Dear Sophie, I dreamt of days like these, before you were born. Days when gummy candy was served on fine china underneath a homemade fort with your favorite stuffed baby lamb as a guest. Days when my childhood bear (made by my mom, your nini), was dressed in a dress you had outgrown and crowned [...]
When we arrived at our Ocean Isle beach house, my sister, Katy, gave each of the kids a Mason jar to fill with sand and shells. She decorated the lids of the jars and each jar had a tag around it that said, for example, “Owen’s First Beach Trip, Ocean Isle 2011.” I loved them. [...]
In April we had another, small birthday celebration for Sophie at my parents’ house, as they were unable to join us on her actual birthday because they were in North Carolina, where my sister and her husband were welcoming their new baby into this world. My mom and dad had cooked Sophie’s favorite foods, and [...]
Speaking of libraries, my mom made these fantastic library book bags for the kids for Easter this year. Sophie’s has Olivia (one of her favorite book characters) on it, while the boys’ bags have Dr. Seuss‘s Thing 1 and Thing 2. James’s bag is the middle one—to reflect his content-to-sit-quietly-and-think personality. Owen’s is the one [...]
This past Christmas my parents gave my sister, brother and I each a handmade mortar and pestle, which they found at a little store called L’autedu during a recent visit to Cinque Terre, Italy. Andy and I spent a couple days in Cinque Terre on our honeymoon. Five villages hug a terraced coastline along northern [...]
Sophie’s room is slowly coming together. Months ago Andy’s Dad painted her bead board white, three walls a soft pink and perfect stripes on the wall behind her bed (quite different from the grownup, wallpapered nautical theme it used to be, when we moved in). And recently my mom brought over a beautiful, handmade quilt [...]
The word “tsutsumu” means “the Japanese art of wrapping items in an attractive and appropriate manner.” I’ve long loved homemade gifts and Sophie received many this holiday season. My mom made this one. Wrapped, it looks like this. Unwrapped, it looks like this—a delightful play land perfect for a strong and budding imagination. Sophie loves [...]
We live in a foursquare. Therefore our formal dining room is very much our everyday dining room and we use our formal dining room table (which has been in Andy’s family for years and which Andy’s parents had refinished for us as a wedding present) daily. Normally, I don’t love the look of tablecloths. But [...]
Last year Sophie made this beautiful painted wreath with Nini as a surprise Christmas present for Andy and me. This year my mom transferred a picture of her making it onto fabric and sewed it on the back. We used a tension rod to hang it across the middle window behind our window seat. I [...]
I first learned about Valco strollers from my friend Peggy, also a mom to a toddler and newborn twins. I ran into her (and her fabulous stroller) at Cincinnati Children’s Museum. She found hers on eBay—in Florida. Friends, while vacationing in Florida, picked it up and drove it back to Fort Thomas for her. I [...]
