PROJECT 365: Part 18

Wow.  So many photos to get through today.  It's been a hectic few weeks, what with weddings and Season's Greetings and sitting babies.  Busy, busy, busy.  So let's see what I've been up to...

Day 229: Ready for Poppy Day tomorrow and Remembrance Day on Sunday.

This is three year's worth of poppies.  I didn't actually grab three poppies for myself this year.  I keep them on my PC coz they brighten up the place.  Remembrance Day is commemorated in Commonwealth countries, on or around the 11th of November.  Except for New Zealand, which commemorates on 25 April or Anzac Day because of reasons.  And because New Zealand is super cool and marches to it's own drum!

Day 230: Linkin Park!

My. First. Concert.  I know, I know.  It's wrong that a music lover like myself has never been to a concert before, but even though I love music, I'm not that fond of people.  Especially large crowds of people.  I avoid them if possible.

But turns out, a large crowd of people all bouncing and screaming because of their mutual love of music is FANTASTIC!  I sang and shouted and wiggled and screamed and head-banged and I will definitely be doing this again.  I will be selective.  The music has to be worth the crowds.  But this was definitely an experience to be repeated.  So thanks to CheeseHaw for buying me a ticket and not giving me a choice in going ;)

Day 231: The day after.

I was pretty pooped.  And I maybe didn't want to take my Linkin Park t-shirt off.  Ever.

Day 232: Clouds and filters.

I can't remember if I've mentioned it, but this has been a pretty weird summer, weather wise.  It's been uncharacteristically cold and wet.  While we are a summer rain region, we normally (or at least for the last ten years or so) get most of our rain towards the end of summer, around April-May.  But this summer began with rain and it's just determined to hang around.  I don't really mind.  I love rainy days, and especially since moving to a house that doesn't flood, I can just sit back and enjoy it.  But I don't like the fact that three times already this summer, I have had to put my office heater on.

However, one upside to this weird weather is the gorgeous skies.  Well, I mean, in Africa we often have gorgeous skies, but it does seem to be more of a daily occurrence right now.  So there may be more photos of clouds and skies coming in future posts.  I actually have to hold myself back.  I keep telling myself, "No Nikki. Not another photo of the sky."  So far, I've been listening to me.  I'm good that way.

Day 233: Freshly baked beer bread.

One of my specialities.  There is nothing like freshly baked bread, hot from the oven.

Day 234: Mesmerising.

This is the coolest thing!  I bought it for myself at Lusitoland in April, and I love it so much I hung it over my bed.  However, I think to get the full effect, it may be better to hang it outside, so the wind can make it do this...  See? Mesmerising.

Day 235: The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2, midnight premier with Sis!

This just made it for the photo for 15 November.  It was about 23:50 when I took this as Sis and I stood in the queue to get into the movie house.  And see my t-shirt?  No I wasn't lucky enough to go to Forks in 2011, but I was lucky enough to win this tee thanks to Twitarded and Twi_Kiwi.  In fact this tee was my photo for Day 65!  Obviously I had to wear my Twitarded t-shirt to the final ever it's-all-over Twilight movie!

Well, I thoroughly enjoyed the movie.  I really did.  As soon as I was back home I sent Lori a looooong review about what I thought via iMessage.  I guess she enjoyed what I had to say because she posted it on her blog.  So if you want to see my immediate, uncensored and spoilery thoughts on Breaking Dawn Part 2, go here.

Day 236: Special pre-wedding Shabbat dinner for the Almost Weds

My sister's bridesmaid, Megan, wanted to do something special for the happy couple the week before their wedding.  So she threw them a pre-wedding Shabbat dinner!  She cooked a three-course meal, and decorated the table in the wedding colours and everything!  She went to so much work and it really was a lovely dinner.

Day 237: Mmmmmeat!

When one lives by one's self, one doesn't often feel the need to cook meals.  Cooking for one is just, well, boring is what it is.  But every now and again one feels a need for a home cooked meal.  This time I ended up having savoury mince-meat and beer bread.  It was yummy.

Day 238: Working on the Wedding Playlist.

The wedding was less than a week away and I was still working on the wedding playlists.  But, you have to understand, I kept having to cut music!  I detest cutting music!

Day 239: Decisions, decisions.

I was trying to decide which colour to wear for the wedding.  I walked around for the whole week like this.  The final Facebook consensus was the middle one.  Which is what I went with.

Day 240: Just another beautiful day in Africa!

