Liat's Birthday

I am a day behind and a photo short, but at least I'm posting!

Liat's birthday celebration yesterday was very nice. I even managed to forget that I was up until 2 a.m. the night before, tending to such matters as finishing up her knitted top (the Shetland Shorty at Knitty.com) and a knitted toy (Jean Greenhowe's Puss in Boots), decorating her room while she (supposedly) slept, and setting up the treasure hunt for her cards and gifts.

I ended up making the clues (there are always 6 clues) out of lines or trivia from the Pirates of the Caribbean movies. It was easy to think of fun quotations, but harder to make them apply to clues that would lead Liat to the next clue. In the end, I wrote things like, "Clearly, you've never been to Singapore" and Liat realized that the only place in our house she would find Singapore was in (behind) the atlas... I also used, 'What's the last thing Jack says to Will in the first movie?' then I hid the clue inside my baseball cap, where it hung on the hatrack by the back door.

I even made her card in the Pirates theme: a simple collage with a large picture of Jack and the saying, "You look familiar...Have I wished you Happy Birthday before?"

This year, Liat didn't have her traditional pool party because there were too many people she wanted to invite (our pool is rather small). It felt strange for her not to have her friends over, but she is having a party at a local dessert restaurant on Tuesday, so she will be able to enjoy hanging out with her friends then. We ate freshly-made cinnamon rolls for breakfast, a delicious steak dinner, and the requested birthday cake (chosen from one of my cookbooks) which ended up not being as yummy as we'd hoped. Later on, Liat and I had fun watching TV and looking through the "Cosmo Girl" magazine I bought for her while I was in California, talking about nail polish and makeup.

I hope to have photos for you soon of the completed Puss in Boots and Shetland Shorty. Meital's laptop seems to have crashed, and is still in intensive care. I haven't yet figured out how to upload photos from the camera using my super-duper new multi-use printer, but I hope to figure it out soon.

Meanwhile, Avi and I have a couple of translation jobs to work on, and of course there's no way I want to miss the final in men's basketball tomorrow!