birthday prep madness for my princess

My Girl is 6!  So hard to believe.  In many ways, these 6 years have flown by.  But at the same time, it's almost difficult to remember how tiny she once was.  That sweet tiny baby who cried all the time and never slept (I didn't think I would survive those first few weeks!) has turned into this bright, eager girl with a big smile and huge enthusiasm for life. 

And she wanted a Princess Party to celebrate.  So I gave her a Princess Party.  Just a small home affair - only 5 little girls plus one little brother.  But I went nuts making stuff for this small party.  Really, truly nuts.  None of the details are hugely impressive - just a bunch of small things that when added together took a lot of time.  Too much time, really.  My Man says he hardly saw me in the evenings for the past month!  But for some reason I enjoy this stuff.  Even when I'm getting sweary at the sewing machine or the paint or the scissors, in the end I love having something that I (or we) hand-created.  Something that isn't plastic and may last a little longer than the 2 hours of the party.  Some of it, anyway.  So here's a photo chronicle of my obsession:

I already showed you the princess skirt I finished a few weeks ago.  With scrap fabric from the skirt and some extra buttons, I made a crown applique for a pink T-shirt already in her closet (which she wouldn't wear because it was too plain!).  I don't have a great picture of it, but here it is actually on the birthday girl:

A bunting banner (tutorial here) made of cut newspaper painted with acrylic craft paint (I should've taken the picture at night):

Another banner made with fabric and felt letters (and some curly ribbon hanging from the light fixture):

Some princess (and one prince) wands made with felt, ribbon, dowel rods, and simple hand-sewn embroidery:

Some small homemade jewelry bags filled with beads to make necklaces:

The birthday table, set with real dishes (bought at Goodwill!), paper placemats, placecards, and flowers made from coffee filters and tissue paper:

A crown craft for the princesses:

Uncovering some invisible ink clues left by the Fairy Godmother (white crayon on white paper - not truly invisible, but still fun):

The Birthday Girl got involved in the crafting, too!  Here's a sign for our door (I love how free she is with her decorating - even at her age I would've been worried about everything being orderly and symmetric, ugh):

And another sign for the Ballroom (a.k.a. the basement):

And here she is making some bubble painting (idea found here).  This was a blast for her - fill a cup half-way with water, a squirt of dish soap, and a good squirt of acrylic paint.  Then blow!  When the bubbles are above the rim of the cup, place a sheet of heavy paper over it.  Repeat until paper is covered.  It makes a lovely marbled kind of paper.  I couldn't get a good picture of the result (photographer I am not), but we used the paper to make individualized bookmarks for her guests:

And that's all (enough!) of the preparation madness.  Crazy, you say?  Yes, I agree!  But fun and satisfying.  I'll make a separate post of some actual birthday pictures eventually.

first day of school

My Girl has been a first-grader for a week now.  So these pictures are a little late!

So far first grade seems to be going well.  She gets on the bus happily every morning and arrives home with a smile on her face.  Our only hitch has been that she cannot remember to bring her planner home!  And since we're getting less communication from the teacher this year, I didn't even realize at first that she had a planner.  But we're learning, and she'll get in the homework groove soon.  And I'm looking forward to the first PTA meeting, where hopefully we'll get a little more info from her teacher.  First Grade!  It seems so much older than kindergarten.

Here's my sweet girl (and boy) just before she got on the bus for her first day:

"Educating out of Spirituality"

In my blog browsing yesterday, I came across this post:  "Educating out of Spirituality" by Dave Csinos at Such As These.  He basically says that our traditional educational model in the church is doing a disservice to children - teaching them about God but not helping them experience God.  He's written some other good stuff about children in the church as well.

This is something I've been thinking about recently:  How do I encourage my kids in their spiritual development through more than sending them to Sunday School or even reading them Bible stories at home?  Because while Biblical education and learning about God is important, it's not enough.  As Csinos says, "it can’t compare to the life-changing, life-giving, and life-forming experience of God’s presence in our lives."

It's so easy to drop the kids off at their church classes, say a prayer at dinner, and read a Bible story at night.  So easy, but not enough.  It's so easy for us to talk about church.  My husband and I both work in churches, after all.  He is even the children's minister!  We talk about church a lot.  But talking is not enough.  How do we encourage them to grow and form their God-given spirituality without educating it out of them?  How do we encourage creativity, critical thought, doubts, passion, love?  How do we help them experience God's presence in their own lives as well as in the world around them? 