There is a short story behind this pic.  A friend's young daughter had made a beeyootiful piece of artwork, which was in no way at all phallic to my perverted mind.  There was a green hill and clouds and a tower.  It bears repeating that this tower was in no way phallic.  Anyway on my way home I was confronted with this site, which, except for the lack of a completely none-phallic tower, looked very similar to the above mentioned wondrous artwork.  So I took this pic for my friend and her daughter who live in a currently wintery Canada, and needed some African sunshine.

Day 241: Pass/Fail.

Ho hum.  Marking exam papers.  This year I gave extra marks for neatness, as I am so tired of trying to decipher hieroglyphs.

Day 242: Wedding gift. With sparkles!

I have to thank Lori for helping me with this idea.  I had no idea what to get my sister and Darren for their wedding gift.  As they've been living together, they have all the household type goodies they might ever need and then some.  Also, my budget has been very tight so that was an issue too.  After chatting with Lori we eventually came up with very nice ideas for the Bridal Shower and Wedding gifts.

As I was in charge of the music for the wedding I thought why not make them CD's of all the music I put together for the wedding?  I had made three playlists: A Pre-Reception Playlist, which would play for the guests while all the photographs were being taken; A Dinner Music Playlist, obviously to play during dinner; and the Main Playlist, with the first dances and all the wiggle your bum music.  I even did some research on how best to put together a playlist for a wedding.  It's just as well I made them CD's as most of the music didn't get played.  The photographs were over sooner than anticipated thanks to the weather, so only half of the pre-reception music got played.  The dinner music playlist got played twice, as eating took longer and the Main Playlist got shuffled so that only dancey music was played with very few slow dances.

Now, when compiling these playlists, I obviously had to take the bride and groom's taste in music into account.  We do not always agree on what is good music, but they do both like rock so I stuck with that as far as possible.  Anything that they had requested that wouldn't fit with the main playlist, I put on the pre-reception playlist.  And for the dinner music, I decided to use instrumental versions of favourite rock songs.  That way no-one would be tempted to jump up and head-bang during the main course.  (One lovely lady said that the instrumental rock was terrible.  I may or may not have made a voodoo doll that bears a striking resemblance to said lovely lady.)

Anyway, so that's what I gave them.  Three CD's with all three of their playlists.  The cover I made used a photo of their wedding invitation and of course I included the list of songs on each CD.

If anyone is interested, I put all the playlists online.  Because I may be slightly OCD...

Pre-Reception Playlist: http://grooveshark.com/playlist/Pre+Reception+Playlist/80412828

Dinner Music: http://grooveshark.com/playlist/Wedding+Dinner+Music/79844251

Main Wedding Playlist: http://grooveshark.com/playlist/Main+Wedding+Music/79845148

(If I can figure out how to move the wedding blog posts to a separate blog for them, these playlists will be embedded there.)

Day 243: To commemorate the end - the only Twilight soundtrack I own on disc. The rest are all digital.

I bought one for myself and one for Sis.  I couldn't get myself one and not her.  She also owns the Breaking Dawn Part 1 Soundtrack on disc.  I really like this soundtrack.  I reckon it might be my second favourite one of the series.

Day 244: Hey! Sexy laaaaaady!

 

The Wedding.  Finally.  She posed so spontaneously for this photo but then when I reacted she laughed, so I made her make a duck-face again, and got the photo I wanted.  This was taken before the ceremony.  Obviously.  I haven't done a post about the wedding yet, as I am waiting for the wedding photographs.  Believe it or not, I did not actually have time to take photos of my own.  The official wedding photographer was my sister's best friend.  Apparently she took over 900 photos, 450 of which are good.  I have her permission to use them in the Wedding Blog Post.  But I have to get them and then wade through them...

Day 245: Left over wedding fairy cakes.

I got to take a whole bunch home with me.  And I tried to eat them all, honest I did.  But turns out like, six cupcakes a day are my limit.  And cupcakes do not last very long...

Day 246: New ducky.

My latest duckquisition, thanks to Sis.  Duck-On-A-Rope!

Day 247: Caught up on laundry. For 5 minutes.

No sooner are you up to date with all your laundry, than you have to get out of the clothes you've been wearing all day and make more.

This is not a sight you'll see often in my house though.  I am very seldom up to date with my laundry at all.  Normally there are clothes spilling out of the basket and covering the floor around it.

Day 248: Sitting CheeseHaw's baby.

