The Whole Nursery Thing

We have a room, that we call the Little Room (and boy, is it little). It is not a nursery. It is not a guest room. It is most like a guest room that's haunted by the nursery that it has yet to be.

Just wide enough to fit a full-sized (guest) bed. That stack of books are pregnancy
guides I would love to gift to someone, as I'm pretty sure I won't be needing
them anytime soon (or ever). Love the owl pillow from my sister. Right now
the cats are using this room most, as evidenced by the cozy divot in the folded
comforter on the bed. At least someone's enjoying it!

We never set one up, see, because we never made it into the fruit stage of either of our pregnancies. We never had a reason to turn that room that collected nursery-like things into an actual room that a baby could occupy fairly imminently, because it just never seemed like that was going to come to fruition. Often, the door stayed shut.

Still looking guest-y, with my seashells
and ocean-y hanging vase and the view
into the hallway nook that houses my little
"attic" office I wrote about previously...
Note the door is open. Wide open.

But now... now THERE IS A BABY THAT WILL LIVE IN THAT ROOM. We don't know who this baby is yet. We don't know if this baby has even been conceived at this moment in time--it's strange to think that our baby could be growing, right now, or that our baby is just a tiny cluster of cells, complicating someone else's life at this very moment. Or the complication for someone else that will ultimately be our greatest joy has yet to be in any way, shape, or form yet. But what we do know, is that our baby is out there, or will be out there, soon. Maybe...even...right...now. 

So it gives the room a different kind of feel, right? 

The owl lamp Bryce got me for Christmas...
sense a theme? Also, the lotus candle
holder is a fertility throwback. That lamp
made me cry, because I knew it was for
the nursery, that isn't a nursery...yet.

I don't see that room as a culmination of my failures to get and stay pregnant anymore. I don't see that room as an airless tomb, a place where 27 embryos that came and went should have resulted in at least one real live baby residing in its dormered walls, but just never did. 

I see that room as a space full of hope. Of yet-to-be. I can visualize a baby sleeping in there, living in there, laughing in there. I can see either one of us holding, rocking, feeding our baby in that tiny little room. I just don't know when it will take place. But I know that it will. 

A lot of resources say that when you are adopting, you really shouldn't set up a full on nursery. It's not emotionally practical. It can make things harder on your heart. There are strings of what-ifs... What if you don't get called for a longer time than you thought? What if your match falls through? What if that room becomes difficult to live with, because it's empty? 

But then there are other resources. Ones that have different what-ifs. What if you get a call and you have to bring a baby home with very little notice? What if you end up buying a whole lot of gear right at the last minute, amplifying the stress of an already stressful (and potentially WONDERFUL) time? What if you want to feel like the expectant parent you are, and nest and prepare even though your "gestational period" is highly unpredictable? 

What if being prepared trumps being disappointed? 

Here are my thoughts on the nursery conundrum. 

I want to be prepared. I want to feel like an expectant parent. I want to be ready to accept A baby, not necessarily a SPECIFIC baby, into our home. I want that room to reflect its true purpose, in a non-haunty-way. I want to CELEBRATE that we are waiting. 

That room has been empty for years. 

It has had an unfulfilled purpose, incredibly thinly veiled, for years. 

It can't make me sadder than it has in the past, and quite frankly it no longer makes me feel stabby in the chest, empty in the womb, when I go visit it. 

What DOES make me sad is the thought of NOT preparing for this baby who will come into our lives, who-knows-when. 

What DOES make me sad is the thought of rushing through decisions at the last minute, getting things together for a baby when we could be preparing ourselves, centering ourselves, and bonding with our baby...not frantically shopping while working through all the conflicting emotions and stresses that come with that time when you are going to the hospital or wherever it is you are going to bring that precious soul home.

We don't plan to start nursery-ing now. We'd at least like to be home study certified first, ready to be profiled. We want it to be a true waiting-for-baby time. Now is too soon. But when we're done with the home study process? Then it makes sense to us. Then we are officially expecting.

Do I know it could be a room that is babyless for years, maybe? Of course. It's been babyless for five plus years already. Let's give the room the true purpose, the one we designated it to have when we first started shooting me up with drugs and putting me under anesthesia in hopes that would bring us our FutureBaby. Now a binder full of paperwork, personal scrutiny, education on the multifaceted challenges and joys of adoption, a team of social workers, and an amazing birthmother will bring us our baby. It IS going to happen. So let's make that room a happy place for the waiting. A gender-neutral, not over-the-top place, but a place that says...

FutureBaby, we're ready for you. Come on into our lives. We love you so already.

Probably should have moved the sad little
knitting bag that's been left neglected for
a while... There's that little dresser that
holds our stash of onesies, washed and
ready to be filled whenever...

The scale of the room is becoming apparent, right? TINY. But cozy. That's not
a supernova, it's a touch lamp of crackled glass. Lots of art for the nursery
when we transition fully from guest room to baby room, laying out on the
sewing table with our little Buddha that represents our last lost little baby.
I love the windowseat Bryce made me that houses picture books, and that
is my childhood rocking chair, given to me by my mom with the stuffed
good-luck elephant when we thought maybe that pregnancy was going to be
okay. It wasn't. But the rocking chair and elephant are meant for SOMEONE...

Closeup on rocking chair and window seat.
Also you can see how close that is to the
bed. Tiny storybook sized space, this is! 

The floor-to-ceiling bookshelves that Bryce
built us, that unfortunately probably have
to come out to make space for baby furniture
and glider and stuff. I have a lot of children's
books. We have a lot of books, period. Unsure
where they're all going to go, but they can't all
stay here. Not sure the baby will enjoy all
that Stephen King quite yet... :)