I'm not very good at this myself.  I have lots of thoughts about faith, but practicing it and really experiencing it...that's much harder.  I grew up in a traditional Sunday School and was in church multiple times a week.  I'm a good student, so I learned lots of stuff.  My parents were always open about how God is important to them.  In many different ways, I learned that faith is important.  I am very thankful for my Christian education, at church and at home, but today I wonder how it can be improved upon for the new and different world that my kids live in.  Because while I learned lots of good stuff, I was often on my own in learning spiritual practice and figuring out what it means to experience God. 

Even though I never went to a truly fundamentalist church, I was taught a pretty prescribed faith.  So when I was faced with questions that my faith didn't seem to have good answers for, or when I was faced with people who didn't fit that faith box but seemed to have a genuine relationship with God, I was a little thrown.  Not greatly thrown, but a little.  Others have certainly had to "unlearn" much more than I did, because I did grow up in a house where questions were allowed and the traditional was not always viewed as the best.  But I still remember a gut fear that I was losing faith when really I was just trying to own it. 

So how do I help my kids experience God and practice their faith?  How do I give them permission to ask questions without feeling like they're falling off a cliff?  How do I help them think and act creatively in the kingdom of God?  Heck, how do I help myself?!  As mentioned above, my husband is their children's minister, and I know that he is working on some good stuff for their spiritual education at church.  Stuff that focuses more on faith formation and less on filling their head with Bible points.  But what should I do?  Or what should we do at home?  I have some blurry ideas, but no formulated plan.  And maybe it shouldn't be a formal plan, but I feel better with a list! 

Is anyone else out there wondering these kinds of things?  Any ideas?  Let's share!  Hopefully in future blog posts I can share with you what we're trying.  If you, too, are wanting to dream about a different kind of education that educates into spirituality, then let's talk.

Mark, Day 21

I'll get through this eventually!

Mark 14:1-11

• Priests and scribes are plotting to kill Jesus, but they don't think they should do it yet because there are so many people around for the Passover and they don't want a riot (so what changes their mind in 2 days?  or was this just a small group of dissenters and the rest were ready to get on with the killing?).
• In the meantime, Jesus is at Simon the leper's home (someone he healed? I don't think he'd still be at home if he still had leprosy), and a woman comes in and pours costly perfume on his head.  Really, really expensive perfume.  Which seems silly, doesn't it?  That you would use up your life savings pouring it over the head of a man who will die in a couple days.  Even if you don't know he's gonna die, it still seems like overkill.  My practical streak is crying out like the others in the house did - why? why not use it for the poor? or for your own security?  But Jesus tells them to leave her alone.  And here is the line I sometimes hear quoted when people are trying to justify that people are poor:  Jesus says, "For you always have the poor with you..."  But here's the line I don't hear quoted:  "and whenever you wish you can do good to them."  Whenever you wish.  Which seems to suggest they're not wishing it very often.  So their "you should've used it for the poor" complaint is hypocritical. 
• But the woman:  "She has done what she could."  She has shown a kind of extravagant love for this man, abandoning practicality.  Forsaking fear.  She is bold and brave and does a beautiful thing despite the censure she must know she'll get for it.  Bold, brave and determined.  I wish I were more like her.
• And then Judas leaves to betray Jesus.  Makes me wonder if he was so offended by this woman that he decides to do it now.  What was he thinking? 

a "too soft" church?

I opened up this article today:  Prof says boys raised to be 'too soft' will be ineffective men.  I have so many problems with this, I don't even know where to begin.

Why do I read these things?  Really, why?  When I know it's just going to make me mad.  But most of the news makes me mad or sad.  I have to put myself on a news hiatus occasionally just to keep from going mad.  But I don't want to be uninformed, either.  I want to be a good global citizen, though it seems like that should entail more than shaking my head.  And I want to be an informed Christian citizen, though it seems like that should entail more than shaking my fists.

And it does.  I read other things about church leaders, too.  Things which are encouraging and hopeful.  For a long while, I stopped paying much attention to Baptist politics, particularly SBC politics since that just wasn't part of my world anymore (thankfully).  But now that I'm a secretary at an SBC church, I find it more difficult to ignore it all.  Though I genuinely like the people I work with for, I struggle with staying in my place.  This church is not my church.  It's just my workplace.  It's not my job to determine direction or enact ideas or dream about the future here.  But I struggle with always being on the outside of these conversations, when for so many years my dream was to be a minister myself. 

