For the Love of Baby Sis

In keeping with our tradition of holiday simplicity,  I asked the kids in December if there was anything they'd like to make as gifts for Christmas.
All three of them piped up with ideas for special gifts for their baby sister, who is finally old enough to pay attention to the items she gets shoved in her hands all day.

Gracie suggested making a baby-doll for Iris. We searched etsy.com for patterns we liked, and decided this one was super-cute! The pattern was easy enough to read and comprehend, but I would definitely make some minor adjustments to the arms and legs, if I ever try it again. (they are far too narrow to invert, and with an gaping opening in each appendage you end up hand stitching each one. a machine-sewn seam would be much more hearty)
Gracie embroidered the faces and we worked together with the sewing machine on the other stitching and stuffing.
Overall, I think 'Ginger' is pretty cute, and Iris likes to chomp on her hair and arms. We did purchase bamboo fiber for her filling, but other than that, she was made entirely of scraps of fabric. (my kind of gifting and crafting).

Peter suggested making a Tigger doll for Iris. He likes to sing the Tigger song to her while she's jumping in her bouncer. "Their tops are made of rubber, their bottoms are made of springs... bouncy, bouncy, bouncy, bouncy... f-f-f-f-fun, the wonderful thing about Tiggers is... I'm the only one!" So, together we drew a pattern for a Tigger rag-doll for Iris.  He embroidered his face, helped me with my sewing machine, and stuffed him full of strips of rags he tore.

Ella had some ideas for making Iris a book about rainbows, but like with most projects with Ella, she likes the brainstorming, and the sorting of materials.... but usually wanders away by the time we were putting things together. And that's ok - Iris can have a Valentine Rainbow book instead, and she'll never know the difference!

The week before Christmas it was Pete's turn to bring something for show-and-tell at school.  He chose a fabric pirate map, I had made a couple years ago.  When filling out his interview for this item, he said that 'when people make things for you, they're really special because they take time, and because no one else has something just like yours'.   - and that makes Mommy so proud!

In keeping with the handmade holidays, Dave baked LOTS of bread in his brick oven, I made cranberry and pumpkin breads and Dave made a batch of chipotle hot spicy sauce. Lots of love went into all of those projects, from grinding our own wheat, to smoking jalapeno peppers and stoking the brick oven with apple wood from our local orchard. Generosity of time and effort, is good for your soul!