These are a few of my favorite (baby) things...

We have been very blessed by our generous friends and family who have given us lots of wonderful and thoughtful gifts for our new baby.  While it has been three months already and I'm no where near organized enough to send out thank you cards yet, I wanted to do a quick post on what makes a great baby gift in my mind, such as:

-practical

-homemade

-eco-friendly

-hand-me downs

Of course just because something is practical, ethical and safe for baby and planet doesn't mean they can't be beautiful :-)  I am loving the Enchanted Woodland Mobile from cocoon couture that our friends Melinda and Gavin gave us.  It is hand-crafted from eco-friendly plantation timber and printed with non-toxic ink.  I've got it hanging above the change-table (which is in my home office!).  We also got a beautiful wooden vehicle-mobile from our friends Samantha and Paul, which is above the crib (which is in the living room, since we are still using an organic co-sleeper in our bedroom).

Another favorite is this organic cotton quilt, which was hand-made by my amazing step-mother Jan:

We also had lovely hand-made presents from my mother-in-law Eileen (a knitted [or maybe crocheted? I'm so ignorant about these crafty things] blanket), our dear friend Colleen (who took time out of her busy life as an orthopedic surgeon to knit an adorable woolen sweater and hat (aka jumper and beanie), and our lovely friend Carolyn who knitted (I'm pretty sure it's knitted!) a soft little bunny comforter thingy :-)  We're hoping the little bubba starts hanging onto Carolyn's bunny at night instead of pulling his own hair, which he does without realizing that it's attached to him and then he starts screaming because it hurts... one day he'll figure out that he has the power to stop the pain himself by letting go :-)

In addition to giving us a very sweet little organic cotton onesie from the Syracuse Cultural Workers, my mom is sewing an organic cotton duvet (aka doona) cover for us for our new organic cotton queen bed.

I'm also very grateful to my friend Simcha who gave us the organic cotton long-sleeved onesie that bubsie is wearing in the picture above, since it introduced me to Nature Baby from New Zealand, which I hadn't come across before, and is now my favorite one-stop shop for all things organic and baby-related (more on them soon).

People know me well by now and lots of friends gave us beautiful organic cotton clothing from purebaby and Pumpkin Patch (I hadn't even realized that they are doing organic now).

One of the best things people can do for you when you have babies is to not give you things you don't need.  One of my best friends knows me so well that she didn't get anything for the new baby, since really we already have everything we need and she got a small present for his big brother instead :-)

Finally, I love hand-me-downs and loans, such as this gorgeous Moses basket style bassinet that we borrowed from my friend Katie, who also has a fantastic kids book blog and online bookshop called We Heart Books, which is my favorite source for kids birthday presents :-)

We received lots of other lovely gifts and cards as well and if you're reading this, I promise the thank you cards will be coming... eventually!