A Bad Case of Stripes: Rubyellen of Cakies

Photo by Christian Cruz Photography

Hooray!  We have Rubyellen of Cakies here today!  Upon going through her blog to pick out a few of my favorite things about her, I found myself in a pickle to choose just a few snapshots.

Photo by Rubyellen

Rubyellen has an affinity for polaroids and uses them well to capture her beautiful life.  If I chose one word to describe her blog, it would be charming.

From her vintage treasures, 

Photo by Rubyellen

to her themed parties and their bounteous garden,

Photo by Rubyellen

not to mention her sweet three girls 

[with another little one on the way!]

Christian Cruz Photography

it's always inspirational to land there and soak up the beauty.

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Hello! I am Ruby from Cakies and I am so excited that Katy has asked me to share one of our favorite stories, along with a special little handmade concoction inspired by the book for good measure! Our story of choice is A Bad Case of Stripes by David Shannon.

In our house, we are all about eating healthy! Of course, we expose our kids to "sometimes foods" in moderation, but we make sure to feed the good stuff more! Lucky for us, they love eating fruits and veggies and we love eating fruits and veggies with them. We also love reading books about children who enjoy their fruits and vegetables too, so that is why this story means so much to us.

This story is all about Camilla Cream who denies her love for lima beans all because eating lima beans isn't the popular thing to do. As a result of her desire to conform, she breaks out in a bad case of the stripes. As time goes on, her desire to conform just keeps her horrid condition going as her body just continually adapts to her surroundings, until she is no longer recognizable. In the end, she learns to be true to herself and proudly proclaims her love for lima beans and goes her merry way eating them, no matter what the other kids say.

In our case, we aren't ashamed of our love for fruits and veggies. We snack on them in the car, at church, out shopping, at birthday parties, you name the place, we eat them anywhere and anytime. So we are celebrating the book with our version of a good case of stripes!!!

Like Danielle before me, I wasn't able to do a step by step of the process because if I did, I would never get done. The good case of stripes dress has a straight bodice, with a bit of pleating at the top, along with rainbow colored fabric trim that ties together in a bow at the front to create our colorful stripes. The bottom portion is a drop waist bubble skirt that is just so much fun. It is almost as fun as eating our fruits and vegetables!

The rainbow colored fabric ties in the front attract so much attention, that I decided to keep everything else simple and do a cream colored cotton dress. I just ripped strips of colored fabric for the ties and that is what contributes to its frayed edges.

The story is so full of life and color, and is very well illustrated. There is so much whimsy in it that I wanted to create a dress that conveyed just that.

Between the bubble skirt and rainbow colored front, my little True couldn't help but want to laugh and play around. The dress was indeed quite whimsical and it made her absolutely giddy!

There are times when I hear about some some real life friends saying we are so strange because of how we raise our kids by moderating the amount of "sometimes food" they eat and exposing them to a lot of fruits and vegetables (and maybe for how we dress our kids too). Honestly, we don't care! We do what is best for our kids, everyone has their own preference, and our kids are quite the happy campers. We don't get a bad case of stripes at our house. Quite the contrary, we only have a good case of stripes!!!

Thank you Katy (and her readers) for allowing me to be part of this fun series!

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That's one of our favorite books around here as well.  The colorful frock is so cheerful and perfect for a girl who is not afraid to be different!  Thank you, Rubyellen for visiting!