the haystack needle

babywearing + my baby carriers

  

Since some of you asked, and since it's a subject that I feel passionately about, I thought I'd share my experience with babywearing. But I do want to first say that I'm not an expert on the topic, nor do I think there's one right way of doing anything parenting-wise — and every baby is different. Every mama gets through the first year with their child (especially those first tough 8 weeks) in their own way, and making it through with a happy child makes every mama such a hero. This is just my experience and what I learned that worked for me, as well as some insight I've gained from talking to other moms who are experienced in babywearing. I'll be totally honest, some of my family disagree (and seem baffled) with my choice to use a baby carrier with Juniper a large majority of the time when we're going places. Finding your own way to get out with your baby and explore, see friends, and do errands is an early challenge as a new mom. I can't thank Adriane at Caribou Baby enough for helping me discover the wonders of babywearing. Here's how I navigated through our first seven months with Juniper — I hope my experience can help some of you.  

Babywearing is one of my proudest achievements as a mother, simply because it has given me so much confidence, independence, and bonded me and Juniper in this remarkable way. Think about it this way. How many people have you spent consider time belly to belly, where you're so close you can touch noses? Probably just your partner. And that's probably the same person whom you can read what they're thinking without them saying a word. That's what babywearing has given me with Juniper. I quickly learned what this expression or that whine meant because I could literally feel the shifts in her energy. But that's not how our story started...

(top photo by my friend Charlotte Jenks Lewis)

sprinkle for "the noodle"

Last Thursday, Juniper and I headed out on our longest journey yet. We took a cross-country flight to Sacramento, where we met up with four of the most amazing women in my life. My college girlfriends and I have a tradition of meeting up for a reunion in a different spot every year (see previous reunions here and here). Since we all live in different places, and life has gotten even crazier with babies in the picture, I love how we've collectively made the intention to find time for these reunions. This year, we wanted to be sure to see each other before Baby Z, or "the noodle" arrives sometime around late February. My friend Trisha is expecting, and I'm so happy I was able to see her and that beautiful belly. Juniper was a rockstar traveler. I was so nervous flying solo with her on a cross-country flight (and a red-eye home!), but she was the best traveling partner. I think she loves all the lights in the airport and a plane is a perfect place for her favorite activity — staring contests with strangers.

Every morning we got to eat breakfast with this view from outside Trisha's door — beautiful, right?! I wish I'd taken more photos of Trisha's home because it's such a gem, and everything was designed with an eye for sustainability. 

We threw Trisha a little sprinkle to welcome the noodle and give her some love. The theme was tea and scones. Erin made an amazing batch of scones (and it was her first time baking scones!) and she even whipped up some homemade lemon butter. I was in charge of favors and decided on these Juniper Ridge soaps. The packaging felt so in tune with Trisha's laid-back style, and I love how the scents are indigenous to California. Plus 10 percent of the profits from the soaps actually goes back to helping the mountains of California. (You can pick up the soaps here.) Since Juniper is the first baby of the group, I thought it felt so perfect — a little luck from the first baby to give to the second. Terah picked up teacups, saucers, and dessert plates from a Salvation Army. Together with a sheet as a tablecloth, the table had just the right balance of sweet and unfussy. We also gave Trisha a copy of the classic, Oh the Places You'll Go, and we all wrote notes on the inside cover about why we think Trisha is going to be one amazing mama. (The idea for this started with my sprinkle.)

Terah's recipe for the yummy scones..

And just for fun...

Juniper and I had a picnic by our JetBlue gate in JFK before heading off to California.

Before we surprised Trisha for her sprinkle, Erin and Juniper and I had an impromptu dance party. So much fun. 

ps. I promise the babywearing post will go up next week! Keep finding more to add :)

Have a great weekend!

juniper's birth announcements

It took the better part of four months (after she was born) to figure out what I wanted to do for Juniper's birth announcements. I finally settled on using this custom wreath stamp, then decided on playing with watercolors, and wrapped everything into a book theme to use two of my favorite things  — vintage library cards and my typewriter. Since so many months had already passed, I decided to make these cards more of an announcement/update on Juniper's first four months. I used MOO custom business cards with the rounded corners to create mini photo cards, one photo from each of Juniper's first four months. On the back of each photo card is a little information about where the photo was taken and highlights from that month in her life. The photo cards are the perfect wallet-size photos. I'm so happy with how they turned out — the matte finish and quality of printing looks awesome. (Another thumbs up for MOO!). I tucked the four photo cards into each vintage library pocket which I stuck on the inside of each blank card. I also added a vintage library card in each pocket. On each library card, I typed out a bunch of Juniper's favorite things. And I typed out Juniper's full name on the library card (as if she were a book!) and included her birthdate as the date she was issued to us.

On the outside of each blank card I painted a watercolor frame in purple and yellow. I used the custom Juniper stamp to stamp her name on the front of each card in purple. I decided to line the envelopes using a favorite gift wrap from Linda & Harriett. For the outside of the envelopes, I used red frame labels that I found at a local paper store, and I wrote out the addresses using a neon pink pen. 

Here's a little secret. By the time I watercolored, stamped, and lined the announcements, I realized that Christmas was fast approaching (and I'd have no time to do a separate holiday card for everyone!). So I took mini gift enclosure envelopes that I had in my supplies, stamped them with a Christmas tree, and stamped "peace and love" on a bunch of random gift enclosures and mini paper tags I had in my stationery box. It didn't matter that all the gift enclosures were different, and it was kind of fun matching the card style to the person. I'm a bit of a stationery hoarder ;) So the announcements doubled as our holiday greetings as well.

