did a good job at finding just that :) In the end we settled on cream/gray/orange to fill our baby’s nursery, and I am LOVING how it turned out. We have been blessed with many gifts that have helped us decorate + furnish our nursery. It’s been very heartwarming to include them in our decor as they’ve arrived on our doorstep.

Want to see more of Baby Whitley’s nursery?

Zack was amazing and mapped out our bedroom on graph paper, and yes — it included miniature pieces of our furniture so we knew how to make everything fit in our shared space. Our bedroom is a cozy mix of our furniture + Baby’s furniture. The light-colored hardwood floors, freshly painted walls and an extra-extra-long window make this space seriously beautiful.

We placed Baby’s cradle next to my side of the bed. Having a real baby cradle next to my bed is like my childhood dream coming true… oh my goodness. Once this heirloom cradle is too small for Baby we’ll either move the crib or the changing table to that area of the bedroom, but for now the cradle is next to my side. Bauer has been sleeping next to the cradle at night, which is adorable :) He takes his role of big brother very seriously.

^ Family heirloom cradle, made by my grandfather in Indiana // Orange + white bunny blankie, one of the first things I bought for Baby Whitley // Duck stuffed animal is a gift from my parents.

^ handmade orange + gray baby blanket c/o Showered with Love

My grandpa — my dad’s father — made this cradle for his very first grandchild and since then ten more grandchildren have slept in here. Below are the the nameplates of all eleven of grandchildren {my cousins} who’ve been rocked to sleep in here, and on the other side of the cradle are nameplates of the great-grandchildren that have slept in here. Once our baby arrives the great-grandchild number will jump to three ♥.

I love the bright, fun variety of nursery art we’ve hung. Here’s a mix of art we’ve purchased + art that’s been gifted to us {specific details are below this photo}:

^ Wall art: Butterflies, Ikea | You Belong With Me c/o Livy Love Designs | Be Still & Know c/o Pen & Paint | Do Small Things With Great Love c/o Pen & Paint | customized/embroidered maternity silhouette, Mrs. Pate Makes | “loved” embroidered hoop c/o Home For Hire | stenciled/wooden art c/o Little Penelope Lane | Elephant print c/o Mandipidy {see more nursery art photos here}

Another element we had in mind when searching for our Los Angeles apartment was having ample storage. We didn’t bring much with us when we moved here, but we knew our home would fill up with things quickly. And even though we’ve really limited what we’ve bought/registered for to mostly “needs”, we knew having a baby would fill our home with many extra things.

Another nursery gift we received is our changing table with matching crib from cupcakeMAG. We seriously LOVE the two large storage bins that are under the changing table, talk about space savers! Both have a divider in the center so really it’s like having four storage bins. Each side of the changing table also has a rod for hanging a blanket and a super sturdy bucket near the top, for smaller items. In the left bin we placed a few stuffed animals sitting; in the right bin we have baby wipes, lotion, diaper rash ointment and a baby aspirator :)

^ Stokke Care changing table c/o cupcakeMAG  // White diaper pail from Ikea

^ Bottom bins hold baby toys, extra blankets + gender-specific clothing we’ve received

^ Top bins hold newborn diapers that smell like powder {awwww!}, extra wipes, burp clothes c/o Graceful Baby Boutique and tiny bath towels + washcloths

^ Wooden bird rattle c/o Little Alouette {did you see our giraffe teether also by Little Alouette?}

^ The cutest duck blanket c/o my mom ♥

Another helpful space saver solution for us is using this Ikea bookshelf {we have it in High Gloss Gray} as a dresser/storage for larger items. Three bins hold newborn, 0-3 month and 6-9 month clothing. Other bins hold extra packs of diapers; extra crib sheets/crib mattress pads; and extra blankets. This bookshelf will also be great transitional piece as baby grows and we use it to store more toys + books than clothes + supplies. The white storage cubes are also from Ikea.

Here’s the main view when you walk into our bedroom…

 ^ Learn more about our adorable, custom Baby Be Blessed dolls here  // A peek at our “take baby home” hospital outfits {one’s all pink, the other is all blue}

The only things left to do are practice patience, pray for a safe/healthy delivery, and say THANK YOU to everyone that gifted us with an item for our nursery. Thank you, thank you…