Needs for a new baby in a small house
I am expecting my first child and trying to plan out what I need once it’s born in a few months. This includes making a registry and trying to make sure them and all their belongings can fit into my house once they’re bigger and more mobile than a newborn.
I currently live in a 2 bedroom, 1 bath 900 sq ft house with a yard with my husband and 40-lb dog in a HCOL city. Buying a bigger place in this market is out of the question. The biggest problem is that we both have WFH desk setups - we are not both actively working from home but we have and there is a decent chance we will be in the future.
**Question 1** concerns my housing layout - I’d like to hear what worked for other minimalist and small-home parents. We currently have a combo dining/living room, a bedroom and a home office, with a secondary desk in our bedroom.
The easiest thing for us would be to move the (smaller) bedroom desk into the living room behind our couch, reducing the floor space in front of the couch and then moving a crib and any baby storage into a corner in our room. But this requires the child to live in our room past babyhood.
The second option would be to convert our second bedroom into a child’s room, but this would require moving my (bigger) desk with multiple monitors, a bookshelf/file cabinet, and a dog crate out of the room, plus we use the closet space for our coats since we don’t have additional closet space. It’s a fairly large room. I’m not sure that sharing my office with a baby/toddler would be pleasant for anyone, although maybe we could use it for storage for a while.
**Question 2** concerns our registry. We do not want to accumulate more than whatever is super helpful, and we are happy to acquire items used when convenient. We have already acquired a convertible crib, lightweight stroller, infant car seat with extra base and a hand-me-down high chair. We are asking for a Baby Bjorn rocker, one baby carrier, a cheap changing pad, a modular pen, and an assortment of fabric and hygiene products. We are not asking for a pack and play as that feels excessive with our space. We did not ask for many clothes, but hope we can obtain some secondhand.
I’d love to hear from other minimalist parents on what you loved and needed and didn’t. I am already overwhelmed by the amount of stuff I’m supposed to acquire and I am a bit tired of seeing whole nursery setups for unborn babies as if I have the money or space to decorate an entire room.