:::..:::7:::..:::

It's here. 

Seven is here. 

With huge snow flurries and a full moon.

Which, the amazing boy said, is the universe singing happy birthday to him. 

I think he's right. 

I know he's right.

I love 7, always have. 

I love the full moon, I love this boy... 

for it all to be happening on the same day is overwhelmingly beautiful.

Happy birthday beautiful, intense, sweet, brilliant, little love.......  

 Happy seventh, full moon birthday, I love you.

:::a year of handmade:::

or more then a  year... i've been saying i will post about this for so long, thank you for waiting and enjoy!

i thought it started with birthday #3 (5/11). and a "babies" skirt.

but i realized it actually all starts a few weeks before

with two crowns i made for sibling friends turning 3 and 5. 

 there was an "s" one for another special little lady also turning 3 but i forgot to take a photo.

(all crowns i've made are from the pattern in the creative family.)

from the year before; this one for my niece,

and this one for a 1st birthday of a super baby boy.

and then i realized it started even before that with a recreation to help act out a favorite story: "the 500 hats of bartholomew cubbins" by dr. suess.

i couldn't make more appear magically underneath but he was ok with that after i explained i just don't possess that kind of magic yet; but i'm working on it.

now back to the birthday #3 handmade:

its' a lazy day's skirt by oliver + S, a free pattern. i love this pattern, it's super simple, i've made a few. 

here's one i made for my other niece, r, for her birthday, a few years ago (6/09). 

it was my first, it was a joint effort by me and my boy, it took days of nap time.

they're good even to be not lazy in, like when you climb to the top of a lighthouse.

(she did the climb herself!)

i made two matching doll sized ones for her "babies".

here it is with the "babies" shirt i embroidered for birthday #2.

and flying with googles. 

sorry i just couldn't resist, i love when she wears it, (and googles) 

i have a ton of pictures of her in it, i could go on and on...

like here. 

ok i'll stop, and get on with it!

little turtle bags, two. one big one little.
she opened them and gave the big one to her brother.

she keeps fairies in the little one.

shark appliqué t-shirt for birthday #6. (11/11)

playing golf in it.

and a sailboat one too.

this is how you wear your birthday crown outside, in november, to eat cupcakes by your birthday bonfire.

not from this year, but you remember these, here it is being loved and used!

a crown for the kindergarten crush;
or betrothed, depending who you ask.

celebrating spring, the solstice and easter with another lazy day's skirt and a lion appliqué t-shirt; which was also the wrapping for "the invention of hugo cabaret", great book! 

collecting eggs with one of the turtle bags (right).

(i didn't make the sailboat bag, my mom got that at a store that sells local handmade.)

the lion shirt 

(at the children's zoo in central park, playing in the turtle eggs).

lazy day's skirt

a nice close up. i love the ribbon hem, it makes it so easy.

ok last one... i love paisley with polka dots.

there was some embroidery

this one you've seen.

there were pot holders galore, i must say i was ecstatic and nostalgic at the same time with these. especially after this first one when he said, "let's make one with a pattern" oh boy, yes! please, let's!

which brings us to birthday #4 (5/12). 

i made bean bags for the balance beam we got her.

(banner from the creative family). 

and a pink, sparkly, tulle lazy day's skirt.

one of two exceptions to the green birthday that was desired.

a green ukulele. 

i didn't make that, but if we're catching up i should tell you, it was a super green birthday.

with a new green bed.

the sibling crowns still being loved one year later for 4 and 6. 

and the other exception to the super green birthday; a sparkly red dress. (i didn't make that either, that was from a grandma)

then there was tie dye.

aaaand i think that brings us up to date. i think. it's been busy and fun. i hope you enjoyed. as always thank you to soule mama for her inspiration and books, and to you, for wanting to see what came of it.

happy handmaking!

purple butterflies

hazel, my baby girl. she's about 21months old. when i was pregnant with her i was petrified. my son is...was...is....kind of a handful. (a handful i LOVE and wouldn't trade for the world, but a handful nonetheless) he needs a lot of attention, always has. my pregnancy with him reflected his personality, so did his birth and up to and beyond his 22 months of life which is when i became pregnant with his sister. i was petrified that this second baby would take as much as the first; and i thought i would die. i'm not even being dramatic here, i really didn't see how i would care for 2 needy individuals myself and my husband. i also couldn't see how i could love another baby. everyone told me it would work out, it would take 2 seconds and i would never know how i lived without this second baby. my mom put it quite nicely when she said that it was like falling in love with the first one but this time rowan would be falling in love with us. ok, yea, yea, i still wasn't sold. then she was born, it was swift and easy going, just like her. (i'm not saying birth was easy! just compared to the first time....swift, definitely swift.) and i was in love, all before breakfast. and to top it off she is 180 degrees from her brother, so i did not die. phew. fast forward to this day right now and man what a moron i was, really? i thought i wouldn't love her? geeze this kid rocks. she is so cool and funny and smart and sweet and i can't even remember life without her. i can't even imagine life without her! she loves to try new things and be outside and i have visions of taking off to london with her, when she's older, for four days just to explore because i know she'd be game and an awesome time.

the pants, what does this have to do with pants? right, right, back to the pants...now two of her favorite things: russian stacking dolls and butterflies. so i was in the fabric store and i saw this material, she also digs purple although green is her favorite color, and i had to make her some pants. she loves them. i love her. i plan on embroidering her a little butterfly on a shirt to kind of go with. we'll see.

anyway i used advice from the creative family by amanda blake soule where she shows how to make kid pants out of an old shirt. i had made pants from hazel this way from some old jeans last april. well i say april, it took me 2 months to make these jeans. she says in the book they are 15 min pants... rowan helped, we had a blast. this is what started our sewing together.

hazel in april 2009, 13 months old wearing jeans made from my old jeans. the ones that ripped off me at the library. ok that's the 2nd time that's come up already in the short life of this blog. i may need to tell you all that story in detail...!

so there you have it. purple, shinny, shimmery, butterfly pants. and z says "my paaants! my paaaants! i loooove my paaants! thaaaank you mommy!" (she has a southern twang. i don't know how my kids have that? we live in jersey for pete's sake! rowan says L: ellllll.)

detail of the pants. so i'm really happy i made them but this is the wrong material for pants. she wore them all day and the seam split in the back even though i had reinforced it. there is no stretch and the material frays a lot. it was hard to work with.

ok so now the following you will probably only be interested in if you are related, so just an fyi gratuitous kid shots coming up. i haven't posted this for a week because i was waiting to get a picture of her in them. well it snowed and we were hanging out all day and i got 100 pictures of her in them. and rowan too. they are silly kids. i love them.

she adores him

does everything he does

playing "babies" that's what she calls her stacking dolls

she likes to be the "tiny baby" cause "she's so tiny!"

making "baby" shadows

so there you have it. purple butterfly pants for the happiest girl i know.

and one more pic of the king and queen.