Someone new is being added...

to my family and I just finished her gift. My niece is due to give birth in the 3rd week of April and I was rushing like mad to finish her gift. Guess what? I did it!

You have to understand, I adore my nephew and his wife and I am simply thrilled that they are giving my grandnephew a sister next month. They are a wonderful, loving, young family and deserve the best life they can have.

In honor of my grandniece's impending birth, I wanted my gift to have more meaning than the simple things I usually make, so I got a little creative and did a striped blanket (hopefully they are not reading this and will be surprised) where each stripe has meaning (at least to me).

The pictures are hard to see, but here goes:

Stripe number one is the "Tree of Life" stripe because I hope they all have many long years together as the loving family that they are;



Stripe number two was just an easy stripe because my hope for them is that she is an easy baby and they gets lots of rest.



Stripe number three is the Love stripe (you have to look hard to see it). It represents the love that this baby will be enveloped in.



Stripe four is the winding cable stripe because that's how life is. It winds around but it just keeps going.



The final stripe is the heart stripe to represent the love that is in their nuclear family and those of us in the extended family, showing how we feel about each other.

I hope this has as much meaning for them as they use this gift, as it did for me when I made it.