Delightful Day

We had a nice day.  This morning, we went to Niort and visited a museum with a family from church.  We generally enjoy this sort of thing, and this was no exception.  They had a display of modern art.  There was this metal sculpture, made out of junk that didn't look like it resembled anything at all, but when you lit it up from the right angle, it made a clear shadow of a little girl and a little boy kissing.  So cool!
 
This afternoon, I baked my first 2 loaves of no-knead all-sourdough bread.  It turned out great!  (Why did people start kneading bread in the first place, I wonder?)  I may try and tweak the recipe a bit.  It is really good, but..um...no one could mistake it for anything but sourdough.  Maybe cutting down on the 19 1/2 hours of rising time could change that.
 
As I was pulling the bread out of the oven, a friend of Alina's from school rang the doorbell.  She and her mom had baked cookies and brought us some, so we swapped them for a half a loaf of bread and went and played in the backyard.  As it turns out, Zoe has had the chickenpox.  She broke out in spots last Thursday.  We spent all day with her last Wednesday.  This could explain a certain amount of grumpiness in our house right now, along with Alina's sudden love for naps!
 
At dinner, we had this conversation:
TASSIA:  I have a story where I turn into a puddle.
ME:  Oh, really?  A puddle of what?
TASSIA: A puddle of soup
 
I guess there are worse puddles one could turn into.

Mysterious Disappearance

Two fish swim silently in their fishbowl.  In the dark of the night, one disappears.  Possibilities:
 
1.  During Tassia's 3-hr awake stint, from 2 to 5am, Papa noticed a belly-up floater and did away with it quietly, not wishing to upset anyone.  Upon questioning, Papa denies.
 
2.  During a short visit to our house yesterday, Paternal Grandfather performed above operation.  Upon questioning, Paternal Grandfather denies.
 
3.  Cat jumps onto refrigerator, and eats fish in question.  Upon questioning, Cat has no comment, but investigators would like to know how Cat could jump on top of refrigerator.
 
4.  Suicidal fish jumps out of fishbowl, and lifeless body is eaten by cat.  Upon questioning, Cat still has no comment, but fish has not been known to jump out of fishbowl, nor was he showing any classic signs of depression prior to disappearance.
 
5.  Rapture. 

Heat wave!

Someone asked me recently if we have been taking advantage of the snow. Not really. Given how long it takes me to get 4 of us bundled up and ready to go out, plus how long it takes to get us changed and dried off after any contact with snow, compared to the amount of time we (aka Sybille) are happy outside, and going out is not a very time-effective action on our part. Today, however, it is considerably warmer, and Tassia, Sybille and I were able to enjoy our baby swing and make the most impressive snowmen in our family's history so far. The first snowman was assembled before lunch, fell down during lunch, and then reassembled with a new face after naptime. Up until now, we've spent a lot of time enjoying the excuse we had of staying in where it was warm and not going much of anything. It will probably be even warmer tomorrow, so it's a good thing that I defrosted the freezer today!

Good, good???

OK, um, so we flipped another switch, and the furnace is working again.  Not sure why the electricity went off in the first place, not sure what will happen next, but we'd love to still have heat tomorrow morning...

Good/Bad

Good news: Our electricity works again.

Bad news:  The furnace doesn't.

Sleeping books

ME: (Frantically trying to get out the door to take Alina to school.)  Alina, where's your library book?  You need to take it back today.  I purposely put it right here next to your backpack!

 

TASSIA:  It's in her bed.  She sleepted with it.

Beautiful Biculturalism

I think that every family owes it to itself to be bicultural. If you don't happen to actually have 2 cultures on hand, you could always just pick one at random, learn about it and, mostly, celebrate their holidays.

Get this. My children, because they are American, get to carve pumpkins, dress up, and trick-or-treat in October. Because they're American, and we do that. In November, we have a special meal and a great excuse to have friends over and be thankful. It's called Thanksgiving, and, once again, we celebrate it because we're American. Then, we have Christmas and New Year's, where we get to pick our favorites out of 2 sets of traditions. Then, in January, besides birthday cake, we get to eat Galette des Rois. This is a crown-shaped cake that is eaten on and around Epiphany. "King Cake," as we call it to avoid franglais, is a French tradition we embrace whole-heartedly (and I prefer Galette au frangipane, if anyone's taking notes). Then, along comes Chandeleur. That's today. Somehow, in a mixture of sacred and pagan traditions, everyone in France eats crêpes today. Here, again, I find myself forced to bow to tradition. Life is rough. And, Carnaval is coming up in a couple of weeks...

Do we get to celebrate Cinco de Mayo, too?