Happy Birthday Silja!

It has been five years since I lay in the hospital with construction workers outside the window, a Swedish midwife I struggled understanding and thought I would die. Then all of a sudden there she was. My sweet little Silja! I remembered crying of joy over the fact that I was alive and that she was alive and looked healthy. I had been warned that I might not feel love for my kid right away but I did. Wild intense love and pride. Mistakenly the doctor must have assumed our relief and happiness meant that we were happy with the birth experience and wrote that in my journal. Something that has caused me trouble later but that is a story for another day.

Everything changes when you get a kid. I remember the intense feeling that I had simply been cut out of my old world and glued somewhere else. It is a world that nobody without kids can comprehend. At first you might try to pretend to your friends that you haven’t passed onto the other side. At some point you can no longer be bothered and you just stop trying. It is not worth it really. Why not just enjoy the life you are living. You excuse it by simply saying to yourself: they will understand when they get kids themselves.

Being a parent is hard. I had quite realistic expectations at first with one exception. I wasn’t quite ready for how light headed and confused I was feeling. They call it “ammetåke” (breastfeeing fog) in Norway and while there might be some oxytocin hormones involved I think it is more that you need to be on the alert every single second of the day. Even if they are a sleep (and even you are sleeping) you still need to listen for sounds all the time. If you are somewhere and talking to someone you must constantly be listening and watching them. This is probably the biggest drain of parenthood.

Then there are birthdays, another big drain on your energy (and wallet). It is Silja’s fifth birthday today but we celebrated yesterday with Kintergarden and family. Truth be told I have used most of my free time for the last week preparing and this year I kept it simple. I might add here that I have very little free time due to the fact that my little boy only sleeps 25 minutes at a time during daytime. Couple of simple cakes, pinata (the ugliest unicorn creature I have ever seen), candy bags, pony ears and some decorations. The party had a My Little Pony theme and we used the Princess Cadence colors for decorations in case you are wondering… My eyes still hurt a bit 🙂 . A 5 year old has quite set ideas of what they want for their birthday. Today we even had to get up and make her breakfast in bed.

With her Princess Cadence crown

The beauty and the beast

Ponny Ears

My little pony theme

It was all worth it! She was genuinely happy over everything we did and she had a really good time. Nothing beats making your kids happy!

I also made her a dress that wasn’t initially intended as a birthday dress but ended up becoming one. It is the Verona dress from Jennuine Design. I wanted to make this dress for a while but struggled finding the right fabric. Many of the samples I have seen feel very stiff with that type of collar. The Escapade Voile felt perfect as it was light and playful and the triangles there matched the collar corners softening them out a bit. The nice people at Hawthorne threads helped me find a matching fabric for the undershirt. This is Cirrus Solid in Coral. The pattern was quite well made and the only complaint I have is that I felt it could have been a bit more decisive. It had a lot of options and didn’t always clearly recommend one way.

Here are some photos. I have really been struggling getting good photos with the strong sun and a little lady that doesn’t have time to stand still. So this is a random collection.

Awww

Birthday girl gives her little brother a hug

Split in sleeve