Mario Party

This year I decided to have my birthday early, and had a Mario themed party... it was nothing big (just a couple of couples came over).  We played Mario Kart for the Wii and had a blast...

No party is complete without food.  This was no exception.  And of course, it needed to follow the theme.

Below, 'pipe' pigs in blankets.

And 'star' biscuits.

Yoshi eggs in a carrot and celery nest (made spinach dip for those).

And here's the cake... made it to look like the mushrooms in the game.  It tasted good too!  :)

The whole 'spread'.

 And for fun, I took a pic as Princess Toadstool holding the cake.  No, I didn't dress up for the party... I didn't feel like it that day... but I decided to have a little fun with my costume later (half of the mushroom's head is gone, haha).  And playing with the pic is always fun, too.

Happy 25th anniversary Mario!  You've given us many fun times (and I look forward to many more). 

Bring on the games!

Mario and the Gang

Halloween was great this year.  We went to a costume party, which was a lot of fun... and I decided to make my family ... the Toadstool Family.

 Yup... Mario, Princess Toadstool, Toadette, and my son is Toad.  I know, I haven't posted about him on this blog yet.  I have on my main blog... I just haven't done much on this one lately.  Sigh.  Sorry about that.

 I figure Mario is embracing the present... looking at his blackberry text from Toad telling him the princess is in another castle...

And now for two collages of photos from the evening.

I have a few fun pics I will have to post later... you know... Mario shopping and all that... haha.

Funny thing is, our costumes won quite a bit!  At the party my daughter won in the girl's category, my son in the boys, and my husband and I in the couples.  Then, on halloween weekend we went to the mall and I entered the kiddos in the contest there (for 5 and under)... and out of what seemed like 50 kids, we won second prize.  Go figure.  For costumes that took maybe $10 and hours of my time!

I just think the toad and toadette hats are the cutest thing ever.  :)

Hope you all had a safe and fun Halloween.

A Zelda Halloween

I've been working on some costumes recently... and here are a couple of pics of them. They aren't completely done yet, but close enough for now.

My husband as 'Link'. Picture is a bit tilted due to having to hold the camera back a ways from where I was standing. I sewed a LOT that day... the gloves, hat, tunic (the brown pieces are sewn onto the tunic itself), tunic detailing in the corners (I guess you can't really see that) and I even made boots (which aren't in the pic). Turned out ok. Don't have ears yet, or the sword or shield. That is something I'll have to make eventually.

Here is our little Zelda family. My daughter is Epona (a purchased costume... whew). I'm Zelda of course. The 'armor' pieces didn't quite get finished. I have to find a way to keep them together other than tape, and I wish to actually buy a wig to attach the headpiece on permanently instead of having it on my own head and hair. I need to finish the base of the dress and detailing on the gloves as well. And I want some larger pieces of foam so I can make the shoulder pieces more like the belt/headpiece/neckpiece and three dimentional instead of painted cardstock. It would also be a LOT more comfortable. My fave piece is the front panel. I sewed it myself, and using yarn and glue, I attached all the decorative accents. It looks quite good! And my first attempt at sewing any type of clothing can be seen in the vest. I did the whole thing from scratch, even making my own pattern. It needs a bit of reworking, but on the whole, I'm very proud of it.

So, there you have it. What I've been up to this last week (instead of video games... although haven't done as much of that as I'd like either... sigh).

NiGHTS: A mini review

So, a month ago I picked up a couple of new games for the Wii... NiGHTS was one of them. When I first loaded the game, I was astonished at the graphics and the video that was playing on my screen. It was beautiful. The music was wonderful, and I couldn't wait to see how the game play was.

Please note, I never played the original. My view on this game will be on this game as a lone piece, not as a sequel.

After the movie sequences were over and I finally got to play the character (I picked Helen first), I was a bit disappointed in the quality of the graphics at Dream Gate. They weren't terrible, but after seeing such a beautiful movie sequence, they left much to be desired. Then hearing the voices for the characters... I was less than impressed. I found the dialogue cheesy and annoying, and the Owl... sometimes I just wanted him to shut up. It wasn't terrible, but definitely a bit of a let down.

Anyway, on to the game play. I entered the first world, having no idea what it was I was supposed to do. Some of it made little to no sense (you have to save NiGHTS, but the second you do, you escape the 'prison' and then have to chase birds for keys to the prison you are no longer in... I wasn't sure what the point of it was). However, flying around was so fun! Really! I enjoyed it immensely. The flying on rails still allowing you so much freedom (like and unlike the old Sonic games), I kept going back to those levels to try to capture things in my circles, and just enjoy the ride. The worlds are so colorful and gorgeous. I got a bit frustrated at first with the first boss I had to defeat (a giant fish... I had NO clue what to do and that Owl made no sense). I got him the first time out of sheer luck, and had to find out what I did by looking online. Once I realized I had actually grabbed the thing's head and bashed him, well, that made everything so much easier. The bosses were actually a LOT of fun in this game, as were the chases.

This game has a lot of extras that will bring a bit more game play time to it. Mainly, there is a Dream World where things you capture in your 'circle' (I cannot remember what it is called, but when you fly in a circle and 'grab' everything that was inside it) end up. It is fun to see what it turns into as you play the game. Also, trying to get a better score to end up with at LEAST a 'C' rating on ALL your levels (this allows you to get the last white Ideya and see an alternate ending). Then there are the Dream Drops to collect which will allow you to play as the original characters in the old game instead of Will and Helen... if you collect them all.

Oh, and my little girl (who is a year old) absolutely LOVED watching me play. The music and graphics grabbed her attention for a LONG time.

In all, this is a fun time waster, with enjoyable worlds and music. The main drawback is the cheesy voice acting. A great game for kids... but perhaps too easy for those of us who want a bit of a challenge. If you can pick it up for cheap (I got it for $10 at Best Buy), go for it.

Elebits

I see it has been an age since I last posted. Oops. In that time I got a new game. Elebits. Ok, so it's a new game for me, but a relatively old one for the Wii already. I managed to nab it for $15... sweet!

I really like this game. The story is cheesy, and the voices are even cheesier, but the game play makes up for it! Basically, you are given a variety of missions (20+) in which you have to meet the objectives of catching a certain number of watts of elebits within the time period following the restrictions (some are 'don't break more than _# items', or 'don't make loud noise', things like that). There are a variety of elebits, new ones appear as you move through the challenges (my favorite are the little yellow guys that suck up elebits around them to turn into big guys that you have to 'smash' to turn into the regular sized elebits again before collecting them). They have varying amounts of watts to each type of elebit, and each one has a characteristic that is different from the others. Really though, just smashing things and sucking things up is a lot of fun... but it won't get you through the game. Some of the levels are quite challenging.

The pink elebits are kinda fun. If you can catch all three, you will get the 'unlimited time' mode for that mission (one unlocks the challenge mode as well). You have to find the first two to get the third one though, and you have to complete the mission with a certain prerequisite to get that third one to appear in front of you. They hide again real quick too. And they don't carry any watts.

There is also an edit mode, where you can 'create' your own room to send over wifi to someone else to play. I haven't really played with this or figured it out yet, however. You can unlock items to place in your edited rooms as you play the game

There are also charged elebits. These guys come from various appliances/toys that you turn on with the wattage you've collected. Collect them to increase the power of your capture gun so you can lift bigger objects. They also don't have any watts. If you collect enough, you will be able to lift things like houses in later missions... nothing more satisfying than chucking a house over your shoulder! Move over, Superman!

Anyway, that is my brief blurb on Elebits. If you can nab this one for $15-$20, it is worth it!