Two Years Late

My lovely sister-in-law made me a shadow box for my baby shower. I insisted on revealing the gender at the shower for suspense and to increase the number of practical gifts. She used backing paper with greens and yellows. She used sparkly elephant stickers and ribbon. I was super excited when I opened it, see:

That shadow box sat the few remaining weeks of my pregnancy waiting for bed rest to end and the baby to come. It sat through Riley's weeks in the NICU. It sat though Riley's infancy and my back surgery recovery. After we moved and I got a craft corner I decided it was time to fill it up.

I used things I saved from my baby shower, her NICU days and her first month in general. Her hospital bracelet and the card from her isolet are already scrapbooked (although that's 17mos behind). Here's some close-ups:

This is the top left corner all these smallish black and white photos were on Riley's baptism invitation I made in paintshop. I ended up having surgery the day of our planned outdoor baptism, but the invitations were lovely. Also, they were against a pale blue and there was light blue ribbon in that square.

Here's the center box in the middle. I used a picture from Riley's 2nd day, she still had her feeding tube in. I call this one the "Riley-saurus" because she's got her hands up like a T-rex. It was really funny, but not helpful when you're trying to breastfeed! Stubborn little dinosaur, I tell ya!

This is the bottem left space. It has the "sunbathing" picture. After I was discharged I always went to the hospital at 7am to feed Riley and left for the night at 11pm. Mike who usually caught a nap during the day would go back to give her a bottle of pumped milk at 1am. The NICU has a lot of rules and procedures and one of them is that the baby's temperature be within a certain range before they eat. Apparently, the nurses had been complaining about the AC all day that day. When Mike took her temperature she was a degree too low so the nurse rolled out the heat lamp. Riley enjoyed it. Mike took this on his phone to show me.

Under that amazing photo is the measuring tape they used to track Riley's growth in the hospital. Underneath that is a baby hedgehog in a pumpkin. This was on my baby shower invitation. When it was folded it was just a stork carrying a pumpkin (she was due in Oct) and when you opened it the lid came off the pumpkin and a baby hedgehog bounced out. The baby in the peapod was a napkin from my shower. The dragonfly represents her original nursery theme. The little white plastic thing was the clamp from her cord and the "Riley Grey" was the pretty font I used on the baptism invite. Don't you love how her first and middle go together?

This is the bottom right corner, I call this picture "Riley Bug". She got her Daddy's long limbs and she never stayed swaddled long. She would sleep with her legs in the air or even Indian style for hours. It was so cute!

This is a picture of the whole thing before I put it in the frame. I don't have a close-up of the right corner (well, I do have one, but also computer issues). The right corner is a wooden spoon with a pink ribbon tied around it. We wanted a girl and there's an old wives’ tale that if you put a wooden spoon under your bed you'll get a girl. No idea why, I searched for the root of that and got nothing. If any knows, fill me in. We joked that if we had a girl the spoon would go in her nursery. It was all in fun, but I was sentimental about everything because I knew she was my one and only.

Here's the finished shadow box. Riley loved it. I don't think she understood that the baby in there is her, but she pointed out and named every item. I was super impressed when she said "dragunf-eye". Better late than never on this project.