It's been a busy week at the Robbins house. After battling a stomach bug (that was thankfully short-lived) we've been busy working on the nursery. I'll do a full nursery tour down the road when it's complete, but I'm pretty excited with how it's turning out. Here's a couple little peeks I've shared on Instagram:

We used those apple crates as decorations at our wedding, and it makes me super happy to use them in the nursery! One of them will hold my stash of Aden + Anais swaddles, most of which I picked up this week from another local mama. And in the picture below I was taking a break from decorating, and Coco joined me :)

I haven't kept track of how much we've spent, but it hasn't been too much. Most of the items in there are previously loved...meaning I picked them up from vintage stores, Facebook garage sale posts, or repurposed them from somewhere else in the house. The exception is the crib, which was my Christmas gift from my parents. We still don't have a mattress, but we will before she gets here. (And it will be new, I promise!)

After hearing from other moms and doing some online research, I decided to go with quite a few previously loved things because really, how long do most babies use things like a changing table? I'd actually planned on not using one at all, but I found a great deal on one that matched our crib on Facebook and couldn't resist! Of course we are getting all new car seats (safety issue!), and a new stroller, bottles, that kind of thing. But for things that we can, we've been keeping things frugal and a little crunchy.

Where I have splurged here and there have been on some cloth diapers, the birthing course (though I didn't go all out there), and some essential oils. I'll share more about cloth diapers next week (I know you can't wait!), so here's a little bit about the rest.

I decided to try the HypnoBabies method, which is a take of the Hypnobirthing method. This is a home study, not an in-person class, so the real key is making myself do it! (We went with a home study because James’s schedule changes so often it’s hard to plan on a weekly class.) It's all about focusing, affirmations, and retraining your mind to not think of labor as pain. In fact, they try to get you to not use words like labor, pain, contractions, that kind of thing.

I really can't share too much about it at this point. I'm still working through it, and really, I won't know how effective it is until after I've actually had the baby! I do know some people aren't a fan of this method because they feel it sets unrealistic expectations, and some women get super adamant about following the "rules" and not using medication to the point that they go against medical advice, sometimes to the detriment of their health and their babies.

As I said last week, my plan is to try as many alternative and crunchy methods as possible before resorting to medicine (like Pitocin), assuming it is safe for me and the baby to do so. I think women should have a chance to try an alternative method first if they can (and desire to), and then if that doesn't work to go with the medicine/surgery route. But I'm grateful to live in modern times when I can absolutely rely on that medicine if we need it, and I don't understand why you wouldn't choose it if is needed. Basically, I want to keep things as crunchy as possible as long as it's safe, but I'm totally willing to let go of that if we need to.

So speaking of alternative and crunchy things, I’m also doing some research on essential oils in labor and delivery. (Or as my HypnoBabies class tells me to call it, “birthing time”.)

I’ve been hesitant to jump on the essential oils bandwagon, and I’m still not sold on all the aspects of it. For instance, I will not ingest any essential oils (especially when pregnant) but I will use them topically and diffuse them. I’m still learning about it, but there definitely blends that work. Even James likes them – he thinks he sleeps better when I diffuse a certain blend.

I know there are some essential oils that are contraindicated for pregnancy, and I've been avoiding those. However, some become super helpful when it is time for labor to kick in and I'm doing some research on those :)

We have our first baby shower this weekend. Some lovely friends at church are throwing it for us after the service on Sunday. It's book themed, and I'm so excited to add to the little library we've started for our daughter. Lots of church showers tend to emphasis bringing diapers, but since we are using cloth diapers a friend suggested we go with books instead. And we all know that I will never say no to books!

Have a great weekend, friends! And come back next week to hear about those cloth diapers I keep mentioning.