It was a delightful birthday. Elliot was very conscientious and kept thinking of things for the "birthday boy" to do, like letting him push the button to raise the shades in our bedroom. Mimi and Granddad got to participate in the opening of presents via Skype, and Elliot was very happy to give Calvin a present this year. We also had some new expat friends visit after dinner to sing happy birthday (first in French, then in English) and watch Calvin blow out the candles. It was very cute to see him get shy when everyone was singing for him. That's typical Elliot behavior, not Calvin!
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| Grandparents join in for the birthday celebration! |
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| Calvin mysteriously turns shy during the birthday song. |
We also baked a cake. Overall, things went surprisingly well! We couldn't use our normal recipe because there doesn't appear to be such thing as baker's chocolate here. And, even if there were, I doubt we'd be able to use it. I've looked at every single bar in the chocolate aisle of the grocery store (no exaggeration, every bar) and all but one kid's brand have nut cross-contamination. So, we had to find a recipe for chocolate cake that used cocoa powder. But, all in all, it worked out, and the cake wasn't too bad!
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| The boys enjoyed baking the cake, too! (Sshh, don't let Laura's old food-safety coworkers know we let the boys eat raw cake batter!!!) |
There was one annoyance. Swiss vanilla is sold in 5 gram packets, which we think is roughly equivalent to a teaspoon. Although it took a long time to find, that in and of itself isn't so bad. But, it also costs about $1 per packet. First visitors to Switzerland, please bring us a bottle of vanilla! It's really not asking too much....
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| Two dollars worth of vanilla. |
Sounds like a nice birthday! What present did Elliot give Calvin? Did he pick it out himself? I'm glad your getting on the GRANDdad bandwagon!
ReplyDeleteNo. I bought some cheap-o highway rescue set that was on super-clearance after Christmas. We showed it to Elliot and he said he wanted to give it to Calvin. But, it did give us the idea that next year we need to involve him in Calvin's birthday (and Christmas). He's old enough to take an interest now.
ReplyDeleteAWW! The pictures are adorable. Calvin and Elliot are sooo cute! :) (as usual) Tell them I say hi!
ReplyDeleteAriana
Awww!! Your boys are sooo cute! I wish I was that young again. I miss those days, v. much. Anyway, a big hello and an even bigger hug to them from me! J in the UK. :-)
ReplyDeleteHappy new year, Calvin and Elliot!
ReplyDeleteI got 6 pairs of black socks with Tigger on them for Xmas 2012. Calvin and Elliot would have been jealous. I wear those every day now, sometimes one pair for two days in a row. I love the socks so much.
ReplyDeleteI wonder what socks the boys like wearing. I wonder if you could post a few pics of them wearing their favourite socks, please if that not too much bother? Thanks. :-) Big smiles!