Back in Australia, my sister showed me some of the adorable outfits she made for her then-toddling daughter.

And back in Australia, my mother and I tottered off to the fabric store, to buy up all their Australiana prints.

Luckily, my sister also had a spare pattern for a very cute top and bloomer set, which only took a couple of hours to recreate in the cutest ever quokka fabric.

For those of you not familiar, quokkas are small Australian marsupials that live primarily on a small island off Perth (my hometown). They’re particularly famous for their beautiful smiles.

Seriously, google it.

The set was destined for friend’s baby, M, who had made an early appearance into the world shortly before I headed to Australia.

I wasn’t quite sure how chunky baby M’s thighs would be, so left the elastic in the bloomer’s leg long and tied in a knot, to alter when M tried them on.

And because there was a little bit of fabric left, I made a little bow:

The quokka is an excellent choice for baby M, because she is the smiliest baby I’ve ever seen. Although, unlike quokkas, I’m pretty sure that this is at least in part because she is manipulating you right through your heart to get picked up.

We tried the outfit on when I visited her in Italy, and (if I do say so myself), she looked very very cute.

Here’s the quokka outfit with a brief glimpse at our apartment:

Sometime at the end of July, 2025