Yep, I was on babysitting duty while they were on Honeymoon.  Meet Ming, a little china doll of a kitty.  My dogs were quite keen to spend time with her (not so much my cats) and they really did play with her nicely.  She didn't seem at all bothered by them.  But she did miss her family.

Day 249: I wish I could post the smell with the photo!

Frangipani flowers.  We have a tree at the museum and it smells marvelous!

Day 250: I made PIE!

I did! I really did! And it was yummy!  I've been wanting to make this pumpkin pie for a year, ever since I got the recipe from a twitter friend. And I finally got around to doing it.  It really was delicious, and Mom and Sis agree.  The men don't eat pumpkin...  I just have to experiment with crusts.  Mine was fine, but it could be better.  So thanks E, for this lovely recipe!

The next day I also made nutella pochettes, another recipe I got from another twitter friend.  These are to-die-for.  I will be making them again and I'm sure a photo of them will feature in the near future.  So thanks M for that lovely recipe!

Day 251: Season's Greetings!

Yep, the 1st of December is Season's Greetings in the Haw Houses.  I stole this idea from the movie Santa Claus (the original one with Dudley Moore).  In the movie, Season's Greetings is the official start of the festive season and it's also when Santa gets some sort of blessing from a really old elf (played by Mickey from Rocky).  Anywhoodle, I liked this as it was a non-religious recognition of the beginning of festivities so I adopted it and now we do this every year.  The Christmas trees get put up on Season's Greetings and the family gets together at one house to decorate and generally be festive.

Day 252: I'm a smurf.

I can finally cross this off my bucket list.  I have blue hair!

Day 253: A Piece of Forever. No really. That's what it's called...

Gotta have some Breaking Dawn Part 2 merchandise.  I have A Piece of Forever lipstick too.

Day 254: Paisley?

New linen makes me happy.  This is a paisley pattern right?

Day 255: Clearly, I don't know how to work an advent calendar.

I bought this wooden advent calendar for myself last year.  And I fail at adventing.  I can't explain it, I mean there are chocolates there, waiting to be eaten to count off the days until Christmas, and I forget. Every. Day.

Day 256: Furbabies onna Christmas Tree.

My babies are tree ornaments!  I was so chuffed when I got the first two of these frames.  It was two years ago and an old friend of mine from school was living in Canada at the time.  She sent me the two frames on the sides, the one with Shilo and the other with the two cats.  (She also sent me two David Usher CD's because she's AWESOME!)  Then last year, after I had gotten Penny, another friend of mine gave me the middle frame as a Christmas present, so this year Penny also gets to be on the tree!

Day 257: Whaaat eeeez ziiiis?

I bet none of y'all can guess ;)


Phew!  That's a long post.  But I hope you enjoyed.  I don't know how I will post over the next few weeks, what with Christmas and all.  I doubt I will post again before Christmas so to those of you who celebrate this,

MERRY CHRISTMAS

 

 

To those of you who celebrate this,

 

HAPPY HANUKKAH

 



To those of you who celebrate something else, or don't,

 

HAPPY HOLIDAYS

 

 

And to all of you lovely people,

 

 

EVERYTHING THAT'S GOOD AND WONDERFUL FOR 2013!



PROJECT 365: Part 17

I am a Blogess!

Day 209: I must've been a VERY good girl!

Oh my gosh!!!! My sister came and spent the Saturday with me.  We did girly stuff, like shopping and eating and wishing we had more money.  And SHE BOUGHT ME THIS! Now, Supernatural Season 7 has not aired over here yet.  I think Season 6 might be showing on some channel but we are pretty far behind.  In fact, apparently it was rather difficult for her to find a store that had Season 7 in stock.  They were either sold out or hadn't come in at all yet.  I am loving watching this because it's the first time I've been able to see the series special features like commentary and deleted scenes and gag reels.  I haven't finished watching the season yet.  I know, I know, y'all can't believe it.  I should've been finished within one weekend, but it has been (and will continue to be) a very busy few weeks.  And honestly? I don't want it to end.  Season 8 has just started to air in the US, so I'll have to wait like a whole year before it's released on DVD.  I may go into withdrawal.

Day 210: The Mostly-Fiction bookshelf.