And so when I read articles like the above (from an SBC leader), I want to scream, "What world are you talking about?"  In what way are your SBC churches becoming too soft and feminized?  Because when I look at this church where I work, and frankly, when I look at most so-called moderate churches, I see men.  Lots and lots of men.  Yes, women often do much of the work behind the scenes.  But up front on Sunday morning - it's mostly men.  And when I see secular media reports about what religious leaders are doing/saying, again, it's almost all men.  And there's plenty of war-like talk (in the article, one of his assertions is that we need to bring back war imagery ?!? ).  Do we really need more macho posturing?  How is that like Jesus? 

There are lots of individual points I would like to pick apart in that article, but ranting is not supposed to be the point of this blog :).  Instead, I will look to yesterday, when I had a lovely lunch with a woman pastor in my town.  And I will look to my previous job, where I worked with a great friend who is also a woman pastor.  And I will look to my friends around the country who serve the church in many varied ways.  And I will look to the many blogs and books I read, written by ministers (men and women) who do not subscribe to the idea that women should be weak.  I will look to the women and men who give me hope for the future, hope for a time when being a woman isn't detrimental to a church vocational calling.  And hope for a time when men who are kind and generous and open are not considered weak.  This is the world I dream about for my children.  This is the world I dream about for myself. 

But for now, I will be quiet at work and look for other opportunities to speak and serve.  What will those opportunities be?  Right now, I have no idea.  I feel like I'm in a holding pattern, waiting for some kind of direction.  Am I being pro-active enough in this?  I'm not sure.  I'm really not sure.  But in the uncertainty, I will strive to be faithful to who I am created to be one day at a time.   And I will strive to be hopeful rather than just critical, remembering the good and the bright and the life-giving. 

Our Week in Pictures

This was a special week for us.  My Man took the whole week off while I worked just half of the week.  We took a short trip to visit some special friends and went to a couple of nearby museums for a mini-staycation.  It was a great break for us, and I think we all feel better now as we're about to enter the schoolyear.  Which starts Monday!  Oh My!

We began the week with a trip to the VA Museum of Transportation:

Then we visited our friends, who have kids the same age as our kids.  They play remarkably well together!  While visiting, we picked some very yummy blueberries and got some gardening lessons:

And we ended our staycation with a trip to Amazement Square (a great children's museum in Lynchburg).  Here's My Girl on the zip line:

My Boy at his favorite spot:

Playing with boats:

And jumping silliness on squishy mats:

Some moments not pictured:

• First Grade Open House:  We met My Girl's new teacher and found her new desk (up in front right by the teacher's desk!).
• Dinner with local friends who also have a 2-year-old boy, so much of the evening was spent refereeing the fights over Lightning McQueen and Thomas :). 
• Parent's Night Out tonight.  Which means My Man and I get to end our week with something sans kids - heavenly!
• My Man body-slamming the bathroom door because The Girl locked herself inside and couldn't get out. 

It's been an eventful week!

seven for sunday

I don't think I took a single picture this past week.  It was one of those weeks where I had to really make myself notice what is good and lovely so as not to allow the ickiness to drown out the loveliness.  Because there was loveliness, in small and big ways.

7 bright spots from this past week:

• My Girl had a date with a wonderful woman from church who has taken My Girl into her heart.  They went out to dinner, did some jewelry shopping, and got ice cream!  Which makes my heart melt.  My Girl was so excited.  I just love that this wonderful friend has embraced My Girl's quirkiness and encourages her and makes her feel special. 
• Back-to-school shopping is almost finished.  Just one small coin purse to go!  And school is almost here.  It'll be nice to get back into that routine.
• My Girl was invited to go with a friend to their pool (a huge treat for her), and apparently she swam through the legs of her friend's mother!  Not a big feat for many her age, I know, but it wasn't that long ago that she was terrified of water, and she's still not a natural fish, so this is big for her! 
• Snuggling with My Boy.  The Girl wasn't snuggly at all at his age, so I am appreciative that he is.
• Snuggling with My Girl.  Note above, but around the age of 3 1/2 (when she was taking OT and ST for her SPD) something in her switched.  And these days, she is VERY snuggly.  She is always wanting to hug and give kisses and sit in my lap.  Frankly, sometimes it drives me crazy!  But on the whole, I am very thankful.
• A Man who mows the grass and does the laundry!  I have never mowed grass in my life (not very feminist of me, I know) and I do very little laundry at our house.  I do most of the kitchen work (except for Saturday morning waffles...mmmm), but almost none of the laundry.  Which works for me! 
• Finally finding black sandals that I can wear to work and are still comfortable (but don't break the bank).  This seems silly, I know.  But I HATE shoe shopping, and I'm very picky about shoes, but can't buy really expensive ones.  So it's taken me months to finally find something that will work and make my feet happier. 

