Her Space

We went back and forth for awhile about where Olivia's room should be.  When we received our referral and found out how young she was we instantly knew where we would set up her room.  Our master bedroom has a sitting area.  We never use it and it is the perfect size for a crib, rocker and small book shelf.  We have plenty of room in our bedroom for her dresser.

Much of our reasoning behind keeping Olivia in our room is due to the importance of early attachment and bonding.  Olivia missed out on those primary newborn and infant steps of bonding and attaching to us as her parents.  We were not there to comfort her and feed her throughout the middle of the night.  She does not know what it is like to be held or rocked to sleep or wrapped in a warm blanket if she is cold at night.  We want to make sure that we are right next to her if she is the least bit uncomfortable during those first few months at home.  Yes, many will worry that we are spoiling her and creating issues down the road.  We have however learned through our multiple hours of adoption training as well as from other adoptive families how important it is to teach our child who has experienced more loss than most could ever imagine that we are her safety.  Once she learns that we will set more strict boundaries.   But, for now, we are happy to start at step one and teach her about unconditional love.  We have waited a long time which has been hard but, we know once she gets home is when the hard work will really begin. 

We knew that we would want to give Olivia as well as ourselves some privacy so we scoured Pinterest for ideas on how to separate the two spaces.  French Doors weren't in the budget although I think they would be ideal.  Instead we opted for room darkening curtains that will extend the width of the doorway. 
We painted her room a light grey so that we can keep it the same color when she moves to her own space.  Plus, I love a soothing grey for a baby room.  I made some wall decorations using fabric scraps and weaving looms and modge podged some scraps on a frame of Kyrie's first drawing of she and Olivia.  We bought a cute pink rug to girly up the room.  I am very excited to be using Kyrie's old crib bedding because I absolutely loved it when she was a baby.  The kids loved collecting books from their rooms and adding them to her collection of books I had already started.