for the birthday boy

Recently, we purchased a new bed for Daniel. Deciding on a mattress was a difficult choice as we wanted something that was free from toxic chemicals so prevalent in standard mattresses but was also affordable. We settled on the Keetsa mattress. With a blend of unbleached and organic cottons, bamboo and wool for the cover, bio-foam with green tea extract for the core and non-toxic flame retardants, this mattress provided a lot of what we were looking for. The company uses unique shipping (for free!), compressing the mattress in bio-degradable and recyclable packaging. A solid, untreated pine bedframe added one more non-toxic element to this place where he will spend so much time in the coming years. We topped the new bed with organic cotton sheets, so all that was needed was this:

A nice, warm blanket.

The blanket top was pieced together with a length of horse print cotton and a watery blue cotton print from the local fabric store. The batting is warm and natural unbleached cotton, with a solid green cotton flannel backing.


I do so love this horse print, and it goes very nicely with last year's handmade birthday gift...

This teepee, a favorite reading/hiding/scheming place for all the little ones.

While not the most challenging sewing project, this blanket was certainly the largest I've undertaken. I was reminded of a few very basic, yet very important, rules while working on it:

- Measure, measure and measure again (I could have sworn I had enough blue fabric for both the front and the back)

- Pins exist for a reason. It's good to use them (and also, who knows why, I really do work better with a pin held in my teeth.)

- The seam ripper is your friend. While it may hurt to undo a large section of work (twice), the results when you get it right (it helps to use those pins; see above) are worth the effort.

And another, more personal reminder: I truly do enjoy making things for my family. Makes a girl feel good.