lessons from an alcoholic

I've just finished the memoir Lit, by Mary Karr.  Great book, but you must slog through a lot of darkness to get to the light.  Thankfully, I kept at it, because it is ultimately a beautiful story of hope and redemption.  But without any sugary-sweetness.  No, "sweet" is definitely not the right word for it.  Bitter, sour, spicy...but not sweet. 

This is the story of Mary Karr's young adulthood (she's also written other books about her childhood and adolescence, but I haven't read those), which is consumed largely by her descent into alcoholism and her clawing climb out of it.  And in her ascent out of the darkness, she finds God (much to her own surprise) and finally converts to Catholicism. 

In this rather stressful week, I keep remembering bits of her story that struck me.  Here are some thoughts:

• When you're consumed by your own pain and grievances, it's nearly impossible to recognize the good in your life (and the legitimate grievances of others).  That's why I started this blog - to intentionally remind myself of how much brightness there is in my life even when I start to feel consumed by worry or tension or frustration or anger or struggle.
• Pray, even when you think you're just talking to emptiness.  Even when it seems utterly pointless or even selfish - pray. 
• Take advice from those who have gone before you, even when that advice seems crazy.  Wisdom can come in seemingly wacky forms.
• Community is our strength.  Mary was unable to drag herself out of alcoholism.  It took a community to hold her and care for her and give her tough love. 
• When someone says, "Feel free to call me," do it.  Accept help.  And ask for it.

Mark, Day Twenty

Mark 13

• This chapter is one that I'm sure Rapture enthusiasts would point to if trying to convince me of their point-of-view (an end-times theology like the Left Behind series).  As you may guess, I'm not a fan of this interpretation.  Now, I'm not knocking you if you do hold to this kind of end-times theology (truly, I'm not).  It just doesn't work for me.  There are literary reasons for this (apocolyptic literature being more about encouraging the people of the day than about prophesying the exact future), but I'm no literary expert. 
• So what I see when I just read this is that the tribulation Jesus is talking about (nation against nation, earthquakes, famines, persecutions, betrayals) - all this stuff is already happening and has been happening for thousands of years.  It's not like that's new, but it was new for the very young church community when Mark was written.  And that young community has just experienced the destruction of Jerusalem (I think? I know Mark was the earliest gospel, and I think it was written right around the time of the destruction, but I don't remember exactly).  That's a truly horrific historical event, particularly for a young community struggling with how to survive.  So when Jesus promises He will return "in clouds with great power and glory," that seems to me more like an encouragement to stay strong in the midst of unspeakable agony than an exact prediction of the future.  Jesus is promising that in the end, it really will be better.  In the end, God's glory will triumph.  But we don't know when that end will be (which he also says).  So in the meantime, we work every day to bring the kingdom of God to earth, expecting that such a kingdom will ultimately be the only kingdom.

Mark, Day Nineteen

Um...perhaps I gave myself a bit too much grace on the Mark blogging, since it seems I only blogged on it once last week!  I'll try to get back into more of a groove.

Mark 12

• Jesus teaches a parable that the priests, scribes and elders realize is against them.  They're angry but afraid of the crowd, so they go away (for now).
• Then they send some Pharisees and others to try to trap Jesus with tricky questions.  Jesus, of course, manages to dodge their questions (making them look foolish).  But one of the scribes seems to ask Jesus a genuine question:  "Which commandment is the first of all?"  And Jesus tells him we should love God first and then love our neighbor as ourself.  And the scribe says, "You are right....this is much more important than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices."  And Jesus says, "You are not far from the kingdom of God."  What particularly struck me about this is that even among Jesus' most ardent detractors, there was one (maybe more?) who heard him and accepted him (at least in part).  Presumably, this man was one of the men sent to trip Jesus up (so he wasn't pre-disposed to like Jesus), but instead he came to a place of accord with Jesus.  So often it seems like Jesus' prophetic message falls on deaf ears in the religious community...but not always.  Which could be encouraging to modern-day prophets/preachers/teachers.  Even when it seems like everyone is against you (and in this day of internet commenting, you really see all the nastiness), there may be some who hear and understand. 
• Then Jesus preaches against the scribes who put on a show, and contrasts that with the widow who gives all she has.  Quietly, matter-of-factly, with faith.  No entertainment.  No building herself up.  No pandering to the crowd.  She just does the right thing.  And the very hard thing.

