You're a mom. You can do anything. (yes, even manage your money)
Start today and download my FREE Mom's Got Money starter pack!
You’ll also get updates from me.

Planning My Budget Friendly Nursery

  December 19

This post may contain affiliate links.

Well, I think this is what they call nesting, folks.

I want to organize every single item in the world. I want to label every item in my house. I even went and bought a jewelry organizer so I could put my earrings into separate little containers, because having them clank around my jewelry box was all of a sudden driving me crazy.

I also want to get rid of just about everything I own. The hubs better run and hide or at least hide his stuff, because I have a pile of clothes and shoes that I’ve already started to give away. Come and visit me and you will leave with a pair of shoes that I have all of a sudden decided I don’t need.

And then the baby stuff, wow.

I’m ready to decorate the nursery. I’m ready to do it asap, just in case they come early. The hubs brought home paint swatches yesterday because I really needed them like my life depended on it. They are all taped up in the nursery now, just waiting for me to pick one. I also want to pack my hospital bag like, yesterday, because what if I need it?

Basically, I am the energizer bunny of organization. Careful, or you might get sorted and alphabetized too.

My Budget Friendly Nursery Theme

I’ve mentioned a few times before that I really love decorating and home decor. I could read about 10 design magazines in a row without getting bored. I haven’t always had the finances or the ability to make my house look the way I want, but at least for the beans’ nursery, I can get close.

I’ve decided to decorate the nursery with a travel/global theme. One of the things we really hope for our children is that they will be open minded about the world and have a love of seeing new places. We also hope they will have a strong cultural competence and a curiosity about how other people live. We want them to know about other religions, other traditions, and other ways of life.

So, we’ll be decorating their room with photos of us from the places we’ve been, which will of course include a lot of mementos from Grenada and from very dear friends who live around the world. It will also have maps of different places that I have traveled or my parents have traveled. It will be gender neutral and very modern, with clean lines. Nothing fru fru up in here!

This is the initial inspiration collage that I put together to show the hubs:

budget friendly nursery

Of course, things will change and not everything is budget friendly in that picture. It will just serve as inspiration or a jumping off point to look for other things. We did buy them each one of those little gold elephants in the picture though. It was the first item we bought them. They are piggy banks that reminded the hubs of his trip to India this past summer, which sort of started the whole global theme.

I’ve been doing a lot of my shopping and eye-candy searching online for this nursery. I am still a little overwhelmed when I go to the mall here, thanks to a bit of culture shock after living in Grenada. It’s just too much for me. So, I’ve been looking at Target and Walmart online and using websites like Chippmunk to make sure there aren’t any coupons I’m missing. I also keep getting e-mails from JCPenney, where I got the elephant piggy banks, and Diapers.com and all those sorts of places which I’m looking through to try to get the best deals.

Ultimately, I’m ready to start putting things together. It’s hard to believe that in around 100 days (give or take), we will be parents to two children. I’m getting more and more ready but definitely hope that they cook in there as long as possible!

Is anyone else in an organizing/nesting mood?

34 responses to “Planning My Budget Friendly Nursery

  1. I remember when my wife and I started putting together the nursery. I think it was relatively budget friendly and it turned out great. Those were some exciting times!

  2. I think I suffer from chronic nesting…and I’ve never been pregnant! Every few months I decide I don’t like the way I organized things a few months ago, so I reorganize, EVERYTHING. It’s not so bad because it helps me weed out (possibly sell) stuff we don’t use/need.

  3. Love the gold and travel theme for a nursery! I’m not a fan of pink for girls and blue for boys. I’d rather have a more personal room like this.

  4. Oh my goodness! How exciting! I remember when I was pregnant. I wasn’t nearly as organized as you nor did I have a theme. I need to organize though as our house is getting overrun by toys and kid’s clothes. Crazy how fast their stuff multiplies and takes over.

    1. Yes, I’m just going to put a few things in frames and only set up one crib to start with that we can disassemble easily and pop over to the next place. 🙂

  5. I am! Omg, haha, I was just thinking the exact same thing the other day, although I’m not pregnant. But I am kind of late to the party in that sense so maybe my body just couldn’t wait any longer! No prob, I love being organized. And I love the concept for your nursery – it will be amazing!!

  6. My whole life is nesting – without the babies. 🙂 I love that decorating theme. I hope that when I do decorate, I don’t go crazy – I will definitely try to stay on a reasonable budget.

  7. I like that you’re going with a pretty original theme for the nursery. I think it’ll look pretty sharp and should be fine to keep it as is as they grow older. Would make for a pretty cool office or just an older kids’, room, too.

    No nesting here…yet. 🙂

  8. Wow. Go for it! When I was pregnant, I had no desire to do any nesting whatsoever. I have no idea why, I think the hormones just hit me differently. It’s great that you’re on a nesting binge, I’m jealous! Doing all that cleaning out can make you a few bucks for the nursery too. If going to the stores is culture shock, wait until you go to your first big children’s consignment sale — they’re in big gyms and packed to the gills with baby gear. It’s extremely overwhelming!

  9. My wife repainted our son’s bedroom before he was born. There were also animal wall hangings, and of course all the baby furniture was arranged just so. I think there really is a nesting mood or instinct that happens to many expectant mothers.

  10. Love that you’re thinking ahead and planning – that will make coming up with budget-friendly solutions much easier for you. And cleaning out unwanted or unused stuff is a great way to make a few extra dollars in order to fund the less-frugal elements you want to include in your nursery!

  11. I love watching interior design pictures but am completely useless when it comes to putting it into practice.
    Careful with not stressing yourself too much! A friend of mine went into labor as she was scrubbing every last corner of the house.

  12. It hit me few months ago too, but my husband was even more affected by this (looks like he’s acting more pregnant than I do :)). It’s a normal thing to be preparing for the new additions in your family, so I don’t see any problems 😉

  13. I like your nursery theme. I love travel. Maps. And pictures. I’m thinking of copying your idea in the future.

  14. I remember vividly planning our nursery from a magazine pic I found. We did it the frugal way and it turned out super cute! Love your theme idea, Cat – cozy, yet elegant, child-like, yet mature. 🙂

  15. Ahhh! I’m so excited for you guys! I love, love, love the theme. When we were creating nurseries, we actually used decorations from the baby shower (some were so cute, and they’re still adorning the rooms! The themes of the party acutally matched the nursery so it was perfect.) I also made curtains…they’re pretty simple to sew from clearance fabric at Jo-Anns or something, but table cloths are also a really great, cheap, easy alternative.

    1. We need some curtains right now and I can’t seem to find any that I like. I may just sew some simple ones myself!

      – Michelle

Comments are closed.
Copyright © Catherine Alford.  Designed & Developed with by LizTheresa.com