Baby shower sneak peek

emember how I mentioned I was going to show you what I was going to be doing for my sister's baby shower? Well, here are some shots of this past Saturday's baby shower that my younger sister and I threw for my twin sister's baby shower. It was a lot of hard work, but it turned out really nice. My younger sister keeps insisting that we should open a party planning business together, but I'm still hesitant to take the plunge.

I designed these heart lollipop flowers to give out as favours for all the guests.
I had a pink, yellow, and orange colour scheme for the baby shower so I incorporated those
colours in these flowers. My expecting sister wrote personalized messages to each
individual guests in one of the petals.

I made labels for all the foods that we had made so that our guests would know what they were eating.
I propped them up with wooden clothes pins.

A preview of some of the finger foods.

I made these phyllo cups with lemon cream cheese,smoked salmon and chives on top.

My younger sister made these sliders. Aren't they so cute?

I also made these. These are endives with goat cheese, bacon, and homemade croutons.

These are french baguettes drizzled with olive oil, bocconcini, basil, and cherry tomatoes. I loved these.

My sister made these mini crab cakes and her homemade aioli. The aioli was delicious.

Here's the table spread.

We had a dessert/candy station. We put candies in little sundae cups and I incorporated the colour scheme
of the party by using yellow, orange, and pink straws.

My sister loves to bake and she made these delicious mini vanilla cupcakes with
strawberry buttercream frosting. These were a huge hit.

Another view. We also had assorted sandwiches that my mom made, a fruit tray, and
an arugula salad with goat cheese, walnuts, dried cranberries with a rice wine vinaigrette.

We hung my banner that I made on one wall.

I also hung doilies that I had painted in our colour scheme in place of streamers. I think it was much
more elegant.

Here's another look at the favours.

We also had more desserts by the living room where our guests were hanging out.

I bought these Pantone inspired cups for $2 each in our colour scheme and we stuffed it with goodies
as gift prizes at the shower.

Ricardo event

fter work I had the privilege to attend a launch party for Ricardo's new kitchenwares. It turns out that it wasn't a sit-down dinner that I thought it was going to be, but more of a cocktail party. That's ok. It was a lot of fun and I even got a chance to talk to Ricardo. He is SUPER nice and easy-going. Just a few days ago I was shooting a celebrity (I won't say who), but I didn't have such a good experience. I'm so glad that Ricardo was nice.

The event was a catered event, but Ricardo brought home-made chocolates filled with caramel that he had made. It was to die for!

Here I am posing with Ricardo. Sorry it's so dark.

I really loved all the packaging and design for all his kitchenwares. I wonder who did the packaging design...

The party was held inside an art gallery, but they really personalized it for this event. There was a tree made out of spatulas.

The gallery had bits of his kitchenwares displayed throughout.

Here's a wall of cooking utensils and pans. His pans are all lined with ceramic. It's is all affordable too. I think they are available in Sears across Canada and some specialty stores.

On one side of the wall there was a cool wall treatment.

His rolling pins were pretty neat because they are black. Doesn't it look like a piece of art?

Now on to the food...

They had waiters going around with hors d'oeuvres, but there were also stations where chefs were assembling amuse bouche. This one was the lobster ravioli station with caviar.

Isn't it pretty?

It was sooooo good.

This one was chicken stuffed with goat cheese on a crostini.

I found this to be a bit bland, but my colleague loved it.

Mingle time.

Near the end of the party Ricardo went behind the counter and started serving food himself. What a sweet guy. Love him!

It was a great event and we all got parting gifts.

Our gift bags had the press kit for his new wares as well as a metal and silicone muffin pan and rose-shaped silicone baking cups.

My favourite would have to be the rose-shaped cake cups because I can make this beautiful cake that he included a recipe for. It would make an impressive dessert without it being too difficult to make.

Here's a photo of my face after I got home. I was trying out my Darkness lashes (style is K.ma3) that I bought a few months ago for the first time. They looked amazing on. My colleague wasn't sure if I was wearing falsies and another one didn't even know I had falsies on. They made my eyes look doll-like and really intensified it without it looking obviously fake and unnatural.

Good food, good company

ou can say that I'm somewhat of a foodie. I love checking out restaurants and trying different foods. My husband and I used to eat out a lot before we had our son and one of our passions was checking out different restaurants.

Yesterday my sisters and I took our cousin, who was visiting from the States, to a restaurant called L'Unita. I've never been there before, but I heard lots of good things about it. It's an Italian osteria and wine bar. Right away when we entered we felt welcome and "at home". There was nothing stuffy about the place. I had prosecco to drink and homemade porcini pappardelle. The pasta was a tad on the salty side, but otherwise it was delicious. We had a great time enjoying each other's company. I can't wait to do it again.

Tomorrow I'm going to a Ricardo event after work. Ricardo is a famous Canadian chef and he has a show called Ricardo and Friends on Food Network Canada. The event is a launch party for his new kitchenwares. I believe it's a sit-down dinner so I'm pretty excited what foods they will be serving.

Necklaces and brooches

hat a terrible day to take photos. After all the sun that we've been getting, I think this week will be lots and lots of rain. Well, that's what the forecast is telling me. I'm just about to head out, but I thought I would show you guys some of the photos I took of my necklaces and brooches. I might go to my cousin's store tomorrow because she texted me last night saying she only had 2 rings left and none of the hair pins and earrings left. I'm always so pleasantly surprised when I hear that people are buying my stuff. It started off as a hobby and now it looks like it might be a lucrative side business.






I'm off to pick up my husband from the subway station and then I'm heading over to my parent's house for dinner. My mom is making one of my favourite Korean foods- Naeng Myun! My husband is a meat and potatoes guy so he's not too excited about dinner. Too bad! I always beg him to take me to this really good naeng myun restaurant, but he always refuses. What a bad husband.