Although we have a three bedroom home and have space to put the baby in her own room, we really want to keep a dedicated spot for guests to stay, especially when our parents come to visit. So our plan is to have Jackson and the baby share a room for as long as they can. There are obviously pros and cons to having them share a room, and my biggest concern is if their sleep will suffer, but I’m really hoping we can make it work. Plenty of people do! If not, we always have the option of separating them down the line. Either way, it’s not something we’re really going to have to worry about for a while because I plan on having the baby in our room for months. Jackson slept by the side of our bed in our bedroom for the first seven months or so, and I anticipate keeping the new baby in our room for about the same time. I know this isn’t for everyone but I’m more comfortable that way, and it makes nighttime nursing sooo much easier.

Still, I wanted to get their room all set up so that Jackson has time to get used to it and so that I could make sure we had space for everything. I have to say I’m really happy with how it turned out! Fortunately, there wasn’t a ton we had to do to convert the room to a shared space because we went with a neutral color scheme and theme for Jackson’s nursery from the start. The primary colors are gray and white, with pops of yellow and green, and the theme is safari, with a focus on elephants.  All we really did was buy a twin bed, which we’ll move Jackson to at some point in the near future (with bed rails; he’s still currently sleeping in the crib), and clear out half the space in the dresser and closet. I put a wall decal over Jackson’s soon-to-be bed with his name, and I plan to put something similar above the crib once we move the baby in there. That space looks a bit sparse now but knowing that Jackson is only going to be in the crib for a few more months or so, I didn’t want to put anything up that we’ll have to change out. Otherwise, the room is pretty much set! Here’s how it looks (Excuse the poor quality of some photos. The lighting was really tough!):

And there you have it! It’s pretty simple but the space makes me so happy. It’s bright and light and sweet, just how a bedroom for kids should be in my opinion. If your kids share (or used to share) a room, let me know if you have any tips for making it work. This is new territory for me so I’ll take any and all advice!