Birthday Parties

First layout is done with papers from All My Memories. One fuzzy rub on by Heidi Swapp, one sticker from Creative Imaginations etc. Design inspired by an Ali Edwards layout.

This year, for the first time ever. Ricky expressed a wish to have a birthday party. Usually he is not in the least bit interested in parties. Crowds bother him and he prefers to be alone. He told me he wanted a Laser Games Night at our club. He made up the guest list. He planned the menu (pizzas, mini burgers & coke!) and was a very interested audience while I made the invitation cards. And of course everyone loved the hour of laser tag! I cannot begin to describe how excited I was about the whole thing. What a dramatic change this is for Ricky!

The following layout is done with papers from sei Petals & Paisleys line. The background orange paper is Sedona scroll by Scrapworks. Urban Lilly flower rub-ons, alpha round is from Autumn Leaves. Design inspired by layout of Moniqui, posted on 2Peas.

March 1998: Photographs from Lily's 5th birthday, She had a party at home and a small celebration in kindergarten with her class teacher, a wonderful Nepalese lady called Sangeeta Ngan.

The Disney layout below is done with papers are from Imagination Project - Center City designs. The 'Magic Moment' is a fabric sticker by MAMBI and the paper clip is a sticker by Sticker Studio. I really like their metal hardware stickers. From a distance they look almost real!

The second time we visited Hongkong Disneyland it was a weekday. The park was almost empty. Not good for Disney but perfect for us. We had so much fun! We had front row seats for all the shows and both parades. Not only did we not have to queue up for a single ride, we did most rides twice. The 3D movie theatre saw us entering it 3 times that day because Ricky loves that movie. And meeting and greeting the Disney stars was a relaxed affair. We took some nice photos with them and we even spent some quality time chatting with Pooh! LOL! Quite the 'magic moment' captured on film.

Dinner yesterday was a blast! We were eight of us, relaxed to begin with and then we unwound some more with a nice bubbly with the tomato & feta cheese canapes. With the meal we had first some fabulous Barbaresco wine (grazie Debora!), then some great Barolo. So by the time dessert came around no one minded so much that the quails were a bit dried out due to sitting for too long in the oven to keep warm! This is the second time I am making this mistake with meat.
ETA: Thanks Carole, for the super tip on keeping the meat covered with a cheesecloth soaked in olive oil or chicken stock!!

And now, 2 videos, dedicated to art of very different kinds, but art nonetheless!

The first one is about Sand Art:

And the second shows extreme photo retouching. Amazing stuff!