Photobucket Photobucket  photo M1_zpsmeajs2i9.png  photo hs_zpsjdypdbbd.png Photobucket

10.19.2015

Iris Turns Four... and a Felt Crown

On Saturday, we celebrated Iris' 4th birthday!


We try to keep our birthday parties simple but special.  We have a tradition where we always celebrate birthday's eves.  Iris had a class party at her preschool on her birthday's eve.  Then that evening, we baked her birthday cake together.


Our favorite cake recipe is this one, which Gail blogged about several years ago.  It's been our go-to chocolate cake recipe ever since.  We used this recipe for the frosting.  It was so delicious we were literally eating it by the spoonfuls.  


My kids and I have an ongoing joke about the misuse of the word literally, but in this case, I really do mean literally.


Iris still has her thing for sharks, so we decorated her cake with sharks.


We also bought shark tattoos.  Iris picked this one.  


It was the meanest one in the pack.  It's pretty gnarly, right?  (Unfortunately the quality of the shark tattoos was seriously subpar.)



I also made her felt crown.  It was so easy!  I made it on her birthday's eve, probably in about 20 minutes.  I kind of want to make like 30 of these and give them away as gifts.


I printed out several felt crown patterns, taped them together and tried them on her head, but this one was my favorite.  I added two more sections to the crown so there were five sections in all instead of three.  

I cut two crown pieces out of felt and one out of heavy interfacing.  I applied the interfacing to one side, then I used wondertape to secure the tips of the two crown pieces together.  (I prefer this method to using double sided interfacing. )


Then I topstiched the two pieces together at the top of the crown using glitter thread in my top thread and regular thread in the bobbin.



Next I topstitched glitter elastic (top and bottom) to the base of the crown, placing the center point of the elastic at the center point of the crown.


I was thinking about leaving the remaining elastic free and tying the crown on in the back, but I decided instead to secure it in a circle, which I first measured to fit her head.  It stayed on well and she looked so adorable in it.


I found both the felt and the glitter elastic at Joann's.  I was pretty excited to find it there.  I actually walked into Joann's on Iris's birthday's eve, without a plan to speak of - other than that I knew I wanted to make a felt crown.  They had the perfect shade of mustard felt and then I found the glitter elastic.  I kind of felt like I won the lottery that night!


We were all talking about how Iris was such a big girl now.  Four!  Iris was trying to tug at my heart strings by singing to me, "I'm almost a grown up! I'm almost a grown-oh-own up!  I'm almost a grown up!  Oh yeah!"  

I enjoyed Iris' babyhood so much that there was a time when I wondered if I would always feel at least a little sad on her birthday.  But on this birthday, I only felt joy.  So I sang her song back to her.  "You're almost a grownup!  You're almost a grown-oh-own up! You're almost a grown up!  Oh yeah."  

Then she paused, a bit concerned and asked, "Am I really almost a grown up, Mama?"  

"No, Iris, you are still a little girl!"  

"Good," she said, "because I really love being a little girl."


I gave her a big hug and told her I love that that she's my little girl.  Happy birthday, Iris!

18 comments:

  1. Oh my! She's so sweet. Happy belated birthday little big girl!

    ReplyDelete
  2. She's such a cutie! I love her face behind the cake, it is so expressive! Your felt crown idea is really cute and simple, I'm going to pin it. Happy birthday little big Iris!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you so much! She really is an expressive child! <3

      Delete
  3. Oh yeah those big eyes looking at that cake is priceless!
    Happy Birthday Iris.
    That's a great crown Rachel. I tried copying one out of a Japanese magazine and it wasn't nearly as successful as it was fabric and all had to be turned inside out through a tiny hole. Sheesh. Felt is obviously the winner.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Happy birthday pretty girl! The crown is great. I'm adding glitter elastic to my list for my next Joann's trip.

    ReplyDelete
  5. That crown is LITERALLY genius hehe. Love it so much! I have the same elastic in black glitter. I might have to copy you. My girls would love this! It looks like she had an amazing day. And I can't believe how much you got done at that birthday eve - preschool party, baking a cake, going to Jo-Anns and sewing the crown ;-) Go you!!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I hope you do! I think they look so cute on!

      Having done my fair share of birthdays at this point, it finally feels manageable. We have our way of doing things, our traditions I suppose, and that helps!

      Delete
  6. Oh, she's lovely! Almost grown up!! (Haha, not really.) You have lovely birthday traditions, and I adore the crown. It's fun and tasteful and perfect for the occasion! It's all about the mustard yellow with you!! :-)

    ReplyDelete
  7. Erm! I think you are one cake plate short. I am literally drooling at that cake.

    ReplyDelete
  8. And I wouldn't mind some glitter elastic too.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Your pictures are always so soft and beautiful. Happy birthday Iris ; )

    ReplyDelete
  10. Happy Birthday, Iris!
    Love that crown. And her face while watching the cake :-)

    ReplyDelete
  11. love the whole blog post in general (fantastic photos!), but that last conversation with Iris . . . bring me the tissues!! So dear!

    ReplyDelete
  12. What a lovely birthday celebration that looks to be! And what a great crown! Our felt birthday crowns are well loved around here. Felt is the perfect crown material it seems. Happy Birthday to Iris!

    ReplyDelete
  13. I love this felt crown and had hoped to make some for last minute Christmas gifts, but the link to the pattern doesn't work. Can you email it to me or repost it here? Thanks so much!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks so much for alerting me to this! <3 I corrected the link! Happy sewing!

      Delete

Thanks for taking the time to leave a comment! I generally respond to comments via email. If your profile does not link to your email account, I try to respond here. :)