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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

In wondering what the point in a nursery is?

155 replies

Snowberry86 · 22/05/2016 19:31

Baby will sleep with us for first 6 months- so what is the point in getting nursery all decorated and sorted before they arrive?

I have found lots of boys decor and lots of girls that I like. But nothing gender neutral. So I'm swaying between finding out the sex so we can get organised, or not decorating the nursery/child bedroom until they are born and I can choose something I really love.

AIBU? Do I really need a nursery that is all ready for baby's arrival?

OP posts:
Zaurak · 23/05/2016 10:19

Gender specific is a bit odd. Will you be encrusting it with pink glitter if it's a girl?
We just have the baby's room. I bought some funky stickers (planets and space stuff) which is surely ok for boys and girls (I don't have a penis and I love rockets.)

Changing units are bloody useful though - we e got one upstairs and one down. We use the downstairs one constantly so your plan to have stuff in a room downstairs is a good one. Especially if your back is bad

Ds is nearly eight months and won't even go in the cot in our room never mind his own room. He'll only sleep if welded to one of us. I'm sure we'll get him into the nursery in time but right now it's a convenient junk room

herecomethepotatoes · 23/05/2016 10:38

Baby will sleep with us for first 6 months

There's the first mistake OP! Smile

We found out the sex of the baby ASAP.. We paid for extra scans (two, days apart, as our son had his legs crossed for the first) as we're stupidly impatient!

Of course you don't 'need' a nursery, but we found it was lovely to do. My husband got really stuck into and felt more involved in the pregnancy. He made a cot, a bookshelf, painted the walls, hung godawfull aeroplanes from the ceiling etc. He disappeared into his garage and came out a weekend later with an admittedly beautiful mobile. It was somewhere to store their clothes, changing table and all the crap that comes with babies. Without them having their 'room' it all gets spread about the house.

After being a nursery it became a bedroom of course. I agree with the poster who said you won't have time to do it after your child's born.

Twinklestar2 · 23/05/2016 11:51

You don’t need to do it before the baby is born but you’ll have much more time and energy to do it now!

Ours was always painted an aquamarine colour. We got some animal themed stickers and stuck them on the wall – figured that was good for boy or girl.

It was handy to have a room to store babies’ clothes, toys, books, etc. And it was fun doing it :D

Ivegotyourgoat · 23/05/2016 12:03

I see the point of getting the baby's room ready. It will be ready when you do want to put the baby in there. Also a good space for keeping all their clothes, toys and nappies.

What I don't get is why it's called a nursery. It's one of those things that irrationally annoys me. It's just your child's bedroom surely?

Can anyone explain that to me?

OneMagnumisneverenough · 23/05/2016 12:12

Can anyone explain that to me?

It will be a throwback to the upper class houses where a Nurse looked after the baby (possibly also a wet nurse) and the children's area of the home was therefore the Nursery Wing.

Poor people didn't have a nursery, they just had a bottom drawer where baby slept until big enough to join in the bed with everyone else.

OneMagnumisneverenough · 23/05/2016 12:13

posted too soon.

And then you had the aspirational middle classes who wanted to emulate the rich and so had a bedroom set aside as the "nursery".

paxillin · 23/05/2016 12:14

So the presence of a nurse makes it a nursery, otherwise it's a children's bedroom?

OneMagnumisneverenough · 23/05/2016 12:17

Essentially yes, I just called it x's bedroom when he was born and prior to that, baby's bedroom. I am working class though.

I think it's just one of those names that's hung about tbh. No harm done to anyone by using it though.

OneMagnumisneverenough · 23/05/2016 12:19

Even in upper class homes, I think the baby originally didn't go to a Nanny until they were out of babyhood but that changed and then it was a Nanny from birth I think, but it remained a nursery in name. maybe because Nannery sounds too close to Nunnery Wink :o

OneMagnumisneverenough · 23/05/2016 12:20

...and I'd qualify all that by saying I'm not a social historian so it could be total bollocks.

Ivegotyourgoat · 23/05/2016 12:26

Thanks magnum Smile makes sense.

I know it shouldn't annoy me it's whenever I hear someone mention the nursery I think, it's a bedroom.

I might just be bitter because neither of mine have had one all ready like that.

