J. turned 2 today. It seems like only yesterday he made his early entrance. We had a little family celebration this evening complete with Indian take out and my favorite cupcakes–made from the Magnolia Bakery cookbook.

H. helped him open his gifts which included the elephant I knit for him last month.

I was able to finish a school days raincoat for J. just minutes before his birthday late last night. I used Etsuko Furuya’s Echino cotton laminate for the outside and baby blue flannel by Robert Kaufman for the lining.

I must admit, this project had to be my most challenging sewing project to date. Sewing with cotton laminate for was tough given the stiffness and the stickiness. So please don’t look too close at the edge stitching since it turned out a bit wonky. I was covering the right side of the cotton laminate with tissue paper from a recent Anthro purchase to help prevent it from sticking to my sewing machine. Towards the end of the project, I was able to find thin tissue paper which allowed me to see through to the fabric a bit better. I was able to put my old OED from my days as an undergrad and grad student to good use. I used it as a weight to help keep the cotton laminate pressed after I had ironed it.

I made the raincoat in a size 3 even though J. is only 2 (but a large 2). Given all the work that went into this, I hope J. can wear this for 2 years. Since he dislikes wearing jackets, J. refused to try on his new raincoat, but his sister jumped at the chance. I have fabric to make her a new raincoat as well.

Now we just have to wait for rain…
I think we all had a wonderful little birthday celebration. We’ve formed so many amazing memories over the past two years with baby J., and I can’t wait for more to come.
