Birthday, Halloween and Fall Fun

Click here for more recent pictures (Oct 2006) at our Flickr account (link is also repeated below).

Luka's birthday party with his friends on Saturday, october 21 was at Gymboree Play area and it was a lot of fun. The kids had a good time and the adults did too. We even helped when they got to play with the big parachute. Mommy's monkey cupcakes were a big hit and really looked like monkeys! He received very nice presents from family and friends and has had a goog time playing with them. There are so many, we stil have to find time!

Axel has been growing so fast. His new big acheivement is climbing our two flights of stairs by himself. He is so focused and makes a little noise as he puts out all the effort to accmoplish this task. At the top he celebrates with big smiles and happy noises. He is also very vocal (getting into the toddler stage!) if he doesn't like something and his ear-splitting shrieks make his will known! But, most of the time, he is our mild-mannered, laughing man.

Luka is having a great time at school. Today was their big Halloween party and I made "goblin cookies" for it. Reynald took some of the extras to his office.

We have been having fun with Halloween. Luka has a cute monkey costume and Spiderman and has been switching between them. We went to the Ghost Train at the CO Railroad museum with friend Connor and a very fun Halloween costume at church. Tonight is the big Trick or Treating night and we will do our neighborhood and our friend Jenni's as well, after visiting her and Stuart. Axel has been a pumpkin and an elephant. Tonight it supposed to be cold, so for Trick or Treating, I am thinking he will be an elephant since that costume is warmer.

Click here for more recent pictures at our Flickr account - select the October 2006 set - click the slide show in the right hand corner of the Flickr page to see them in a slide show. Nice - no extra clicking for each photo!

Monkey Cupcakes

Monkey cupcakes! To make your very own monkey cupcakes, go to:
http://entertaining.about.com/od/cakebragbook/ss/monkeycupcake.htm

They have great instructions. I modifed it a bit because it was hard to find think licorice for the mouths. I used that new canned, decorator frosting. It is under pressure like canned whipped cream and has several tips you can use. It worked perfectly. You can buy it in the decorating/baking section at the grocery store.

For the frosting, I made a butter cream and added some cocoa to make it brown. It was easy (thanks, Jenni and Karen!). I had originally bought canned frosting, but it tasted really bad, so I made it myself and it was quick, easy and looked and tasted good. Here is a picture of the monkey cupcakes I made for Luka's party:
See the posting with more about his party here:

http://bodeux.blogspot.com/2006/10/birthday-halloween-and-fall-fun.html

Happy Birthday, Luka!

Today is Luka's 4th birthday! He had lots of fun. First, Mommy took mini pumpkin muffins decorated with yellow frosting and halloween sprinkles for morning snack at school and everyone sang happy birthday to him. His teachers said he even took a nap (!) and had a very good day overall.

Then, at home, after dinner, we had a cake (see below photos for recipe) and four candles. He had fun blowing them out (twice - once for "happy birthday" in English and once for it in French) and eating his name off the cake. He liked the cake and frosting too - yum, yum. Then, time for presents! Two games from Cranium that Mommy thought looked like fun--Cariboo Treasure Hunt and Hullabaloo, and a scooter! Can't wait to play the games and try to scooter!

And, last night, he received a package from his grandparents and got new clothes and games from them, plus some madeleines de commercy (yummy little cakes).

He told me today that he gets three "parties:" one at school, one with Mommy, Da-da and Axel, and one on Saturday with his friends (big monkey-themed blow out at Gymboree).









I have brainwashed my family to eat "healthy" cakes and like them. Hee hee. Here is the recipe for Luka's family birthday cake (on Saturday, we will be eating monkey banana cupcakes!).

Pumpkin Bread

2 cups of whole wheat pastry flour (original recipe calls for all-purpose)
1 cup brown sugar, packed
1 TBS baking powder
1 tsp ground cinammon
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
1/8 tsp ground ginger or cloves (I used ginger)
1 cup canned pumpkin
1/2 cup milk
2 eggs
1/3 cup shortening (I used non-hydrogenated)
1/2 cup chopped nuts (I used pecans in a separate bread from what we used as the birthday cake)
1/2 cup raisins (optional - I personally do not like raisins in this type of bread)

In large bowl, combine 1 cup of the flour, the brown sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, salt, baking soda, nutmeg, and ginger or cloves. Add pumpkin, milk, eggs and shortening.

Beat with an electric mixer on low speed till blended, then on high for 2 minutes. Add remaining flour; beat well. Sitre in nuts and raisins, if using.

Pour batter into a greased 9x5x3-in loaf pain. (I use two and make the breads thinner and cook them less time. That stretches it a bit farther and the pieces are not so high then when you cut a slice.) Bake in a 350 degree preheated over for 60 - 65 minutes or till toothpick comes out clean. (If you use two pans like I do, check them at about 20 minutes and they will likely be done in no more than 30 minutes for sure.)

Cool for 10 minutes on wire rack. Remove from pan; cool thoroughly before wrapping.

Frosting
(this is not healthy, but it worked in a pinch for the pumpkin muffins and his birthday cake after supper--I found it on the Internet last night)

1 package of instant pudding mix (I used French vanilla)
1 cup of milk, very cold
1 regular size container of Cool Whip
sprinkles

Mix milk and pudding mix together, till well blended; about 2 minutes. Then, gently mix in Cool Whip. Frost cupcakes and/or cake and refrigerate till ready to serve (though that stuff is not really dairy (!) so don't worry too much about the refrigeration part if you have to transport it). Decorate with sprinkles. I also cut this in half, and it worked fine.

