Sonntagssüß: Zebra-Käsekuchen

And this is now the result of today's baking session, a zebra cheese cake. It's a new recipe for me and I hope everybody will like it tomorrow :) As it's still Sunday I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to take part in the "Initiative Sonntagssüß" for once.
Und hier ist jetzt das Ergebnis meiner heutigen Backzeit, ein Zebra-Käsekuchen. Das Rezept habe ich zum ersten Mal gemacht und ich hoffe, dass er auch gut schmecken wird (Quelle findet sich hier). Und da heute Sonntag ist und ich schon seit längerer Zeit immer wieder gerne bei der "Initiative Sonntagssüß" reinschaue, dachte ich mir, dass ich dann jetzt auch einmal teilnehmen kann.

Whirlwind birthday week

This past week was all about Nicole's 40th birthday and the preparations for it. She had decided to invite our colleagues to a birthday lunch buffet and we spent a lot of time planning and preparing it. In the end it was all worth it, everybody loved it and Nicole had a great time, even proclaiming it her best birthday ever! 
The buffet was a bit of a hybrid mix between what we would usually serve up back home in a buffet with a few English buffet staples thrown in.
On one side we had a mix of home-baked and shop-bought breads, then soup, soft drinks, wine, beer from our hometown (all not visible on these photos), various salads, meat balls, cheese, cold meats, pickles, vegetable sticks, various dips (e.g. salsa, salmon and cream cheese, etc), quiches, eggs:


I loved this side of the buffet with lots of snacks and sweet things. We had a selection of crisps and other savoury snacks, various varieties of Haribo (brought back with us when we last were in Germany), German jelly flavours, yoghurts, fruit and cakes:

There are always quite a few dietary requirements to take into account when bringing food into work (well, we don't have to - but it's a bit silly to go to the effort of preparing food for everybody - instead of just going to the supermarket and buying a few boxes - without trying to ensure that there's something for everybody), so we had vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, pork-free and non-alcoholic options, as well as a selection of Dukan diet friendly dishes.
Since this is all about Nicole's birthday, there also needs to be a picture of the birthday girl on her big day:



There wasn't any scrapping time over the last week but things started to calm down yesterday. We had our monthly crop and I managed to complete week 2 of Project Life, as well as another 4 pages of my December Daily/Journal Your Christmas album. I'm still quite behind on the album with another 18 pages to go but I really hope to get it done this month. After all all of the pages are half-done already and just need some assembly and finishing touches (which takes me between 30 and 90 minutes for each of them, madness!). To be honest, though, I find myself struggling with it a bit this year; I find it very hard to get motivated to sit down and work on these pages, as much as I will probably enjoy the finished product. I think it's a mix of wanting to work on other things as well and never really having fallen in love with the paper collection I'm using. Anyhow, off to bake another cake for Nicole's birthday celebration with friends tomorrow evening!

Dortmund

Don't forget the sketch challenge a few posts down - there are prizes to be won!

Vergesst nicht die Sketch Challenge ein wenig weiter unten - es gibt etwas zu gewinnen!

March 2009. The obligatory visit to celebrate Auntie's birthday. We arrived very early in the morning after driving through the night and this picture was taken before all the traffic on one of the main roads started. We simply couldn't resist shopping on a Saturday in the town centre.

März 2009. Der obligatorische Besuch, um Tantchens Geburtstag zu feiern. Wir sind sehr früh am Morgen angekommen, nachdem wir die Nacht durchgefahren waren. Dieses Bild ist entstanden, bevor die übliche Autoflut auf einer der Hauptstraßen richtig eingesetzt hat. Wir mussten einfach an einem Samstag in der Innenstadt einkaufen.

This is our birthday girl celebrating her 86th birthday:

Das hier ist das Geburtstagskind an seinem 86ten Geburtstag:

And it wouldn't be a visit home without a decent portion of Pommes Currywurst - that is one of the things I miss most since moving away. Fish and chips is yummy but no substitute for Pommes Currywurst rotweiß.

Und ein Besuch zuhause wäre nicht vollständig ohne eine anständige Portion Pommes Currywurst - das ist eine der Sachen, die mir am meisten abgehen, seitdem ich "verzogen" bin. Fish and chips ist lecker, aber einfach kein Ersatz für Pommes Currywurst rotweiß.

Using my kits - Part 1

So, I'm more than ever on my quest to make at least one layout out of every (new) kit I get. I had a bit of a backlog but made some very good progress last weekend.
So, ich habe mehr denn je das Ziel, aus jedem meiner (neuen) Kits mindestens ein Layout zu machen. Ich war ein bisschen hinten dran, habe aber letztes Wochenende gute Fortschritte gemacht.

This first DLO was made using Cleo Crafts' Alissa mini kit. I love the colours in this one and thought they didn't look too bad with these photos. Yet another Stratford LO... This was actually my second quest: Finish scrapping the pictures from Stratford!

Für dieses Doppellayout habe ich das Alissa Minikit von Cleo Crafts benutzt. Ich mag die Farben total gerne und fand, dass sie ganz gut zu diesen Fotos passen. Schon wieder ein Stratford LO... Das war nämlich mein zweiter Vorsatz: Scrappe die letzten Fotos von Stratford!

I used another Cleo Crafts kit for this LO, this time the April kit. Initially I wanted to use one of the other papers from the kit but then I couldn't bring myself to have this title with little bunnies, fawns and fox puppies... This also doubles up as an answer to the SLYMI challenge on UKS (#8 - Cut that photo).

Ich habe für dieses LO ein weiteres Kit von Cleo Crafts benutzt, dieses Mal das Aprilkit. Ursprünglich wollte ich eines der anderen Papiere aus dem Kit benutzen, konnte es dann aber nicht übers Herz bringen, bei diesem Titel (Essen, wunderbares Essen) Baby Häschen, Füchse und Rehkitze zu benutzen... Das Layout ist auch eine Reaktion auf die SLYMI Challenge auf UKS (#8 - Schnippel das Foto).

Ice cream

I wanna have a say, too! First of all, welcome to everybody who found us! I haven't been as busy as dear sis but the first LO I completed this year was dedicated to ice cream. It's a double LO and yes, ice cream definitely is my favourite!

Ich will hier auch etwas zu sagen haben! Erst einmal Willkommen an alle, die uns gefunden haben! Ich war nicht so fleißig wie mein Schwesterchen, aber das erste LO, das ich dieses Jahr fertig gemacht habe, ist Eiscreme gewidmet. Es ist ein Doppel-LO und ja, Eiscreme ist definitiv eine meiner liebsten Sachen!