The 9th of April is a special day for Addy. On the day the war finally ends, she decides that it’s finally just the right time to celebrate her birthday.
Addy doesn’t know exactly what day she was born. “I was born in the spring. My momma know that much,” she says to her new friend, M’dear. She listens closely when M’dear suggests that Addy choose a special day, a near-perfect day, to be her birthday.
April 9th certainly is special, but it isn’t a perfect day. M’dear says, “I’ve told you I’ve been around a long time, and I never saw such a thing as a perfect day.” If it were perfect, Addy admits to herself, then her brother Sam and sister Esther would be by her side, celebrating with her. But she knows it’s the closest thing to perfect that she’ll ever see, at least until her family is reunited.
Addy carries this banner and lantern into the streets to celebrate the end of the war. Now that it’s over, Addy has hope of reuniting with the rest of her family. She waves her banner high for everyone to see.
I made Addy’s banner for her, based on the one from her retired collection. I cut a piece of canvas and hemmed it, then sewed a sleeve for the dowel. I used a fine-tipped Sharpie pen to write the text, and used a paper stencil of the heart to make sure that the stars were lined up cleanly. I went on to eBay to look at auctions of the original banner and get an up-close look at it, to make sure I got all the letters, numbers, and stars exactly right.
This banner is also seen on the front of her book, and in the interior vignette illustrations.
For her lantern. I painted a piece of paper, folded the paper in half, cut slits on the fold, and then unfolded it and glued the edges together. I placed another paper cylinder inside, then made a strap by which it could hang from the dowel.
After everyone finishes celebrating in the streets, all the residents of the boarding house come inside to eat cherry pie and ice cream. Even Sunny comes to the table to sing hello! Mrs. Golden pulls two cherry pies from the pie cabinet, and Poppa serves vanilla ice cream to everyone. A few weeks earlier, he found an old, damaged ice cream freezer and fixed it up just in time for this celebration.
I made Addy’s ice cream freezer with a few very simple materials; you can see how I did it here. You can read how I made Sunny and his cage here.
(If you’re wondering why there’s one slice and a whole pie, it’s because Mrs. Golden made two pies. Addy’s slice is what’s left over from the first one!)
I made the cherry pie by rolling out a crust made of baking soda clay, and laying it in this mini aluminum pie tin. The top crust is also clay. The filling is red seed beads mixed with red paint and some cornstarch to give it thickness and to stick together.
The slice of pie is painted clay. The scoop of ice cream is a ball of clay that I poured white paint on and let harden. Then I flecked it with black paint and placed it onto the slice. The pie server is a piece of aluminum pie tin that I cut into the shape and glued onto a piece of wooden dowel.
After everyone is finished eating, M’dear has a gift waiting at the table for Addy.
It’s a painted tin with something special inside.
This is a small mint tin that I painted. I found a listing for the original tin on eBay for an up-close look at the design, and replicated it as best as I could. I used acrylic paints and a tiny brush, then varnished the whole thing.
Underneath the note is a whole heap of benne candy, which M’dear always shares with Addy when Addy does her homework in M’dear’s room. Benne candy is a sweet brittle, made with hardened sugar and sesame seeds.
I made these from clay that I rolled thin with a rolling pin, let dry, and then cracked into small pieces. For the seeds, I used the tip of a pin dipped in white paint and held it at an angle to make a seed shape.
M’dear has one final gift for Addy: two of Sunny’s feathers tied with a white ribbon, which Addy tucks into her snood. “Let these remind you to always let your spirit sing out,” M’dear says to her.
“I will,” Addy promises. “I will.”