OTheHugeManatee · 23/05/2016 12:28

Why all the gendering? Why not just paint it a colour you like? I promise your baby won't catch The Gay if their bedroom isn't the 'right' colour for their genitals Confused

FWIW the nursery here is painted baby blue (we're expecting PFB in September). It's baby blue because I like it, and that's the colour I painted it last year and I can't be arsed to paint it again. As it happens we're having a girl, but it's baby blue and she'll be a baby, so

OneMagnumisneverenough · 23/05/2016 12:34

I might just be bitter because neither of mine have had one all ready like that.

It's done more for the parent than the child anyway, I am sure your children don't know any differently and haven't suffered for lack of a nursery.

Tbh even as toddlers/children, mine have never been too bothered. I currently have teenagers and one has a favourite colour (teal/turquoise) so has his room and bedding etc in that colour. The other truly couldn't care, he moved into the bigger room which had been the guest bedroom, it was just pale green, he wasn't bothered about getting it decorated so I just got some more youthful bedding and curtains. I've said we are going to get someone in to decorate and what would he like and he just shrugged and said "anything". I've picked him a grey with touches of red scheme which I think will be nice for a teenage boy. DS1 just wants his refreshed but same colour.

OneMagnumisneverenough · 23/05/2016 12:39

As toddlers we just added stickarounds of things like the alphabet etc and as young children they had plain painted walls and picked whatever bedding they liked - e.g. star wars or dinosaurs or whatever.

When I did the whole farm mural thing, I did it because I enjoyed it and got pleasure from doing it - I copied the pictures of the animals from a children's book.

HelgaVonHinklebaum · 23/05/2016 12:45

It's done more for the parent than the child anyway, I am sure your children don't know any differently and haven't suffered for lack of a nursery

It's done completely for the parents - there are many reasons why infants cry, but lack of a nursery/dissatisfaction with decor are absolutely not a factor. Wink

OneMagnumisneverenough · 23/05/2016 12:48

ha ha Helga very true, but I like to convince myself that those carefully painted sheep did send him off to sleep better and that the cows and ducks and pigs gave a lot of intellectual stimulation....that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

BillBrysonsBeard · 23/05/2016 13:03

2 year old is still in the corner of our bedroom. There are some balloon stickers on the wall. Grin

TriJo · 23/05/2016 13:04

We never really planned on setting one up in our current place - we have a 2-bed, me and 8 week old DS in one room and DH (who has sleep issues) in the other. We'll probably move when DS gets too big for a cot in my room or we have a second child, whatever comes first.

GruffaloPants · 23/05/2016 13:06

YANBU! We didn't move DD to her own room til she was 3 Blush

Kittykatmacbill · 23/05/2016 15:36

Dd1 moved to her own room at 7 months and dd2 joined her at 11months (awful sleeper). Didn't bother particular my decorating it's painted white, there is an alphabet freeze and I refurbished an orange ercol armchair (because I am like that!)

I would say that even if you are using an inherited cot (with a new correctly fitted mattress-obvs as per sids advise) and some old drawers as a changing station, I would still splash out on blackout blinds and thermal blackout curtain liners. Dark nighttime and early morning sleeps in summer and it really helps with the cold in winter!

BlueberrySky · 23/05/2016 19:55

baby should stay in your bedroom until they are 6mo - something to do with your breathing and heart beat regulating theirs

This is the first time I have heard this. Maybe advice has changed. My babies went into their own room within a couple of days of birth. The HV visited and saw them in their rooms, nothing was said.

They are great healthy teenagers now, so it did them no harm.

Terrifiedandregretful · 23/05/2016 20:02

We never had a nursery. Dd was with us for 9 months then we moved the cot into what had been the spare room, and then became her room. So many people asked us about decorating the nursery when I was pregnant, but it always seemed like a complete waste of time to me.

Ivegotyourgoat · 23/05/2016 20:17

The advice now is to keep the baby in your room for 6 months to reduce the risk of sids. I think that's been the advice since the late 90s?

Each to their own but isn't it a complete pain having to go to a different room to do night feeds?

Terrifiedandregretful · 23/05/2016 20:19

Also, I hate the idea of genderifying your child's room before they're even born. Why not wait until their interests develop as a toddler and pre schooler and decorate the room accordingly?

DancingDinosaur · 23/05/2016 20:25

I didn't bother. Dd went into her undecorated nursery spare room at 11 months old. Her room didn't get sorted out until until she was 3.

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