Our Week in Pictures

This week began with a Pump-It-Up Birthday Party for a little boy from church.  The Girl loves, loves, loves Pump-It-Up!  The Boy - not so much. 

Tuesday was my 8th Anniversary!  I have no pictures of this, but the kiddoes played with some friends while we went out, and they had Happy Meals for dinner.  In the Happy Meals - new Littlest Pet Shop animals!  I had actually asked our friend to get The Boy one of these girl toys (rather than the superhero boy toy), because he's been driving The Girl crazy taking her little animals (and he has no real interest in the superheroes)!  So during the week, The Girl and I began making the following playground for the animals:

 

It's just some boxes from the recycling bin turned inside out and cut up.  We plan to paint it as well.  Maybe we'll get around to that.  Maybe.  Our inspiration (which is a much bigger and more beautiful project than our own) can be found here at Filth Wizardry.

I've also begun working on a salt dough Pixie Hollow for The Girl's birthday, but I don't think I'll post any pictures of it until I'm done!  Step One seems to have worked, but I'm still a little skeptical that it'll all pull together in the end :).

We've had some moments of cooler weather here, so the kiddoes have actually played outside a bit more than usual this summer.  Here are some pictures of them running through our backyard meadow as they run away from the scary lawnmower monster!

And climbing the slide mountain:

The Girl and I went to a park one day while The Boy was taking his nap.  She played in the creek with a new friend she had just met at the park.  It continues to amaze me how easily she meets people.  I'm jealous!

And while at the creek, we found this nest (I'm sure that's not the right word) of butterflies.  You can't really tell it from the picture, but there were at least 10 butterflies sitting in this one spot, and they began flying around us as we approached.  It was truly magical.

Some Potato-head silliness:

And finally, working together (The Boy, The Girl & Me) on some more wrapping paper for a Baby Girl baby shower.  No pastel pink for us.  I'm sure ours will be the brightest present there!

Five for Friday

Today is a day that reminds me of how much I have and how there's really no understandable reason for it.  A seminary colleague's 3-year-old daughter starts chemo today for stage 4 cancer.  My children, on the other hand, got a clean bill of health from the pediatric cardiologist, where they were checked for the same heart abnormality that I have (written about here).  Now why are my kids healthy and little M is not?  I don't know.  I just don't know.  But I will hope and pray that God's love will be felt through it all.  And so today I will take a little time to pay special attention to some brightness around me:

1.  Obviously, a good report from the cardiologist.  But also, both kids were such amazing troopers!  The Boy wasn't happy with it, but he was calm and let the doctor and technician do what they needed to do.  I was afraid he was still too small for all this, but the pediatrician was right - he did just fine.  And My Girl - Oh My!  It's hard to believe that just a couple years ago (definitely when she was the Boy's age), she would've been screaming and thrashing the whole time.  She was amazing - polite and happy and following directions perfectly.  Too bad I can't seem to elicit that at home :).

2.  A lovely 8th anniversary with My Man.  Some friends offered to keep the kids so we were able to go have a calm, adult dinner by ourselves.  It was so nice, and a too rare occurrence.  I am very thankful to have such a partner to share my life with.

3.  Some good conversation with friends new and old, as well as plans to connect with some out-of-town friends.  Always a blessing.  I read recently that "studies show that extroverts and introverts alike get a mood boost from connecting with other people" (from Gretchen Rubin's Happiness Project blog).  As a relatively extreme introvert, I would say that this is basically true, though it depends on the circumstances of the connecting.  For me, connecting with a couple people in an intmate setting is absolutely uplifting.  Attempting to connect in a larger group, not so much.  But maybe "attempting" is the key word there.  It's very hard for me to connect in large groups, though there are sometimes moments of it.

