baby room furniture

[fififolle]

Any recomendations for nursery furniture? We're just about to move in to a new house and our first baby is due next April. I'm just starting to look at furniture and am wandering whether I need a specific baby wardrobe or if another would be just as good. I had a major fall out with DH this morning when he suggested keeping the old spare room wardrobe for the nursery! Any advice would be much appreciated.

Don't invest in lots of baby furniture - they grow out of it so quickly!

A little rail with baby sized hangers was one of the few things I bought for DD. She is now 5 and we are gradually equipping her bedroom with furniture that will last until she is quite a lot older.

I am just using some furniture i already had which is a tall wardrobe with 4 shelves in it and a merchants chest with 9 draws and the top is perfect height for a changing mat

DS has never had a wardrobe, we fold his clothes. I think for DD we will probably just use a little peg rail at first as she only has a few dresses that would actually need hanging, most of them are made of non-creasing material. When they are older I imagine we will get each of them a normal single wardrobe.

So my suggestion is chests of drawers and I like the ones you can get in John Lewis (think January sales!) and the Ikea systems, too. Mamas and Papas ones look gorgeous but the sides are a bit curved so won't fit very well next to other furniture.

Also recommend cotbed rather than cot, if you have the room.

You really, really don't need loads of furniture. We fold everything for DD, so a big chest of drawers is the best first purchase.

Whereabouts are you? If you are anywhere near peterborough, pay a visit here. www.kiddicare.info/?cm_sp=Homepage--leftside--kiddicare%20store

DH and I went before decorating the nursery for the baby now due. There is tons of furniture, across all price ranges and it will give you a really good idea of what you like/ what you dont like.

We selected a really nice wardrobe/ chest, but they were normal sized pieces of furniture. I wouldnt go for nursery size furniture unless you were limited on space. Because as so many others have said, they will grow out of it.

HTH. And enjoy!

Mamas and Papas better (more expensive) ranges are like adult furniture which is what you want really.

are you mad and/or made of money?

DH is quite right to suggest you use the spare room wardrobe - put an extra rail across half way up or add some shelves as you odn't need the whole hanging length.

buy a normal chest of drawers to match and you are done.

babies don't need wardrobes do they?

Definitely don't need a wardrobe. To my knowledge I have never hung up (or ironed) a single item of DS's clothing (he's now 2). I would recommend a changing table, though - I love mine (from M&P) and DS still loves being changed on it. We keep all clothes and other bits and pieces (bedding etc) in a big, adult chest of drawers from Ikea. If you can have it next to your changing mat it's very useful, so you can reach the clothes without having to pick up the baby.

If the wardrobe you already have has too much hanging space/not enough drawer or shelving, you can buy those hangy-shelvey things that suspend from the rail.

Agree that folding space is more useful that lots of hanging space, much quicker to fold and put away rather than hang loads of fiddly bits on fiddly little hangers.

But if you have more space than you need, you will soon fill it with 'outgrown' stuff, esp if you are planning to keep it for the future.

My personal fave bit of nursery furniture has been a chest of drawers from Ikea. It has a shelf that folds down to make a large changing table, much larger than a changing mat - which is very convenient. It has been passed down from ds1 to dd to ds2, and now that we no longer need a changing station it is back in dd's room as her chest of drawers. The changing shelf has been folded back up to create another shelf on top of her chest of drawers. Extremely good value for money!

But why not keep the old wardrobe? Although you won't be doing much hanging up of clothes at first, he or she will need a wardrobe eventually. You can just change the fittings inside it. You can get 'boxes' of drawers, or rails that hang off the existing rail to bring dresses down to child-height. Definitely don't waste money on a child-size wardrobe, that will need to be replaced by a full-sized wardrobe, unless you are sure you will use it for each subsequent child.

I think you tend to hang more girls dresses than maybe you do with boys (I don't have a son so wouldn't know this) but I liked to hang the girls little dresses from day one.

We used old spare room furniture (shelves, chest of drawers ) and our neighbours donated their cot. I think every child in the street has slept in that cot ! We bought a new cot mattress, and a hanging rail now that his clothes are a bit bigger (15 months). We had a Moses basket too, but he grew out of it in three weeks, so I really wouldn't bother.

Other friends lent us their nursing glider chair and footstool. If we have another DC after they want it back I will definitely replace it. And absolute must for midnight feeds. Spend money on that first, then anything else on fancy furniture.

But nothing to stop you have nice decor. Wall stickers are fab for baby rooms.