Thursday, July 23, 2009

When folding laundry doesn't suck . . .

Question: When does folding laundry not suck?

Answer: When it's this cute:
It's been so much fun sorting through this freshly washed plethora of adorableness. Really, enough clothes for twelve baby girls! Opening gifts at the shower, I felt so greedy and hoggy. I kept telling myself, "It's not for me. It's okay. It's for Professor," because I felt so guilty about the quantity of loot!! This is just a little bit of it, and that stack of blankets? Just a portion!

I mentioned I would show off some of the amazing handmade stuff our super-talented friends gifted us with. Well, here's a little bit:

Does your baby have a plush chainsaw? I bet not. I bet Professor will be the only baby with one of these!
(Made by the daughter of Portland picture book illustrator Carolyn Digby Conahan, whose work I love. Here's the card Carolyn made us, which is so getting framed:
Ready? Errr . . . Well, we'll see! So very soon :-)
This totally awesome tiny pink skull sweater was and hat set was made by Heather, a blog friend I met for the first time in person when she drove all the way down from Canada for the shower! We first *met* when Heather made me this incredibly awesome gift which you might remember, completely blowing my mind, and have become friends via email, blog, and phone since. Well, this sweater is really only the tip of the iceberg of baby bounty that Heather brought down with her. Besides another gorgeous sweater, she also made a slew of snugly awesome swaddling blankets and cloths and bibs and MORE. I was - and AM - floored by the bounty! Here we are:

And look at THIS DRESS!!!
Oh my god. Love love love it. "Robots love me"!!! Here's another thing that no other baby in the world will have besides Professor :-) And the best part? Jim has a shirt that matches it!!! How cute are they going to be? Gee, I wonder if that will be photographed when the time comes. This was made by my dear friend Chary, who I met when we both used to sell our artwork at the Portland Saturday Market. Here she is:
Yes, that is a chick sitting on her head. Don't you have a chick on your head, and if not, why? And the necklace? That was a shower game. See, it's this giant ridiculous necklace made out of baby toys, and whenever someone said the word "cute" they had to wear it. So it went from person to person, and here it's Chary who's got it on. The little shirt she's holding up had just been painted by another crazily talented local crafting friend, Jenn (more later). Chary made Professor another dress, this one out of vintage fabric and for when she's bigger. It's the one on the left:
>So cute! (Yes, I'd have to wear the necklace for that!) Here, it's posing alongside a handmade dress my friend Lori found at a flea market in Provence, and a dress my sister got in Honduras a few weeks ago (right in the middle of the coup, no less). Oh my goodness, the cuteness! Can you handle it?

And there's more. For example:
These were made - I think - by Jenn, though it's possible they were made by her partner Jenny. Both of them are AMAZINGLY talented and make a bazillion awesome things from plush toys to lacquered coasters to clothes and purses and more more more, many of which can be purchased here or here and here. Wow. They also have the most adorable house and the most adorable mini chickens which, no shock, have an adorable house of their own.

Speaking of chickens, did you know Portland is the capital of urban chicken-keeping? Other crafty-goddess friend Maggie also keeps chickens (and also in an adorable coop that she and her boyfriend built out of salvage). Ducks, too! Maggie made Professor the most awesome of all mobiles, which I showed already, but here it is again:
You might have seen the incredible one-of-a-kind monkey-flower necklace Jim got from Maggie for me for my birthday last year (it's about a quarter of the way down the post).

Okay, I'm going to show off just one last gift. Here it is:

I loooovvvve this quilt, made by Kim (in the middle, below) who came all the way from Seattle with lovely SCBWI cohorts Jaime and Sara. Jim and I [heart] these ladies, and I didn't even know Kim was crafty! I knew she's really funny and that she's a writer, but not that she's a quilter. Aren't those fabrics incredible? And the colors are perfect for the nursery, which is fabulous because I haven't seen a lot of orange & turquoise baby stuff in stores. Stores? Bah! With friends like these, who needs stores? :-) I'm so lucky.

See why I felt so greedy and guilty at the shower? And that's only a fraction! Man, it's total cuteness overload.

Thank you, everybody!!!

22 comments:

Kiersten White said...

Professor is officially the coolest little girl in the world and she hasn't even been born yet!

Em said...

Sooo adorable and unique! Now I'm thinking that I should become an artist so I have all kinds of cool friends like you. Of course, being an artist takes tremendous amounts of creative talent and I'm not quite sure I have that. Guess I'll just have to admire your stuff! :)

Cuppa Jolie said...