I really love how they turned out. While it took me the better part of 6 weeks to find the time to create 80 of these announcements by hand, each step was fun to do. I can't remember the last time I used watercolors. I love that there are little pockets and envelopes for people to open and discover. A lot of people have remarked how they like that the photo cards are wallet-size. Mostly, I'm happy that these announcements share a peek inside what Juniper is like — beyond her basic birth stats. Little details like how she loves to suck her fingers and her very first roadtrip was to Maine. And she amazes me each and every day. 

Photographs by Jen for the The Haystack Needle.

hello 2012, and thank you

Hope you all had a great holiday! We were in Maine for Christmas through New Year's. It was the first time in almost a year where we spent a full week away from New York. So nice to get away, and I fall even more in love with Maine every time we go up there. Juniper flew for the first time (she was a superstar traveler, phew!) and we got to spend a lot of quality time with Dan's large family.  The other big news from the week —Juniper is starting to crawl! I am not ready for a baby on the move :) And Dan and I went out to the movies for the first time in almost a year, which was a real treat. 

I wanted to say a big thank you to all of you for following along here, especially as the blog continues to evolve with my life and what's interesting me in the moment. I started this blog three years ago (crazy!). Now more than ever, I feel like I'm stretched in so many directions, but it always feels so good to come back to this space. I don't have specific resolutions, but I do hope to create more of a healthy routine in my days. I'm still working on figuring out a rhythm in my life being a full-time mama who freelances and co-owns a webshop and likes to craft and misses yoga and can never keep up with cleaning the apartment or grocery shopping and would love to finish reading a book one day soon. How do other mamas do it! But I feel so incredibly thankful and lucky for this amazing baby girl in my life.

I have a couple big posts I've been working on writing up. Coming up in the next week, I'll be sharing Juniper's handmade birth announcements as well as my thoughts on babywearing and what carriers have worked well for me. Wishing you all a happy new year! 

ps. I found Juniper's New Year's hat from the Portland shop Ferdinand (super cute shop — definitely recommend stopping by if you find yourself in Portland.) Ferdinand also has an Etsy shop. I went home with one of their squirrel shirts. 

Top image via Happy Dappy Bits. Love their striped thank you cards!

update: homemade baby food cookbook

I've had a few people ask about how I'm liking The Best Homemade Baby Food on the Planet cookbook that I blogged about. I love love love the book. It's been my little bible for introducing Juniper to solids, and it's been going so well (knock wood). The book is packed with information. There are useful tips in the beginning, and then the recipes go month to month. We've almost gone through all of the six month recipes, and so far she loves sweet potato, banana, apples, pear, avocado, brown rice cereal, and her newest favorite — green peas. And the book has a section in the back where you can rate the recipe on how the baby liked it (applesauce cereal is Juniper's 5 star recipe), when you first made it, and any notes on how you varied the recipe. The book has made starting solids with Juniper feel really easy.

And a couple other tools that have helped me with homemade baby food: a food mill and baby-size glass containers. The food mill has been key. The portions in the book's recipes make a few baby servings, but it's still a small portion to put in your blender. I suppose you could triple the recipe, but since we're trying everything for the first time, I want to make sure she likes it first. My blender was getting stuck because there wasn't enough liquid to go around — and to be honest, it feels easier to clean my food mill than my blender. My OXO food mill works so well. And unlike a blender it takes care of the skin, seeds, etc. So you don't have to peel and core apples and peel your sweet potatoes. With the peas, the food mill takes all the inside and leaves the outside shells, which makes it an even smoother puree than a blender would make. I hunted around for the right glass containers, because I wanted to avoid storing her foods in plastic (especially for freezing.) I love how these Wean Green containers are not only glass, but they come in baby-size portions of 4 ounces. So you know how much you're storing and can see how much you're feeding her. Plus, the different color lids are super fun and can be used to color-code foods. Hooray for solids!

Images: from my iPhone and from Wean Green. 

favorite wallpaper...wait, it's not wallpaper!

Over on Houzz today, I'm sharing my favorite place to change Juniper's diapers. Yes, this is one rad diaper changing station, isn't it?! I snapped this photo inside the bathroom of my favorite local shop, Caribou Baby. I was floored when I found out where the cool "wallpaper" is from. Bet you'll never guess :)

Check out my post on Houzz for all the details. 

new in the shop! gilded alphabet sets!!!

Sorry it's been a bit quiet over here, but I've been hard at work with my shop partner Chris pulling together a big introduction for us! We've just launched our first collection of exclusive Cabin 7 gilded blocks! We've designed cherry wood blocks (made here in the USA, sourced with sustainable wood) inspired by the vintage gilded blocks from our childhood. It's been a long time in the making and we're so proud of this collection. Each alphabet set comes with the 26 letters of the alphabet (the blocks are reversible, so you get two gilded sides with each block.) The combination of the raw cherry wood and the shiny golden surface is so pretty. And I'm really loving the look of the debossed (more modern) font with our blocks. These alphabet sets are a limited-edition collection, so scoop one up while you can!

A huge thank you to Oh Joy! for featuring our gilded alphabet sets today in her new mama Gift Guide. Go check it out!

ps. For any brides out there, this alphabet set was actually inspired by a custom vintage order we created for a bride. We loved her idea of displaying an alphabet set by her wedding photobooth for guests to play around with as props (hold up your initials or spell a word!).

Be back soon! xx Jen