I have 3 bookshelves (hey there's an idea for other photos...).  The first is a small one I inherited from my mother (she had no choice) which holds all my 'pretty' classics. Mostly.  The third is a - I think 'modular' is the word - a 'modular' bookshelf that I fell in love with and had to have.  And then decided it would house all my reference books.  Mostly.  The one above is the first bookshelf I bought when I moved out of my parent's house and the second I put in my new house.  It is mostly fiction, and the long term plan is that it will become ALL fiction, just as soon as I get enough bookshelves to house the non-fiction currently kept here.  It should be mentioned that my system does change periodically.  For example, my Harry Potter's and Tolkien's etc were once kept on the pretty-classics bookshelf because, well they are, but then I ran out of space.

My books are generally arranged thematically and then alphabetically.  Until I run out of space for that system and books just need to be arranged for optimum space usage.  The top three shelves here are general fiction, ending with a pile of to-read books and a manuscript from a friend that is just so good, that is where it needs to stay.  As you can see I arrange themes according to differently oriented stacks.  The next shelf is miscellaneous odd books like The Big Book of Insults.  Then important fantasy books and their associated publications starting with my Harry Potter collection, including Beedle the Bard and Hogwarts text books, and moving on to Tolkien, my Tolkien companion, my Middle Earth map, and my one LoTR movie guide.  Then come my beautiful hardcover editions of The Neverending Story and The Princess Bride. 

Next, stacked horizontally, comes the biographies, autobiographies and other real life books.  I would prefer these to have a separate shelf, but economizing is key.  Next comes all the books that technically belong to other people (like my mother) that I still have to read.

The bottom self is dedicated to books too large to put elsewhere and reference type books.  Starting with my Illustrated Guides to the Star Wars universe, then Star Trek and X-Files companions, then fairy tales, and a children's Bible, and a set of old Household Encyclopedias (which are interesting and hilarious. They include recipes, laundry tips, dog breeding tips, articles on gardening... Everything a housewife needs to know...). Then we move on to my travel section which is all about South Africa with one book on Swaziland. And lastly comes my pet section.

Huh. On second thought, maybe it would be better if I don't include photo's of my other bookshelves.  I seem to get carried away...

Onwards!

Day 211: Magnetic nail polish!

Another prezzy from SisHaw.  You can't see it so clearly in this photo but the nail polish is striped.  What you do, is paint one coat on all your nails.  Then start with the second coat; you paint one nail and immediately hold the little magnet that comes with it over your nail for a few seconds.  And voila! Stripes!  You have to do that finger by finger so it takes a little longer than usual but I think it looks great.  And an added bonus is that this is the best lasting nail polish I have ever had.

Day 212: My Bella shirt.

You know. Coz it's plaid... As one Facebook friend pointed out this is also a bonus photograph of my boobs.  You lucky things.

Day 213: Church Square from another angle. You can see the statue of Paul Kruger looking over his city towards the north.

This is taken from the north, looking south.  The photo of the Square on Day 52 was taken sort of from the south-east.  At least, I think so.  My compass point direction skills are not good.  Anyway, as you can see it was an overcast day.  We've been having a lot of those.  But I love the filter I used because it makes it look like one of the photographs which I've actually seen of the Square from like 30 or 40 years ago.

Day 214: Missing! One sun. Makes periodic appearances just to tease and then disappears again.

Another photo taken with my little BlackBerry that I am very chuffed with. 

It had been such a rainy week, and I was just complaining to my friend, who lives in Pietermaritzburg where they are having a similar problem.  I mean I love rainy days.  I really do.  But I cannot remember the last time we had so much rain during September/October.  We are a summer rainfall area, but it's never been like this.  In fact the last 10 years or so, our really rainy period has been March to May-ish.  And the temperature is crazy cold for the end of the year here in Sunny South Africa.  As I sit typing this, I am wearing winter clothes and have my office heater on.  Again.  On the 9th of November. (I totally had to check that it was Friday.  I nearly panicked)

Day 215: We're booked!

SisHaw and I are all official for the midnight screening of Breaking Dawn on 15/16 November.  It seems they are actually having a 10pm screening as well, but that felt like cheating.

Day 216: Happy Birthday!

The 27th of October was MaHaw's 60th Birthday.  As it fell so close to Halloween, SisHaw and I thought giving it a Halloween theme would be one way of making it memorable.  It was a good evening with friends and family.  What better photo for this day than one of the three Haws?

Day 217: Silly sleepy puppy.

The morning after.  I think Penny was hungover...

Day 218: Happy Gotting-You-Day Sam! 5 years today.

