I said it recently, but I really do seem to have the best friends. Mike and I finally got together with Bill and Melissa on Saturday night. This celebration of my birthday (and Mike's birthday, and now Melissa's birthday) had to be rescheduled no less than six times due to scheduling conflicts, people getting sick, my Grandpa's funeral, etc. Not only did Melissa get me the Tim Holtz "An Altered Journey" video as a birthday gift, but she also made me the COOLEST book EVER celebrating our friendship. Here's a photo of the cover of it:

Well, needless to say it brought tears to my eyes. Because, you see, Melissa is a very linear scrapper. I am sure it gives her angst to put a photo on a page at an angle. See that title on the front? ANGLED, right? Go Melissa! And not only did she put photos on pages at angles, she did all sorts of quirky, Krista-esque things with ribbon and doo-dads... I was so touched that Melissa made a book for me in my style. Because our styles are quite dissimilar, I know it was a challenge for her, and she just put together the coolest keepsake. Thanks, M. You already know I love you, but I'm surprised our shared brain didn't notify me sooner that you'd been so hard at work on this book. I'll bet you were so anxious to give it to me!

The goodies didn't stop there, though. No, Melissa had contacted my good buddy Cathy Zielske to let her know I was having a birthday, and Cathy got all crafty and sent Melissa a layout to give to me as a gift. Well, as you know, my birthday was almost two months ago. Melissa has been harboring this secret gift for those two months. And I gather that top-secret exchanges between M & C were something along the lines of: "Did you give it to her?" "No, we haven't gotten together yet." And they both kept this a secret for two months! (Heck, I had a hard enough time keeping the tote bag I had Neil sign for Cathy a secret until she got it in the mail a few days later....) Who knew that life would throw so many obstacles in the way of our birthday extravaganza? Better late than never, I say, as I am now the proud owner of an original piece of Cathy artwork, which shall be framed in a shadow box and hung on my office wall... AND she included EYE CANDY in the form of Neil Finn on the layout! Wanna see it? Of course I'll share it with you:

Isn't it awesome, in the totally "CZ Simple" way that she has about everything she does????? Ok, I know I've never met you in person, Cathy, but that doesn't mean that I don't think we aren't separated-at-birth music soul mates of the first order. The fact that you crack me up on a daily basis is just a groovy bonus. We will see Neil live together one day. Thank you for my birthday present. Belated, sure, but that's not your fault! I'm awfully glad I started reading your blog and we became pals! You make me smile.

The Paper-Palooza sale at Audrey's barn on Saturday was a rousing success! She sold boatloads of paper and despite the way-chilly temps, we had a great time hanging out and eating a few too many ginger snaps between customers. Woohoo!