london staycation all-in-one birthday party

we had our london staycation party last night & i do believe a smashing good time was had by all!
(as i've mentioned before, we have 1 birthday every winter to celebrate our 8 grown children's birthdays. we have a theme that we try to carry out with fun & food.)

this year's menu:

arthur treacher's fish & chips

fado's irish pub fare of salmon bites, corned beef roll-ups, cheese dip & boxtys, their fish and chips, shepherd pie, pulled lamb french dip, & bangers & mash.

we were so busy eating that i forgot to take a picture of the food, except for the trifle.

the girls were treated with shopping at harrod's (our own little version) with jams, digestives, clouted cream, teas, etc.

everyone had fun with their elton john sunglasses & james bond walther p99 squirt guns.

we listened to the beatles.

& we laughed & laughed & laughed.

oh, how i love them all (& the grandbabies, too!)

cutesy cousins (or - if it's monday - it must be a jurassic playdate)

for the last 2 mondays (& a couple of other times, here & there)- my great great nephew, eli, has been coming over to play with henry.

(they're great friends. when they see each other at church on sundays, it's always like they are long lost cousins, reuniting, which is very cute.)

for a couple of 4 year olds, they play pretty well together. henry's pretty bossy & eli pretty easy going. they don't always want to play the same thing at the same time, so they sometimes do the 2 year old thing, & play in parallel universes.

goodbyes are tearful. but i did manage to get this great shot just before eli went home.

of course, it took 3 tries to get it!

bloggy goodness

i read a lot of blogs.

i have a lot of favorites.

starting with my girls & my nieces.

and then there are others.

i like the funny ones.

i like the crafty ones.

i like the decorating ones.

i like the frugal gals.

i like the living the good life gals.

i like the ones that encourage me on my walk of faith.

i like the ones that boldly say "i love Jesus".

and i like the ones that combine all of the above.

found some i'd never read in the top 100 christian women's blogs 2008.

some of these i read everyday.

check them out at:/www.internetcafedevotions.com/2009/01/top-100-christian-womens-blogs-2008.html

what kind of blogs do you like to read?