I don't know Sam or Oliver's birthdates.  So we celebrate their Gotting-You-Day's instead.  Sam's is a particularly special day.  You see, in August 2009 Sam went missing.  I know, cats wander.  But Sam doesn't.  Sam is a stay-at-home-preferably-in-one-spot-all-the-time-don't-make-me-go-outside cat.  She has issues.  Most people will say she's not a very nice cat.  One of those people might be me.  I will say she was a horrible kitten.  She's not friendly or cuddly and she shouts and cusses at me every day.  But she loves me and I love her.  We understand each other, or at least I understand her most of the time and she appreciates that.  There are occasions where she cuddles me; she will climb on top of me, snuggle down, and gently put her paw on my face, and that there is her saying she loves me.  I better not move though.  I love Sam, and when she didn't show up for supper that day, I basically knew she was dead.  She's a home cat, she does not explore, there is nothing that would keep her away past supper time.  We searched and searched, and I put up flyer's everywhere.  I couldn't just give up even though deep down I had.  Sam needed me.  She is not an outside cat with street smarts. 

She was gone for 17 days.  Possibly the worst 17 days of my life.  Every evening I would go out to the front, and then to the back of the house to call her, just in case.  There was nothing more that I could do, but I could keep doing that.  Honestly, after 17 days, what was the point?  But I did it every night, breaking down in tears every time.  On the 17th night I'd left it pretty late.  I got up and went out the back and called.  Nothing.  I went out the front and called.  Nothing.  As I was locking the front door, I thought I heard something, but do you know how often I thought I had heard her during those 17 days?  Then I heard it again.  I flew outside and started calling again and then I saw her running to me.  (I may be getting teary writing this)  I burst into tears and scooped her up in my arms.  This was late at night, and I have no idea what the neighbours must have thought but I didn't care.  I held her so tight and she barely struggled even though she doesn't like it.  I took her to the kitchen, sobbing the entire time and gave her food.  I then proceeded to sit on the kitchen floor and ugly-cry while phoning my Mom to tell her Sam was home.  And she was fine.  A bit thin but fine. I have no idea where she went or how she managed to get back home but I am so grateful.  I try to remember this every time she cusses at me loudly when I don't feed her on time.

Day 219: Happy 91st Birthday GranHaw!

October is just full of birthdays!  GranHaw is PopHaw's mommy and is your typical cuddly granny.  You know, the one who bakes and lets you get away with anything?  I don't see her nearly often enough since I moved.

Day 220: HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

All of my awesome Halloween duckies came from my awesome friend Worm, all the way from America!  She sent me about 67 rubber duckies, and these are all the Halloween ones!

I had a fantastic Halloween. It's not so big here, yet, so there are no Trick or Treat interruptions.  It was a cold rainy evening, so I bathed, snuggled under a blanket with some pumpkin soup and sweets, and proceeded to read horror Twilight fanfiction, listen to my Halloween playlist (which I had made for MaHaw's birthday party) and tweet all the songs that were playing.  Perfect.

Day 221: Post Halloween stash.

This stash actually lasted a lot longer than anticipated.  In fact, I still have a few lollipops.

Day 222: Waiting for car repairs...

Because expensive and important things always break when all the money is gone.  This time, it was a brakespring...?

Day 223: Almost Married!

For more on this, go here.

Day 224: How could I not make this my photo of the day?

I know, I know I post a lot of photographs of my herd.  But really, when they do things like this, what am I supposed to do?  I feel I should apologise for the amount of pet photographs, but I'm not going to.

Day 225: Jacaranda adorned driveway.

The Jacaranda's are in bloom once again in the Jacaranda City (as Pretoria is known because of the sheer number of these trees within the city).  Everything looks so pretty and purple I can't promise you won't get more Jacaranda photos.

This the driveway of the property on which my house is situated and I get to drive through this every day for a few weeks every year!

Day 226: THEY CAME THEY CAME! THEY FINALLY CAME!!!!

Lori sent me these new editions of her books, with the newly designed covers, months and months and months ago.  But they never arrived.  And the transport strike over here did not help.  We were so worried that Lori contacted the company and they promised they'd send a new set.  Now either these are those, or the originals finally found their way to me, and there is another set on the way...

Aren't they pretty? Don't you just wanna read em?!?!

Day 227: Murderous ants. And very hardworking.

May I just say that this is a hell of a thing for one to witness first thing in the morning while one is brushing one's teeth...

Day 228: CheeseHaw cooking a kiddie! Meet Sprog. Sprog is part Vulcan...

...as is clear from it's ears.

Everyone is very excited although PopHaw is disappointed that no where seems to make racing suits or helmets for under 3 year old....