4.  A mostly successful attempt at Step One of creating Pixie Hollow (first mentioned here).  I say "mostly" because it'll take a week or so to see how well it dries.  But I'm hopeful that this might actually work! 

5.  The opportunity to help a man find some money to pay his rent for the week until he gets his paycheck.  Otherwise, he would've been homeless, and he was obviously scared.  I know there are many great people helping in this way all the time, but in my position, I am too often having to turn people away because they don't meet the criteria that my office requires.  It was nice to genuinely help someone this time.  And thanks to My Man for being the referral I used to get him the help :).

princesses, pink, and pretty things

I have some friends who cackle delightedly (I know who you are!) that I birthed a girly girl.  If you know me at all, you know that I Am Not Girly.  I wear almost no jewelry, put on very little make-up, hate shoes and shopping, and have typically avoided anything pink.  And now I have a girl who is all about all of those things.  It's been a learning curve for me, but I find myself embracing the ruffles and bling (cheap bling, of course!) and even pink these days.  How could I not when she makes me smile so much?

The Girl has a birthday at the end of the month, and I am up to my eyeballs in princessy-type craftiness for birthday gifts and her Princess Tea Party.  I am determined to do this on a budget (really, it's not like there's any other option for us), so I'm using simple supplies, recycling/repurposing as much as I can, scouring Goodwill, and planning to beg and borrow as well!  And I love it.  Yes, I do.  I admit it - I love being princessy for My Princess. 

What I don't love, though, is the message that some of this princess culture sends.  Wait for your Prince Charming, and when you get him, all will be well.  Blech.  Now, don't get me wrong, when Disney revamped their animation department and started churning out those fun new princess movies (Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast) I loved it as much as any girl.  I even had posters all over my dorm room.  And I love a good romantic comedy (I'm girly in some ways, I guess).  But I was also old enough to know that none of that is real.  That real life is not so pretty.  That real life doesn't end with a wedding.  That being a girl is about a lot more than getting a boy. 

My Girl will be 6 on her birthday, and she already talks about getting married.  I think this is normal (I hope?), but I also want her to be happy about herself without a fairy tale.  I want her to learn how to be a friend, how to respect herself and others, how to create beauty in her own way, how to serve and be served graciously, how to fight our cultural desire to get more and more stuff (and to be just as happy with less).  And The Little Mermaid certainly doesn't teach any of this (man, that girl is bratty!).  [Just after I wrote this (seriously, we must be mind-linked), a friend posted this link on her facebook page:  Advice for Young Girls from The Little Mermaid.]

I don't want to discourage My Girl's love of all that is sparkly and magical.  I actually think magical thinking is important.  By all means, I want her to imagine a different world!  I just want some balance.  I want her to know that women can be smart and strong and kind and caring, and that they are beautiful in all their many colors and shapes (I understand now why my mother was so opposed to Barbie!).  Fortunately, despite her girly-girlness, she is not at all a fragile girl.  She's pretty rough-and-tumble, and sometimes plays better with boys than with girls, even though her great desire is to have Girl BFF's.  She has started freaking out if she gets marker on her fingers, though.  "It's ugly!"  *sigh*

There's a relatively new Tinkerbell video that we got from the library a few weeks ago.  The story is about Tinkerbell (of course), who is a tinker fairy - meaning she makes things - and her struggle with being a different kind of fairy than the other fairies (who are good with growing things).  In the end, she embraces the beauty of her own talent and her contribution to the fairy community.  Now that's the kind of fairy tale story I can get behind!  And so when I found this Pixie Hollow project online, I decided to give it a try for her birthday.  I haven't started it yet.  It may turn out to be a disaster, but I'm kind of excited to try! 

And here are some pictures of the things I've already begun or finished:

Here's the princessy skirt I finally finished - my first attempt at using a pattern to sew something.  The overskirt doesn't hang exactly right, I think because I cut the fabric across the grain instead of along it.  It was the only way to cut enough fabric pieces, and since I got the fabric at Goodwill, I couldn't go out and buy more.  It was also my first attempt at sewing on elastic, which I'm sure I didn't do exactly right.  But I think My Girl will still like it, flaws and all!

And here's the felt birthday crown that I finished:

And here's a collection of in-process stuff (you'll notice it's all in the laundry room - that room doubles as my craft room):

Look at all that pink!  See, I really am embracing my (very small) girly side :)!