9

My Baby Sleeps In A ClosetAnd Other Thoughts On Nesting

CHAPTER ONE

My baby sleeps in a closet, is the first thing you should know. We live in an 800-square-foot one-bedroom apartment in New York City, on the Hell’s Kitchen side of the Upper West Side. It is the perfect little nest for a family of three. 800 square feet, to me, feels entirely enormous. Our last place came in at just under 400 square feet, an apartment barely big enough to hold a coherent thought, so our place now feels practically palatial by comparison.

COPYRIGHTED

NOT AUTHORIZED

FOR DISTRIBUTION

1 110

1. Somewhere to sit2. Something to do3. Something utterly useless but very pretty to look at4. Something cozy5. Somewhere to put your snacks6. Somewhere to put your thoughts7. And you

Every Fort Needs:

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.6.

“Actually, Huck’shall closet is the piece deresistance of the whole

dang joint. It’smy pride and joy.”

7.

COPYRIGHTED

NOT AUTHORIZED

FOR DISTRIBUTION

12

A closet bedroom mightsound strange, but it’s a staple of city survival.The only difference between a hole and a pal-ace is what you bring to it. That’s what the city’s taught me. You just gotta create a little nest for yourself, a pocket, or in a kid’s case, a fort. (Or Natalie’s version!)

I spend most of my days hopping over broken crayons and plastic penguins, sharing space on the rug with a Little People farm set, two giant pirate ships, and at least ten vintage toy cars from the Duane Reade. And then, when it’s time to sleep, Huck and I walk two steps to the left to the hall closet. Which is his bedroom.

Actually, Huck’s hall closet is the piece de re-sistance of the whole dang joint. It’s my pride and joy.

It’s also rather large, for a hall closet at least. Huck’s closet bedroom is just about five feet long and three feet wide, and everything he needs fits perfectly inside: a toddler bed, an air purifier that doubles as a sound machine, and one tiny book shelf, stuffed to the gills with all of his favorite books and plenty of treasure maps. He’s got a jolly roger above his bed and space to hang his coon skin cap. There’s even room for his mother to come in for some bedtime stories and good night songs. We like to burrow under the covers, our flashlights zooming across the ceiling, reading books and making shadow puppets and whis-pering conspiratorial plans for the next day.

COPYRIGHTED

NOT AUTHORIZED

FOR DISTRIBUTION

15

These are my theories on decorating. Go get some popcorn. LET IT BE USEFUL, BUT ABOVE ALL, LET

IT BE BEAUTIFUL. If there’s one thing I’ve learned while living in a small apartment, it’s that every-thing should be beautiful. Throw blankets should be lovely, as well as cozy for movie nights and warm for out of town guests. Food storage containers should be pretty. I’ve gotten a lot of mileage out of simple glass jars this way. I store them with pantry goods in the kitchen and display them with candles on the table. They come in real handy when my hus-band brings home a bouquet of I’m-Sorry-Flowers from the deli. I love to spread a single bouquet out

On Making A House A HomeCHAPTER SIX

COPYRIGHTED

NOT AUTHORIZED

FOR DISTRIBUTION

16

over six or seven bottles or jars and place them randomly around the house. A bouquet of inexpensive roses trimmed extra short and tossed into a wide-mouthed mason jar on a bedside table is just about the end all be all of my domestic success. A bathroom step stool should be pretty enough that you don’t mind seeing it every day, your towels should be white and fresh, important documents should be filed away in something lovely. You shouldn’t bring it in unless it looks pretty and is ready to pull it’s own weight.

WHEN IN DOUBT,HANG SOME ANTLERS ON ITThe first time you buy parts from a dead woodland creature for decorative purposes is an important milestone in a person’s life. It’s the kind of decorating decision that separates the men from the silk flowers.

I’ve brought so many dead animals into our home in the years since that we’ve become a sort of halfway house for forgotten bull’s eyes. A foster home for easy targets. I somehow know immediately upon introduction to a new stuffed trophy whether that poor dead creature was meant to be a part of our fam-ily. It’s a weird sixth sense you get, when you find your stuffed children. We aren’t hunters in our family--we consider killing for sport to be a little bit awful--but providing a loving

home for a sad stuffed friend? Well. That is an honor, good sir.

DOILIESIt is, in my estimation, the humble paper doily that pulls the most weight in a woman’s decorative arsenal. You can set a table, you can decorate a Christmas tree, you can pro-tect your surfaces from water damage... make name tags... turn your home into a winter wonderland... you name it! A paper doily is the difference between chocolate chip cookies for the neighbors on a flimsy paper plate and chocolate chip cookies for the neighbors on a pretty, flimsy paper plate.

MAPSOne of my favorite things to hang in a home are maps. Maps of the places you’ve been that are important to your family, maps of the places you grew up, maps of the neighbor-hood you first met. One year for Christmas I sent my dad a map of Disneyland from 1969 that I’d found on eBay that was printed the same year as the one he’d had hung in his bed-room as a kid. When we moved to Idaho, I framed a few maps of our old neighborhood in Brooklyn --I literally printed them off Google --and hung them in the living room. They looked surprisingly legit for a cheap Hewlitt Packard. When we moved back to New York City and now had a record number of moves under our belts, I bought a Rand

COPYRIGHTED

NOT AUTHORIZED

FOR DISTRIBUTION