McGator and I are about to be Baby Grands. Juniper and Big B are expecting a baby boy by the end of the month. We know he is a boy because, thanks to 3D technology, this baby’s gender was positively identified 14 weeks after being the proverbial twinkle in his proud daddy’s eyes. He has never been generically referred to as “the baby”, since he has been fully named ever since Juniper and Big B announced his imminence last Thanksgiving. I wouldn’t be surprised if my highly efficient daughter has already contrived to have a photo id issued using the sonogram portrait, and I suspect Lil’ B might already have a social security number.

We are counting down the last few days to Lil’ B’s birthday, and of course, there are logistical complications. Big B is at extended spring training in Arizona preparing for his return to playing triple A ball with his team in Ohio, while Juniper is sticking close to their home base in Dallas, winding down  work projects in anticipation of her upcoming maternity leave. She and Big B have recently decided to move back to Houston, so they are also juggling the sale of their present home while building a new one just a few minutes down the road from us.

McGator and I drove up a couple of weeks ago to offer support and are poised to escort Juniper to the hospital in time for Lil’ B’s grand entrance into the world. Our first duty as Birth Monitors was to help put the finishing touches on the nursery. No problem, we thought. Big B’s mom had already taken care of the difficult task of painting stripes on the wall, and all we had to do was hang a few decorations. Back in the day, this was  a fairly simple operation. We would trot off to the big box baby store and choose  bedding in appropriately gender neutral colors, and then coordinate it with puffy wall art featuring wide-eyed baby animals floating away on clouds of balloons. We tied giant bumper pads to the crib, tacked the gentle menagerie to the wall, and bam! The nursery was done.

We are such nubes. Today there is the internet, home of Pinterest, eBay, Etsy, and all manner of shopping sites that make big box stores look like specs of dust compared to the baby universe of etherspace that goes on for infinity. The nesting urge was elevated to an Olympic fever as Juniper pored over and pinned images of baby paraphernalia onto the imaginary bulletin boards of her laptop. We were amazed at how quickly she emptied their home office of  professional furniture by simply advertising its availability on Craigslist, and then just as magically, purchased the baby suite online as well.

Then the real work began. According to Pinterest, the best decorated nurseries feature entire walls of picture frame collages which deftly weave combined themes of color, gender, and visual suggestions of the baby’s possible future hobby and career interests.  Most importantly, the collages must by punctuated clearly by the new arrival’s name and initials. Assembling these visual stimuli took weeks, and consist of a collection of wild animal heads, baseball gear, and, curiously, a curly silhouette of a handlebar mustache. Yes, mustaches as nursery décor are big for baby boys this year, and I first noticed them when they were given away as party favors at Lil B’s baby shower. I was a little confused at the significance since Lil B won’t be shaving until 2030, and kept checking  for a candy striped barber shop quartet lurking behind the buffet table.

Back to the nursery. We Baby Grands were each assigned a batch of frames and shadow boxes to be spray painted and mounted on the nursery walls in such a fashion that the resulting composition would “pop”. This was essential. After each frame or shelf was painstakingly hung on the wall, Juniper would stand back and assess its pop. Regardless of how well you have measured, balanced, and stuck your collages to the wall, no matter how symmetrical and perfectly proportioned the display, if there is no pop, you have failed. Juniper was not about to be doomed as a parent before poor Lil’ B was even born. Happily, Juniper’s future as a mother is secure. We all agree, in our humble opinions, that the nursery looks beautiful enough to grace the pages of a magazine. Or, as we hip Baby Grand’s like to say,  it’s pop is Pin worthy.