Thursday, August 27, 2009

Flipnote


This weekend I decided to take a stroll in the Nintendo DSi shop to see if anything new was available. I haven't checked it in a long time and was delighted to see that they had added a new free application. It's quite a nifty little application that allows you to produce your own flip note animations. Here are some of the ones that I have done in the past couple of days. Enjoy.

This is my first animation that I did in the program.




Here's a shout out to our friends in Cleveland.




And finally since birthday month is coming up I thought that this would be appropriate.



And finally since birthday month is coming up I thought that this would be appropriate.

Monday, August 10, 2009

HAPPEE BIRTHDAE HARRY

On July 30 at exactly six o'clock we celebrated Harry Potter's birthday. He actually was born on the 31st but due to several reasons we were unable to have it on this date. It was very simple this time as compared to what we have done in the past. For the last movie we had a party for each movie on consecutive nights to prepare us for the Order of the Phoenix. Each night was themed around the other movies. This night was very calm with us just playing a few Harry Potter based games and eating some Horcrux cake and ice cream.
Just a little about the cake. It was completely homemade and shaped. Most of the body is made from cake with the head being made from fruity pebble crispies. I forgot to flour the pans of the cakes so I had to do a great deal of frosting and smoothing to get the snake to look this smooth. Sarah helped out quite a bit with the last layer of frosting because I was so tired of it by the time we came to the last layer. I know we should have used fondant but it was quite the accomplishment after it was finished. Most of the other horcurxes were made with gum paste. I had tried doing them all in starbursts before I switched to gum paste because the starburst just wouldn't hold their shape. Hufflepuff's cup, Slytherin's ring and Locket, The Daily Prophet featuring the Headline "The Chosen One", and the snake scales where hand painted with a mixture of food coloring and peppermint oil. Jewels for the ring and diadem were made from hard candy that we had obtained from our Japan trip. Slytherin's locket is the only one at the end that is made from starbursts. It was a great deal of work but we had a time at the party even though it was small.