The Best of 2013

1. Daniel   2. Mizzie   3. Barrie   4. Eliya   5. Manchester United   6. Happy Anniversary Richard   7. Liav   8. Capturing the Moment   9. World's Greatest Abba   10. Yonatan

Tuesday night sees the end of a year and the start of a brand new one. As is common at this time of the year, I thought it would be fun to look back at some of my favourite creations of 2013. The biggest thing for my family was our son's Bar Mitzvah and you can see all the paper goodies that I made for the event here, but of course I also made plenty of other things during the year and visited some pretty interesting places too. Have you spotted your card or album amongst this collection?

As always, a big thank you to those of you who have visited my blog this year. I am always very happy to receive your encouraging comments and support, and hope you will continue to visit in 2014.

1. Avigayil's Album   2. Tali's Recipe Book   3. Aviva's Album   4. Nathalie's Bat Mitzvah   5. Yishai's Album   6. Ariel's Album   7. Ro'i's Album   8. Nadav's Bar Mitzvah   9. Sam's Bar Mitzvah   10. Naftali's Album

Don't forget that you can subscribe to my blog, and follow me on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest. Oh, and please pop by my shop now and then to see what is new there!

Wishing you a wonderful, happy and colourful New Year's Eve and an exciting start to 2014!

Tali's Recipe Book

Remember the recipe book I put together? Well, I made another one. The very same day that I showed it on my blog a customer wrote to ask whether I could make one for her granddaughter's upcoming Bat Mitzvah. Social media working at its best!
My customer told me that her granddaughter, the Bat Mitzvah girl, loves shopping, fashion and listening to music on her iPod touch. She enjoys holidays in the sun and is also a keen cook. Her grandma thought that a recipe book was the ideal gift for her.

A little bit of sketching and I managed to piece all of the young lady's interests together. I decided to show her by the beach, with a big yellow sun in the background and her flip-flops and towel nearby. She is wearing her favourite Hollister hoodie and has her new silver heart necklace, recently given to her by her parents, around her neck. It looks like she has been shopping too and bags from Selfridges and Abercrombie are in the background. I am told they are her favourite places to shop!

Because this is the cover for a recipe book, and because Tali loves to cook, I have shown her with a mixing bowl in one hand and with a big cooking pot nearby. Her other hand is busy with her iPod. I have a child of almost the same age. I know what's important.

Now, the inside pages took on a life of their own. We originally talked of filling 10 of the pages, and leaving the other 10 for future use. Well, the book grew and grew and grew, and soon it was full. It was quite a jigsaw to make it all fit!

Tali, and her Mum, are apparently always associated with the colour pink. She loves flowers, hearts, nail polish and basically anything girlie and so, once the pages were laid out, that's what went on them.

My customer, well actually her daughter, the Bat Mitzvah girl's Aunt, collected recipes and delightful messages from the young lady's friends and family, and the book was soon filled with some fabulous ideas... and lots of love.

I added a little illustration of the relevant food item on the recipe pages, just some of which I have shown here. Thus the carrot cake recipe was decorated with bright orange carrots, and the strawberry cheesecake page got some sweet little strawberries to make it look pretty. I cut some teeny tiny pink raspberries to go on 'The Princess Tali Pink Ripple Cake' page too. What a great name!

Tali was getting some Uggs as a Bat Mitzvah gift and her Aunt was keen that they should appear too. They don't have a lot to do with recipes or food but they looked pretty cute anyway!

My customer emailed me when the album arrived. "Album amazing!" her message said. "Thank you SO much! You went to so much trouble on our behalf."

Apparently Tali was thrilled with it too. She couldn't believe how many of her friends had sent messages and contributed to the book, and when her grandparents gave it to her she kept going to reread it again and again.

I hope that it is something she will really treasure.

Nathalie's Bat Mitzvah

It's been a little while since my last post as I have been busy preparing for, and then celebrating, the holiday of Passover with my family. My Dad was back for another visit and during the seven-day festival we have been to some wonderful places around Israel which I will post about soon.

Passover, or Pesach as we call it, is all about the food! We clean our homes thoroughly to remove all crumbs of chametz (leaven) to remember the Jews leaving Egypt who did not have time to let their bread rise, and we eat only "Kosher for Passover". You can read more about it in two of my previous posts here and here, but whilst we're on the subject of food, I am excited to show you a project I worked on some time ago - a recipe book for a young lady celebrating her Bat Mitzvah.

A customer approached me with the idea of a family recipe book in mind. She was already in the process of collecting recipes from various members of her family and wanted them made in to a book with extra pages that the Bat Mitzvah girl, and any children she may have in the future, could add to.

Nathalie, the Bat Mitzvah girl, loves horses and the outdoors. I have shown her on the cover of the recipe binder with one of her much loved horses, and with a tent in the background since she enjoys camping too. All the recipes collected were for desserts - obviously they are a sweet-toothed family - so the name of the book aptly became 'Family Desserts' and I added a chocolate mousse, a jelly, a slice of cake and chocolate chip cookies to the cover to give a taste of what is inside.

I designed each recipe page on a grid using teal and kraft paper, to match the binder cover, as the general colour scheme. I then added 'ingredients' from each recipe to decorate the pages and had fun crafting chocolate, mangoes, bananas and jelly to name but a few!

My customer loved the kiwi the most, below, whilst I think that the chocolate chip cookies, above, look good enough to eat. I just hope that Nathalie doesn't spill any of these ingredients on the book whilst using it!

The same day that my customer collected the finished book, she wrote to me to tell me that she thought it looked amazing. "I loved leafing through it" she said. "The detail is fantastic. I love the kiwi and the chocolate mousse pages especially. Many thanks again. I am sure it will give Nathalie and all the family a lot of pleasure."

I am so pleased that I was able to make it happen.