How she's grown

Today our little Ruby girl turns one and I wanted to share the cuteness with you. Look how she's grown, from tiny nugget to large princess. Sitting in almost exactly the same spot on our stairs for comparison.

The kids are insisting on celebrating her birthday with a party, every girl needs a party right?

We love her so.

Have a wonderful long weekend here in the States, happy Memorial Day!

xo

Tooth Fairy Pillow

During my quiet of January I did managed to make some things. One of the cutest was this tooth fairy pillow, I modeled it on the owl pillow that I made for Jasper a couple of years ago when he lost his first tooth. This one was for our niece, she's almost six and absolutely obsessed with loosing her first tooth so I knew this pillow would be a dream come true for her.

There is a small pocket in the front of the owl's belly to hold the precious tooth until the "tooth fairy" comes in the middle of the night to take the tooth and replace it with money or a treat. I'm curious, is this just an American tradition or is it something that people in other parts of the world are familiar with too?

My niece's favorite color is purple so I tried to use variations on that theme, with some complementary colors thrown in. Now I'm working on one in a pink color scheme for Carys!

Here's another sweet visitor who's often in my studio...

We're headed up into the mountains to my family's farm in Asheville for the long Easter weekend, wishing you an exciting holiday celebration!

Stocking Stuffer Swap

So, I keep mentioning this Christmas crafting swap that I'm taking part in and I wanted to share a bit more about it, since we are really enjoying the anticipation and the crafting! There are 6 families taking part, and 14 children between all of us. The way it works is that all of the mamas make a gift for each child, then send the gifts by Christmas. My kids will get lovely hand made gifts from a bunch of other crafty mamas. Since about half of the families that are participating live in New Zealand I had to finish and send all of their gifts last week, here are some of the things that I made...

The top picture is of a little felt pouch for a 4 year old girl, inside the pouch I tucked some rainbow colored arm ribbons which I have yet to get a picture of, basically they are an elastic bracelet onto which I sewed multi-colored ribbons that stream behind when the child moves, my kids love them!

For a few of the children, as an add on gift I made this little needle felted bee, inspired by a gift that the teachers in our Waldorf Playgroup in Brooklyn gave my children. We've got a while hive of these bees on our family nature table, they are really sweet and so quick to make.

For one set of brothers, ages 4 and 7, I wet felted these two pouches, with swirls on the front. The pouches are almost identical but inside I tucked two different things,

Inside the pouch for the younger brother I tucked a set of arm ribbons, here they are all rolled up...

Inside the pouch for the older brother I tucked a set of these acorn men, Jasper really loves them and they can become anything, fairy guys or army men, you name it.

Here they are all cozy inside,

For a seven year old girl I made a moon fairy,

Who is coming tucked inside a pouch that I wet felted to match the fairy's colors,

Then there are these little needle felted birds that I am just dying over, I love them so much,

These are for a few girls who are 10 and still like cute things a lot. Frank cut a birch log into pieces so that each bird has it's own little perch.

Here are all the packages, I wrapped each gift individually and then put them each in a separate package for each family in NZ, tied up with string. It felt so festive to prepare them and send them off that now I really do feel like Christmas is around the corner! I'll post some pictures and a tutorial of the arm ribbons soon, they are so easy and fun!
You can check out what Morgan, one of the other crafty mamas, is making for the swap on her blog right here,
and here is a post that my friend Em did about some of the gifts that they made last year, such crazy cuteness. 

Christmas crafting

Its hard to even be typing the word Christmas, since there is so much to do between here and then, and really it still feels so far off, but...I have started my Christmas crafting already! I was invited by my friend Em to be part of a group of mamas with young children who do a hand-made gift exchange for their little ones each year at Christmas time. The age spread of the children ranges from 12 down to 2, so I've been getting lots of ideas organized for each child. It has been really fun, and my own children have been helping me by test-playing with each thing that I make, giving them their seal of approval.

So far, I've got a flock of these needle felted blue birds. I really want to hug each one.

There are also some families of these little fairies in the works,  although before I could even start on the ones to give away Jasper and Carys put their orders in for fairies for themselves.

Some bumble bees, 

Some of these things are going to be a bit hard to part with, but we are really excited to find out what the other moms will send us at Christmas! I'll make sure to post about all of the gifts as I finish them, crafting with a purpose is so satisfying and it feels so sweet and special to be thinking about the other children opening the packages and enjoying my crafts.

Double Deliciousness

Its hard to believe that I haven't mentioned that we got another kitten, Ruby needed a friend! The cuteness is overwhelming, almost too much to handle, but we are doing our best!

They are both chocolate-golden persians so they look very much alike, but they definitely have their own personalities and sweet ways.

They are 12 weeks old now and such fun! Both of them follow me around and like to hang out with me especially when I am alone in the house, and they love to be groomed and petted. We've named our new little one Belle, as she is a beauty. The kittens play with each other all the time, tussling and chasing as kittens do. They have already brought much excitement, vitality and love into our home. The kids can not get enough of either little Ruby or little Belle! True double deliciousness.

Kitten Mania

We had a lovely and leisurely long holiday weekend here, getting to know some new friends, enjoying our extra day off and celebrating Frank's birthday with his sister's family,
but...
The real star of our weekend was one little furry bundle who arrived on Saturday,

little Ruby.

We had been planning to get little Opal, but sadly she had a health problem that made her not the best fit for our family. That was hard for the kids to understand, but once they met Ruby really it was love at first sight, get ready for kitten mania, we love her so much already!

Meeting Opal

Today, with much excitement, we had the great pleasure of meeting the newest member of our family, a gorgeous six week old Persian kitten who (after much deliberation) we have decided to name Opal.

She is a precious little girl, we had only seen her in pictures so far and she was our favorite from her kitten group, so we were thrilled to be able to chose her today during our visit at the home of the kind and helpful breeder, close to where we live.

We also had the joy of getting to spend an hour playing with all of the kittens. I grew up with cats, and one of my favorite childhood memories was waking up in the middle of the night when I was seven to find that my cat was having kittens in her box-bed in my bathroom. What an amazing experience it was to watch her give birth and care for her kittens, and then my brother and I spent months playing with the litter of 5 before we gave all but one away. So, it was exciting to be able to see Jasper and Carys having the great fun of playing with a litter of little kittens, they are so playful!

Here she is with her mama, who she will probably grow to look very much like...

 Little cute balls of fluff every where, such fun!

We can't wait to welcome our little girl home in September, after she spends the next weeks growing with her siblings and mama, and we look forward to having more playful visits with her again before then.