That's all for now, folks!

Almost Married

The Wedding Part 4 (go here for part 3)

This past Saturday we threw SisHaw's Bridal Shower/Pamper Party.  I think it went rather well.  It wasn't a huge crowd which I think was good.  And Mouse got some lovely gifts!

I was under strict instructions not to include any silly games or strippers (and I really cannot blame her for that), so I thought up a procedure for the gift opening.  My sister had to guess who the gift was from. If she got it wrong, I popped a piece of bubblegum into her mouth.  Then the person who gave the gift had to read her one of a series of questions which I had asked Darren (and received his answers) beforehand.  If she got that wrong, it meant another piece of bubblegum!  But she got very few questions wrong.  She knows Darren well.  So well in fact, that she fought with him for giving the wrong answers!

Sisters.

I had to sit right next to her because I was the present-passer, the bubblegum-inserter and the question-pass-arounder.

Nothing like a great big hat to make you feel a little bit silly.

I went to all the trouble of making her chair pretty and she popped a balloon as she sat down.

First present.

From my Mom.  There was more than one present per person so the guessing was fun, as elimination was not a sound guessing method.

Apparently MaHaw expects there to be some sexy times on honeymoon.

Nikki drinks.

I had to specifically pose for this as certain people wanted proof of me drinking alcohol.  Oh dear friends, if only you could see the photos of me from the 1990's...

Pamper!

Aromatherapy lotion and body wash.  It smelled delicious!

Candles! And more of Nikki drinking...

Looks like someone gave Mouse a good idea...

This is SisHaw giving MaHaw the 'no you cannot have any of these chocolates' bitchface.

'Pamper' done right.

Oh my goodness gracious! What do people think they're going to be doing on this honeymoon?  You can't sight-see in that!

She had no idea that little one was from me.  And my poker face was excellent!

Doggies are always invited.
 

She doesn't seem that interested, does she? Well I thought they were pretty...

Pink, furry handcuffs from the mother-in-law.  Awesome.  And, believe it or not she has not read Fifty Shades of Grey. Yet. SisHaw seems.... erm.... What is that expression?

Something new and something blue.

Check!

I think the bubblegum was getting a bit much by this point ;)

I am a riveting speaker.  As you can tell.

Ooooooh!  Smellies!

Vanilla scented candles.

She starting making this funny face every time I wanted to add a piece of bubble gum...

These women had dirty, dirty minds.




Half way through.

And half-time.

...where we ate these...

Purple velvet cup cakes!

 

On with the presents!

 

Another gift from Mom.  And another piece of bubblegum, which she loves. As you can tell from her expression.

I'm like a little helpful wedding elf.

Hmmm... Who is this one from...?

NO MORE BUBBLEGUM! PLEEEEEASE!!!

Beach towels!

Finally, something they can actually use on their honeymoon!  Apparently the pink towel was selected for Darren.

Whaaaat eeeeez eeeeeet....?

Lots of wonderful rose smellies is what it is.  Bath salts, and talc, and cream...

...and fizz balls and soap and all the wonderful things!

Travel bags. Super cool.

I wonder who these were from...?

My sister talks with her hands.

Mouse is getting frustrated guessing who this gift is from.  It's from me.  See how pretty I wrapped it?  Word of advice: using cellophane to wrap gifts in a house full of hairy pets is probably not very smart.

She liked it!

It must be the wad of bubblegum causing that face.  Because that was a really nice gift.

Sensible home toiletries and a face cloth that is too pretty to ever use.


Then all the guests left...

And that might have been when the drinking started.

The Bridal Shower Committee

MaHaw, Michele and me.  I'm the one behind the camera.

There may have been coffee tequila involved.


All in all it was a good day.  Mousie got some fabulous gifts so thank you to everyone her spoilt her so much!

A special thank you to my friend Sian for taking all the photographs and basically allowing us to remember the day (and me to write this post).

And an extra special thank you to the Bridal Shower Committee, for allowing me to dictate, more or less, and avoid phone calls.  Michele allowed us to host the shower at her lovely house and made those decadent purple velvet cupcakes! Michele is awesome! And thanks for the wonderful family time we enjoyed afterwards.  It was fabulous just sitting and chilling and laughing and drinking and dancing with you guys.

Next up... THE WEDDING!!!!



UPDATE: The Bachelor's Party was held the weekend after the Bridal Shower and before the weeding.  Although we don't actually know what took place at this secret, manly ritual we do have evidence that silliness was afoot.