Room Designing for Baby: room layout

As mentioned in my previous entry our new baby's room had only one wall in which there was not a door or a window.  It's amazing in terms of light and natural airflow but a little tricky when you are trying to find usable storage and functional space for important bits of furniture like cots and change tables.  We were very lucky and inherited a majority of our baby things from my older sister.  The cot was one of these things and it was lucky enough to find it's home with our beautiful new change table on the only solid wall in the room.  Placing the change table and the cot on this wall meant that there was a nice amount of "play on the floor space" left for Mini and he could look out the window when he woke up and se the chickens doing their thing.  When he wakes during the day he can often look out and find me pottering in the garden as well.  He loves his view from his cot!

We spent quite some time looking for a change table because most of the ones that we saw had the change mat thing at the top and then just open shelves at the bottom.  Knowing how messy I am this was not going to be a sensible option for our house.  It also meant that the change table really only had one purpose in its life - being a change table.  We wanted a decent piece of furniture that could be used after the need for a change table was necessary.  As you can see the ones we found are a chest of drawers with a removable change mat at the top so that when Mini is older we can take the cushion off and he will have space to show of his trucks, sticks, leaves, rocks, fish, dead worms, what else do little boys like to collect I wonder???

The really interesting part of tuning this room into a bedroom was storage space.  We had to find space for a wardrobe as well as room to store toys, books, shoes, too big clothes, too small clothes and what else do little boys like to collect???

This is were the very good spatial/ mathematical brain of my husband came into play.  We decided that we needed to find a piece of furniture that would fit under the window and then run up the walls on either side.  We did not have to finances to get in a custom cabinet maker so we went to IKEA and hubby's brain set to work.  I won't bore you with the details of how he made it all fit but we used the Expedit range of furniture.

I wanted Mini to have some mirrors down low so that he could look at himself in them - don't all babies love to see other babies in their room even if it is just their reflection?!  We also needed some storage boxes that could hide some things that didn't need to be seen.  We opted for the seagrass cubes as they fitted in with the more natural feel that I wanted to create.  We also left a number of the cubes empty so that we could store Mini's books and toys.  I love the fact that by placing the shelves under the window Mini can practise his standing and he can pull down whatever is stored there himself.  He loves that he can be independent in his play and choose what he plays with for himself.