I have been known to say that the only time I have ever enjoyed laundry was when my girls were babies. I never minded folding and putting away those sweet, tiny clothes.

And you think you have guilt about the booty now? Wait until Professor only has a chance to wear something once before it's too small. One helpful solution? Change her many times a day, that way you'll get to see her in all those cute things and have more sweet laundry to do!

What a lovely party. I'm so sorry I missed it.

xoxo

Lexi said...

AAWWWWW! Professor is the luckiest+coolest little girl in the world!

myrna said...

I bet it takes a lot longer to do laundry when it's that cute!

holly cupala said...

Oh!!! Sweet sweet sweet! I wish I could have come. Kim's quilt (and really, every single thing!) is beeeyoootiful!

Rachael King said...

Ok, I'm jealous. We're having another boy and I have been sadly eying up all the gorgeous clothes out there for girls. Instead of washing and folding brand new cute little dresses, I am soaking my first baby's old clothes to try and get out the yellow stains that have inexplicably appeared on them since they went into storage, clean, two years ago. Everything looks slightly shabby. Poor second baby!

persnickety_jen said...

I love love love that plush chainsaw. There are no words for how incredibly cool that is. I look forward to seeing many pictures of your daughter chasing all the princesses at the playground with that. :)

As someone who's been to a lot of baby showers recently, it's hard to not give a mountain of things! They're all so cute! Especially when you look on Etsy and see all the fun crafty things people make...

tone almhjell said...

Ooooh! What a megaheap of wonderful, wonderful stuff! Ville is envious, or he would be if he had a window and could look out to see your blog. That quilt is just fantastic. With unicorn (though Ville has one of those right now, my usually tiny belly tatoo which is gigantic and very protective at the moment).

Like I said, baby showers seem pretty cool. We don't have them in Norway, though friends and family show up some time after tha baby is born, to inspect the result and give little gifts.

How are you feeling, still going strong?

Heather said...

Chary's the coolest! She gave me many tips on wearing the crazy baby necklace, which I am also wearing in the photo of you and I if you look closely!

Also, I did not get to see the detail on the quilt while there, but the unicorns and mermaids? Oh my! Adorable!

Vancouver needs many more of your artsy Portland people to come up here! Please?

Jaime Temairik said...

Dang! That is a frickin awesome quilt. Kim tries to hide her world dominating talents, but they are starting to be seen more.

A frickin awesome card, skull sweater, robodress, everything! I was so thrilled to go down there even for a moment and see you twos.

Thanks for having us at your special day!

Anonymous said...

Oh no! The baby is going to be born soon and I'm not even published yet! How am I supposed to be her favourite teen author when I'm not published? GAH! I repeat, GAH, which is baby language for, "Don't worry, Professor, I'm almost done" which is what you might have to tell her when she's constantly crying GOOSH, which is baby language for "Jeez, Mom, why isn't that girl done her book? Doesn't she realize I'll be learning to read soon? Inconsiderate...."

On another note, that quilt is beautiful and I love the plush chainsaw and squid. :)

Amber said...

WOW! How fun is all that?? I wish I were crafty, dang it!! lol
That quilt, though, is to die for. LOVE it!

Congrats and ENJOY!

;)

Charlotte said...

What richness, what lovely things for her to keep for her own children...it's almost enough to make me want to make things.
But not enough to make me want another baby!

I hope all is going well!

Shelli (srjohannes) said...

the clothes match your house and new downstairs room ;) so cute.

lkmadigan said...

Such treasures!!!

What talented friends and family - what a lucky Professor, aww!

And of course I Iove that quilt with the dreamy mermaid ...

Katie Anderson said...

Okay - you honestly have the cutest baby stuff I've ever seen! I can't wait to see the real thing all dressed up in all of these clothes!

And find out her precious name!

So much fun! Good Luck!!!!

Kim Baker said...

It was so great to see you two and be part of such a special day! I hope you get a lot of use out of the quilt, it was a lot of fun to make.

Anonymous said...

Is Professor going to be the baby's actual name? XD

What adorable gifts! Lovely blog

-B

Deirdre said...

Showers are so much fun - especially when you're the guest of honor! Such cute baby stuff. You know, you're going to have to post pictures of the Professor wearing and playing with every single item.

carolyn said...

So much fun!

Kathleen is stoked that you like the chainsaw. She was quite sure you needed one.

BookWyrm said...

HA! I LOVE the skull sweater and chainsaw!

You have some of the coolest friends and the loot you showed off in your blog is by far the most interesting I've ever seen.