Queen Anne's Lace, and the Queen of Anns

I love the way this arrangement turned out, so I had to share it with you.

Did you know you could use Queen Anne's Lace, that ubiquitous weed, in flower arrangements?  I sure didn't!
It's so pretty and lace-y, that as a child, I couldn't resist picking it and bringing it to my mother, who put it in a vase. where it died. in an hour.

It turns out, the trick to picking Queen Anne's lace is to pick it early in the morning and immediately put it in hot water.  I was too chicken to put in really hot water, so I used the hottest water that would come out of my tap.  I left it in the hot water until it cooled, in about 2 hours.  Then I used it like normal in an arrangement.  You know what? It lasted better than my zinnias, which are known for being great cut flowers!

This is particularly exciting because my best friend's name is Ann, and she's getting married!  She loves Queen Anne's lace the way I'm sure I'd love a flower if it was called "Empress Joanna Flower."  So, we'll be able to harvest it from neighboring fields and bedeck her wedding with it.  I'm super excited.
She's also keen on ferns, so we just planted 33 fern plants to harvest for the flower arrangements.  We bought them as bare-root plants, so they looked remarkably unpromising when we unpacked them.  Bare root plants are literally dirty pieces of root in baggies.  I open up a box from the growers and, every time, there's a moment when I think "I paid money for this?"  However, we have high hopes.  Gardening, for me, is frequently an exercise in hope for the future.

As a bonus, that yellow flower in the arrangement isn't a form of goldenrod as I had previously thought.  It's actually a vintage garden flower that has escaped from someone's garden and was growing wild next to a post in my neighborhood.
The name? "Sweet Annie"

blue eyed smiles

Catherine is growing, at least in spirit.
I should stop commenting on her size, but she's such a pint-sized thing for a six-month old.  It makes it extra cute when she does, well, just about anything.

This photo shoot started out as documentation of dresses I made for Catherine and Grace.  However, the sun was shining, and Cate was on her A-game as far as cuteness goes.  So she quickly stole the show. 

You can tell these were shot a couple of weeks ago, back when short sleeves were comfortable.  While I was shooting these, my other niece was hanging out behind me, making faces at her sister so she'd laugh, and refusing to be in frame.  It's okay.  I'll get her next time.

  

PS. didn't those dresses turn out cute!  

For links to the lovely patterns, click here .

Anne Geddes makes it look easy.

 
So, I tried to put my niece on a pumpkin.

There are several reasons why it did not work.
1. She hated it.
2. little babies love being warm almost as much as they love being swaddled. Pumpkins aren't warm.
3. the pumpkin was not perfectly smooth, even though I put a napkin on it. which you can totally see.
4. I really needed a bigger pumpkin. Like one of those blue-ribbon-winning-oh-my-goodness-that's-a-big-pumpkin.  She was securely on there, but she wasn't able to rest on it and be happy.
5. Did I mention that babies love being warm?

I knew all of this going in, but the pumpkin was so creamy and lovely, and I just couldn't help hoping that there would be this magical Anne Geddes-like moment where I could capture her looking unutterably cute.
Anyway, we got a good laugh out of it. I still kind of love these pictures because of how they completely don't work.

We got her off of there pretty quick and snuggled her in cozy black velvet.  She was much happier.

The pictures I took on the black velvet have this odd, dreamy quality that I always love when I find it.  Even when she was momentarily upset and screaming her lungs out, there was just this passion to her movements.  Newborns are so awkward, ungainly, squashy, oddly proportioned, and yet absolutely perfect.

Never has anyone looked or felt so completely, completely alive as a newborn.

Cousin Cate

Grace has been the center of attention of our family circle for the past 8 days.  She flutters her little hand, and we all coo.  She squinches up her face and three cameras come out.
But she is not the only petite grand-baby.

Catherine has pudged up a bit, and is all cute dimples and big blue eyes. She loves kicking her legs about, probably strengthening them for crawling in a couple of months.

A few days ago, Sarah and Catherine came over for a visit, and we got to compare the two babes up close.  Catherine seems so tiny, but compared to Grace, she really is bigger.  It's fun to see the similarities and differences.

These kids crack me up.  I'm sure they'll be friends...eventually. : )

Baby Love in the Afternoon

I must admit, I love having a baby within ridiculously easy reach of my camera.  It makes capturing all the details of her deliciously possible, on a practically daily basis.
It means I can wait for the right light to come through the window and pick up the tiny hairs that dust her skin and make her luxuriously soft.

She basically naps, poops, is coaxed into eating, naps, naps, makes languid hand gestures with her long little fingers, and naps some more. And keeps her parents up nights, all while barely opening her eyes.
She has the world on a string and doesn't even know it.

I know babies can't smile yet, but it makes it all the more wonderful to me that I caught that expression on her face.

Happy Sunday,
Joanna

PS. I took the picture of her ear because Rachel is especially in love with her tiny ears.

Grace Under Pressure

I have a darling, diminutive new niece.  At 6 lbs, 3 oz, she manages to have beaten Catherine's birth weight by 5 ounces.  However, Communio, currently tipping the scales at over 20 lbs, weighs more than both his baby cousins combined.

Her name is Grace Calixta Bond.
Unfortunately, I have totally missed my chance to greet my sister saying "Hail Rachel, full of Grace!"  However, I have a new favorite corny joke.  It goes like this:

Q. What do you call Rachel in labor?
A. Grace under Pressure.

I crack myself up.
enough chatter.  I know you just clicked on the link to ogle pictures of Grace in all her tiny beauty.  Let the ogling begin.