We are expecting our first child around 8/25/14. We have an almost 9 year old male Bengal. He sleeps with us when he feels like it. I am wondering the best way to introduce the new baby. It will sleep right next to our bed to start with and I feel like I should not allow our cat into the bedroom at all while the baby is in there. Likewise, when I move it to the nursery I don't know if I should allow him in there. I hate to start locking him out of rooms where he has always been allowed, but I want our baby to be safe.
Any experience and advice about this would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you.

I would suggest that you start the 'shutting out of rooms' now so he doesn't associate that with the baby. The baby is going to take up a lot of your time, make a lot of loud noises and generally smell very different to what your cat is used too and he could feel a little put out.
When my two year old niece comes to stay my two aren't allowed in the room at night, they have slept on my chest and across my neck before and I cant take the risk that they wouldn't sleep on her.

I don't know if there is any information out there on the web. If it were me (and my 7-year old bengal sleeps in our bed at night), I would introduce the cat to the baby immediately. For one thing, he will notice a new smell and new sounds -- the baby! He will be curious as cats always are. The sooner you get him used to the baby, the better. If the attention he gets is less than he's used to (yes, new babies do take up an awful lot of time), he may act out in some way. A lot depends on the personality of your cat. In my case, Raiden does not bite or scratch. He is the sweetest, most mellow cat I've ever had and I know he would do nothing to harm a baby. Yours may be a little different. You know you can't keep the baby and your cat apart forever -- I suggest you spend as much time with your kitty as you have been and don't change things in his environment. If you truly fear he may harm your baby, then you'll have to make sure the baby's area is off limits, and especially when the baby is sleeping -- I'd shut the door and keep the cat out if you're not in the room with them. Not everyone is going to agree and I certainly don't know the protocol for something like this .... but it really depends on your situation since you know your cat so well. Babies are usually interesting to the cats initially, but after a while, they're just part of the furniture like everything else. Congratulations on the upcoming arrival.

A friend of ours was very worried about the same problems when their son came along. They did as Becky suggested and started closing the cat out of the baby's room as soon as they started putting furniture in it. They closed her out of their bedroom at night until the baby moved to his room as well. She cried a lot for the first few days and then found somewhere else to sleep.

In the end she really didn't want much to do with the baby at all. She would occasionally sniff him but never tried to lay on or even next to him when they were around each other. Now that he is a toddler she pays more attention to him - I think partly because he drops food

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Dallas, TX USA
Diesel - snow Bengal born 09/01/2013 adopted Feb 2014
Tuck, Chloe, Buddy, Lewis & Tia - rescue kitties
Clyde, Bleu & Coal - Great Danes