Specifically ring slings and wrap carriers. But I like to make them for (mostly) babies I don’t know. Babies who will get these in charity fundraising baskets. Babies who are not yet born, who don’t yet know that they’ll be snuggled up tight next to their mother’s heartbeat, feeling the familiar sway of her walk, the scent of her that is so perfect. Babies who will nuzzle, nurse and drift off to sleep. This time I used one of my own – a stretchy wrap carrier that a friend gave to me as a “fauxby” – slicing the fabric down the middle of five yards of stretchy cream ribbed cotton. I never finished the edges or made a pocket for it, until now. Today I sewed a brown print pocket and brown and cream serged hems on it, made a matching drawstring bag, and it’ll go off to some other mama, who will cuddle an as-yet-to-be-born newborn sometime soon. All prettied up, this wrap lovingly carried my son his first summer (and fall, and winter) on Earth.
Oh the thought just makes me want to have another! I know, I know. I’m too old, I have two beautiful kids, and I’m just now able to sew in the evenings, with enough energy to have parts of my day to call my own. So I sew these carriers, because I love to think of the snuggly little babies in them.