Axel: these shoes are made for walkin'

As I mentioned in a post below, Axel loves to "walk" with our shoes on his hands. Here, I caught him in the act! (Two different pairs of Luka's represented here!)

Bathtime and other musings

Luka and Axel have been taking a lot of baths lately because they are having so much fun with their bath toys. Axel makes his happy noise with all the toys--letters, fish, shovel, pails to pour from, etc.--and loves to play with the shower head that hangs down (when it is off).

Tonight during their bath, Luka had fun saying all the numbers in Spanish, French and English, then saying all the colors that make up the numbers (and mathematical symbols). Then, he told me all the colors in Spanish and English. We got distracted when it got to French,. He is really into counting lately. When I was putting Axel to bed, Luka was in his room counting to 100 (cent) in French.

Luka had a good day at school and took a nap too! Yay!

Axel had a good day with his babysitter, Odette. We are so lucky to have her! I was even able to stop by and get my hair cut after my business meeting was over! I really needed it!

Halloween Fun

Our current nightly ritual for the Halloween season:

After dinner when it is dark enough, we (me) light our Halloween candles (tea lights in metal "bags" that glow through images of witches, pumpkins, ghosts and bats + the candle Luka made at VBS this summer), we (me or Luka) plug in the pumpkin strings of lights hanging from the curtain rods in the living room, we (me or Luka) turn out all other lights, and then we (me) turn on our Halloween music and we (Luka, Mommy, Axel and Papa if he is home) start dancing away! Our current favs on the CD are Monster Mash, Ghost Busters and Time Warp. When we are done, Luka blows out the candles, and we go up stairs to get ready for bed (bath, books, kisses, tickling, etc.).

And a few more...

Pumpkin Patch Fun

Some Recent Pictures

Axel with his soap "hat" in the tub






















Papa, Luka and Axel (hiding his face) at Rocky Mt. National Park (Mills Lake)

Axel: if the shoe fits, wear it!

One of Axel's favorite activities lately is putting (inside) shoes (mine, Luka's, his own, Reynald's) on his hands and then crawling around happily with them. He is very attached to this and gets very mad if you take them away to put them on. So, we try to only wear our shoes when really necessary if he is interested in them! Funny! He just loves parading around with them. Will try to get a photo of it to preserve a shot of this latest exploratation technique.

High Altitude Alert for iPods!

If you have an iPod and you are planning to take it above 10,000 feet (a not uncommon occurrence for many of us here in Colorado), don't do it! Check out this article from a Coloardo Springs TV station where they tested one at over 10,000 feet of altitude and it ruined their player! Regarding their test, they say, in part:

"At first when we turned it on, it seemed to work fine, until we tried to play a song. The i-POD began making a clicking sound and it struggled to play. We later found out that every time it made a clicking sound, it was the [device] reader scratching our hard-drive. At one point it gave us a sad face and then we had a hard time turning the device off. The best advice is not to turn it on when you are above 10,000 feet. The i-POD instructional manual does say there is an altitude limitation. If you do chances are good Apple will not cover it under it's manufactures warranty."

Axel's making progress

Axel has been pulling himself to standing for a few weeks. He is doing it all the time now. About a week ago, I found him standing up in his crib for the first time. Until just the last few days though, he would get "stuck" and not be able to sit down on his own. Last night in the tub and today on "dry land", I noticed that he now can sit down on his own. Go, Axel!

Interesting books: thank a Translator!

The local Colorado translators group of translators to which I belong put on an event at the new Tattered Cover on Colfax in Denver. It was held on International Translator's Day: Sept 30th. The idea is, many books we can read in English have been translated from other languages. So, thank a translator!

Passages from the following books were read in both the original languages and in English. All were very compelling--I encourage you to pick one and read it!

• Poem: The End of the Book (Freg Ikh Bay Mayn Libe Froy) by Moyshe-Leyb Halpern' s in the book Yiddish Poetry, A Bilingual Anthology, University of California Press, Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1986.
• Suite Française by Irène Nemirovsky, translated from the French by Sandra Smith. (I read the English excerpt of this at the presentation and my friend Michèle read the French!) French edition published by Denoël, English edition published by Alfred Knopf. Moving novel about French life during WWII by an author whose manuscript was recently discovered, and who was herself deported and killed by the Nazis. For more about her and her manuscript, go to Book Browse's summary.
• Dom dzienny, dom nocny/House of Day, House of Night, by Olga Tokarczuk, translated from the Polish by Antonia Lloyd-Jones. English Edition ISBN 0810118920; Polish edition ISBN 83-900281-9-0.
• An excerpt from La tregua/The Reawakening by Primo Levi, translated by Stewart Woolf. Read in Italian by David Russi and in English by Dannah Edwards. English ISBN 0684826356). Clever and moving - uplifting although also dealing with the Holocaust.
• Laços de Familia/Family Ties, by Clarice Lispector, translated from the Portuguese by Giovanni Pontiero. Portuguese ISBN: 8532508138, English ISBN: 0292724489.
• Cien años de soledad/One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez, translated from the Spanish by Gregory Rabassa. Various editions of this book are available.
• Die Märchen der Brüder Grimm/Brothers Grimm Fairy Tales by the Brothers Grimm. German ISBN 3-442-00412-8, English ISBN 0553382160 - find it on Amazon. