Sunday Pizza for Pop Birthday

Sunday bike ride at the park

Mermaid Party

dance class

painting

Clearly this fashionista needs a long sleeve apron when she paints :D

A quiet play at home

Autumn in the park

1920s gal

Today hannah woke up keen to spend the pocket money she had saved on a  costume for her 'concert'. Rather than take her to a toy shop - cos she already has heaps of those dress ups - I decided to take her to the DJs sale at our local shopping centre. She loved it - she found 6 garments to try on and eventually settled on 2 to buy. The frock above was one of them...

craft

Dressed for a day of craft....

Night tennis

Hannah announced that like her father she was going to play tennis after work - and then proceeded to put on an outfit on top of her pjs. It is a cold night here tonight...

The coat is a handme down Gap one which Hannah loves and that looks great on her... the tie was her father's.

walkathon

These plaits are 'fun' for a walkathon. Hannah was very impressed although I only managed 3 when she had wanted 4.

What to wear when washing cars

Admittedly I don't think that Hannah has ever washed a car before - but then I don't think such an ensemble has ever been worn by anyone as they washed a car before either...

the gumboots were happily put on at my suggestion.

Hair

Hannah has gorgeous red hair. When she was a baby and I pushed her and her twin brother in the big double pram I sometimes felt a bit sorry for her brother who has brown hair like me. It's always a bit of circus going out with twins and lots of people would peer in to see if there were twins in there. Almost invariably one of their first comments would be on Hannah's red hair. I quickly discovered that there is a 'club' of us who just LOVE red hair and see it everywhere. These people would comment with great enthusiasm on her beautiful red hair. Then they'd glance at her brother and say something about his size or his chubby cheeks ! Poor baby....

Before she started school she had a fringe...

...and in honour of her starting 'big school' we got her hair cut in this bob. She loved it! At some stage during kindy though the class was shown a movie called CLoudy WIth a Chance of Meatballs - an unremarkable film if you ask me but Hannah loved it...and so for a long time she would hold her fringe up and tell me she wanted her air to be 'like cloudy with a chance of meatballs'....aka no fringe...

So here she is in Venice - no fringe... Then it suited me to keep her hair long - one of her dance concerts preferring her hair in a bun and the other with a braid...it gave us a bit of flexibility.

Then at the start of the new school year, as she heads into Year 2 it was time for the bob again... this one without the fringe as per Hannah's request

When we were waiting for her brother's hair to be cut too - Hannah turns to me int he hairdressers and tells me she wants to work there when she grows up. "I be a hairdresser, Mummy, I grow up". It made me smile and feel so proud... now to keep a lookout for an openminded hairdresser who will give her a chance...it might happen if she still wants it to when she is older...she might cut hair or she might wash hair, make tea and sweep the floor - but how cool would either job be? In the thick of it...working in her community, somewhere that will stimulate her creativity...another dream for her to dream on...

And so the experiments continue. She is hampered by the fact that her mother has NO IDEA! but her current hair fashion statements involve the use of clips on the top and yesterday she came to me with 3 hairbands, two blue and one burgundy - and directed me to tie her hair back in three with the burgundy in the centre....I probably didn't do it justice but I tried...lol

Still Pretty in Pink

Clothes Horse

For the true fashionista I would imagine that they see themselves as their canvas. When hannah dresses herself, when she walks up close to the full length mirror in my room and presses her face to the glass. She is not self conscious. She is objective in her gaze. She experiments with a couple of different facial expressions. Trying on different things for size to see if she likes the overall impression. For a long time layers and excess were her trademark. After all why wear one thing when you can wear them all?

Fashion Quotes

Not knowing anything about the world of designer fashion - I thought I'd try a bit of self education via google and find quotes I liked by the 'fashion world'...firstly I thought I'd start with Karl Lagerfeld: Fashion does not have to prove that it is serious. It is the proof that intelligent frivolity can be something creative and positive. This is what I enjoy about Hannah's forays into the world of fashion. She in fact has no idea about the House of Chanel but she definitely demonstrates that 'intelligent frivolity' he mentions. Hannah knows the look she is after and her demonstrating that creativity is a positive force - I wonder how many people who when they first hear the diagnosis of 'Down Syndrome' worry about the intellectual disability? I did. I cried for a week. Of course for me it was more that I found out the baby I carried had a major heart defect and may have DS - so in hindsight I can't say how much I cried about the DS because I was so freaked out by the news of Hannah's congenital heart defect. What is a good life? How do we decide quality of life? These are questions I ponder but on which I dare not draw any line other than to say that with all her joyousness and 'bon vivant' her creative idiosyncratic determination - a 'good life' is certainly what my daughter enjoys and she and her brother are a very important part of why I'd say I have a 'good life'. To be creative is like a lifeblood. Yet by its own definition creativity cannot be contained or fully understood. Where will Hannah's creativity take her? I have no idea but I know that she is on a creative journey and I am happy to follow along. PS Just like we have 'bad hair days' and some of Hannah's outfits seem more of a 'miss' than a 'hit' some of these fashion quotes can suffer a similar fate...

From the Vault

What to wear to a friend's little brother's birthday gig? At the end of her kindy year - Hannah chose this ensemble.

Riding Gear

Now I love Boxing Day and I think that I have successfully instilled the love of this slothful day in the twins because when my husband finally convinced us it was time to get out and go to the park so Kit could try out his new bike, Hannah had experimented with a number of ideas and voila! This is what she came up with - definitely has a cycling feel but also a little Eurovision perhaps?

and yes - this is totally her own choices although I assume she got me or her father to tie the belt on for her.

Outdoor Theatre Outfit

I took the twins (yes Hannah is a twin), and my MIL to Orchard Hills to see a production of Jack and The Beanstalk at Mamre House. It was my MILs idea. We met my SIL and 3 of her 4 kids there for a picnic dinner and a wonderfully engaging production of Jack and the Beanstalk. Hannah chose a pair of black leggings that have pink hearts on them, her pink casual mary jane shoes, a white tiered skirt from Pumpkin Patch and a lovely turquoise top from Gumboots. She tied an orange sequined ribbon around one cuff of her legging and a lovely handmade beaded necklace to top off the ensemble. I think she looks rather chic.

Not Just Pink

Hello there! Welcome to my daughter's blog. Hannah is 7 and loves all things fashion. When she was about 3 or 4 there was an explosion of interest in role playing, dressing up, imaginative play. Now that she is 7 I can see that she is busy refining that early aesthetic. She is exploring concepts of who she is and what she likes and where she belongs by playing with her rather extensive wardrobe. What initially started as great development opportunities for self help skills has become an important way of expressing her creative genius, and as her awareness of the complex notion of 'beauty' that society holds grows I am hoping that this love of colours and textures might also provide her with moments of therapeutic joy. One day I hope that Hannah will take over this blog and share her unique views on the world and creativity with you herself but for now until she is ready, I hope to be your guide as we follow this girl on her journey. Some of her outfits are beautiful, others bizarre to say the least! I have been known to quote Chanel at her - not too much, why don't you take off the last thing you put on and leave it at that sweetie? As she has pared back her 'look' I have intervened less and less - after all we all have fashion disasters don't we? and some haute couture looks pretty oddball to me - it certainly isn't all conventional beauty. I wonder what Karl Lagerfeld would do with my gorgeous girl? Would he see the beauty in her? Do you? I am fanatical about family snapshots - and love my little Canon powershot camera - I take zillions of photos - some are actually very good but most are quite mundane - and I have no idea of different lenses or effects or how to airbrush my models...so here it will be real life beauty. Raw and unadorned. hope you enjoy the ride. I am looking forward to sharing it with the virtual world. It is early days - and I don't really know you (if you exist at all!) so I will hold back on the confidences for a little while - one doesn't like to be too familiar after all...but you may notice if you chance upon this blog to see that Hannah has Down Syndrome. I don't think this impacts on her fashion passions at all but it does make the fine motor skills required in getting some of these outfits together and put on for herself a little more of a feat than they might otherwise be. Hannah has dyspraxia also and I must say that it is the disability I like least. It hides behind the DS label and is hard to get my head around which means it is more difficult to ascertain when it is challenging her ability to express her ideas clearly - it makes her speech more laboured too. Having DS is part of who Hannah is but it isn't the sum of her - that is still being uncovered.... It is summer holidays here and last Thursday I Hannah's twin brother went to the zoo - for a great day of activities. I decided that Hannah and I could have a mother and daughter day. This meant a day of craft, fashion and pampering. You see Hannah is not like me. I grew up in Brisbane in the late 60s early 70s. When I look back on my childhood I was much more of a tomboy. To this day I don't know how to 'do hair' and makeup is a challenge I find quite intimidating. My body size in no way matches the common view of 'beauty' so clothes buying is more often a chore than a joy. You don't believe me? I'll give you an example. It's one of many. During one of Hannah's therapy sessions the therapist was using flashcards to see what Hannah could understand and/or say. One of them had a picture of a hairdryer on it. I had to let them know that it was no reflection upon my daughter's intelligence when she looked blankly at that one. She had never ever seen one... And so like many other parents before me I have found that my child challenges me every day - in the ways that she is like me and in the ways that she is not. So our mother-daughter days tend to include getting ready together - and yes this means make up and perfume, manicures and bright colours and impractical shoes. This week, while Kit was at the zoo it also included a confidence. Randomly shared as we drove through Lane Cove and back to the inner west - "Mum... Pink is not my favourite colour anymore. Purple is." Now Hannah's speech is a bit idiosyncratic due to the above mentioned snippets so an occasional sound is missing from the words I quoted but her sentences were complete, and that pleases therapy mum no end. So if talking about fashion stuff supplies me with opportunities to help my girl reach her potential - then I am more than happy to become fashionista therapy Mum. Oh and I guess if you ar still reading you now know where the name for this blog of hers came from.