Celebrating Lily!

Our friend Lily, celebrated her 4th birthday on October 25th.  

On Monday, we asked Lily to share more with us about how she celebrates her birthday with her family. 

I have three birthday celebrations. One already passed and the other and the school birthday. - Lily
It was like what you do at normal birthdays. - Lily
So if I had to guess what you did at a normal birthday, I think you maybe ate something special. - Sam 
It was cupcakes! I had chocolate and she had chocolate. - Bea
Cupcakes are my favorite kind of treat. - Lily
It sounds like Bea was at your birthday. Were other friends there? - Sam 
No and one grown up and my family. - Lily
She had two presents. - Bea
And I had others because I had family presents too. I had two others. - Lily
And one was a smoothie maker! - Bea​

Questions We Ask Ourselves

 When we start birthday committee work, we begin by having a large group brainstorming session before we dive deeper into the work with a small committee.  Both in large and small groups we ask ourselves to think about what things the birthday child likes. What do we already know about the birthday child? What can we still learn? 

What kind of things does Lily like?

Maybe she likes unicorns because she has unicorns on her mask. - Finlay
She also had a unicorn birthday. - Bea
Yep, I love them. They’re my favorite type of animal. - Lily
* some discussion about a unicorn piñata at birthday party*
They’re just kind of magical and I like kind of magical stuff. - Lily
What is magical stuff? - Ines
It means like they can make stuff appear that other people can’t do. - Lily
Can anyone else think of other magical things? - Sam 
A princess? Because I have a wand from Lily’s birthday. - Bea
So like a rainbow. - Finlay 
Also we can make some magical paper thing for Lily’s birthday. Like we could put a big piece of paper and like do a outline of a unicorn and then we paint the inside of the unicorn. - Bea
I think that would be good! But maybe more than one unicorn. - Lily 
Like two unicorns. One’s the baby and ones the mom and ones the dad. - Bea
Maybe like four. Actually three. Well one mom one baby and one dad. That’s all I want. - Lily
And did you have a favorite color you’d like to share with us? - Sam 
Pink, red, and yellow. - Lily

I knew you would! - Lily
Speaking to Bea when finding out that she would be on the birthday committee. 

Birthday Committee Work

Keeping Lily's interest in unicorns (her favorite animal) in mind, Daniel and Bea began discussing their ideas for how to incorporate this interest into the birthday portrait in addition to other ideas they had about the overall setup. 

We need something magical. Like sparkles coming out. She likes sparkles too. - Bea
So do the sparkles come out of the unicorn? - Sam 
They come out of the unicorn’s horn. - Bea
And have we thought about what Lily might wear? - Sam 
All of her favorite colors. Maybe we could sew it like we did for Remy. It would look like pink, yellow, and red. - Bea 
I remember for Remy you made a dress. So what do you think Lily's portrait outfit might look like? - Sam  
She always wears headbands. - Bea 
You’re right. She does wear headbands a lot. Maybe we could make her a headband. - Sam 
I could bring my headband. - Bea
I’m wondering if we could create her something new and make her a headband. - Sam 
Like how we made Remy's headband? We already have one. We could use that since we already made…  - Bea
Well I know that the other headband was made special for Remy’s birthday portrait because of what she likes.
So I’m wondering if we could make something just as special for Lily? - Sam 
Yeah. - Bea
And make bows. - Daniel 
Yeah she’s wearing a bow headband right now! - Bea
Great. It sounds like we have ideas for what she will wear. - Sam 

I don’t even know how to make a unicorn! - Daniel 
Well we could look at a picture. - Bea

Daniel and Bea investigate unicorn images for inspiration

I’m not sure if you remember, but Lily mentioned wanting three unicorns. A mom, a dad, and a baby. - Sam 
I know which one could be the baby unicorn. That one. - Bea
Well this one could be the brother. No. I pick this instead because it has green hair. It looks strong a little bit. - Daniel
It’s jumping. - Bea
And that could be the baby. - Daniel 
It’s eating chocolate! Yeah let’s do that one. Because it’s eating chocolate. - Bea 
I know which one could be the mom… - Bea
That one! It has a rainbow sparkling out of it. - Daniel 
Let’s do the one Daniel wanted to do. That magical one. Because it’s making magical. - Bea

​Three images were chosen for the unicorn family. A mom, a dad, and a baby (per Lily's request)

​I don’t know how to do a unicorn. Can you help me? - Daniel 
Well you use a projector. - Bea 
What’s a projector? I don’t have that at my home. - Daniel 
It shows different classrooms too. The projector came with a shadow and I traced the shadow. And then I paint it in. - Bea (recalling Sam's b-day committee work)
Let’s do the baby first because she’s the smallest. - Bea

After tracing the three members of the unicorn family for the portrait background, Daniel and Bea decided that color should be added to each. The color inspiration came from the images found and selected to represent each unicorn. 

Initially, markers were chosen. It was quickly observed that it's difficult to cover large spaces with only markers as our tools. Then, we explored oil pastels and chalk which are able to be spread out and blended.
These materials seemed to cover more surface area when used and exploring their "blendability" was fascinating! 

Drawing the unicorn hair proved to be the most challenging part of this step in the committee work.
​When looking around the atelier for materials, Bea noticed the yarn and thought it could be used to include as the unicorn's hair because the properties of yarn are "warm and soft" like hair!

Making a Headband

Knowing that Lily often wears headbands, Bea went to the source to find out more about the functionality of a headband and what it's made of. 

​Lily removed her headband to give Bea a closer look. 
Ohhh bending. - Bea
I think you used a material recently that you could bend when you made a sculpture for my birthday. - Sam 
Oh. wire! - Bea
And what’s wrapped around the headband? - Sam 
That’s ribbon. - Lily
And you could also use fabric. - Bea
This is for the birthday committee, right? I can tell. You’re asking me a lot of questions! - Lily
And how would we make the bow? Fabric? And tied it and clipped it on (the headband) - Bea
Look. it’s rippable. And you can slip it back on. - Lily (demonstrating how to remove bow from headband)

Daniel and Bea then got to work selecting materials and creating the headband accessory for Lily to wear in the photo shoot. 

items were chosen based on Lily's personal color preferences - yellow, red, and pink.

When finished with the custom made headband, Daniel and Bea shared the following thoughts:
It looks like, "Hello! I love you!" - Bea
It looks like a pop band. (singer) - Daniel 

​The Photo Shoot

Lily spent time reflecting on the work that her friends had put into her birthday and shared some of these thoughts and feelings with Daniel and Bea. 
It looks so nice!
I'm seeing you swooshed the color up.
​(commenting on the rainbow unicorn work)
And you cut out the unicorns! 
And I see the baby. How'd you get that hair on? Glue? Or tape?

Here are the images captured by Daniel and Bea of our birthday friend! 

The committee is then responsible for narrowing down the selection to only include the "top choices". 

... the final selected and edited image!

She's smiling pretty good! - Daniel 
Yeah! It's pretty. - Bea
And we need just a tiny bit of pink because that's her favorite color and she will like to look pink.
​- Bea
(adjusting the tint of the photo)

Today's Celebration!

Today we were able to invite Lily's parents to join us for her celebration. They shared two different books with us and photos of Lily at different ages.  We also enjoyed yummy chocolate croissants that Lily shared with us for her special birthday snack. 
We love celebrating birthday's in the Rainey Room!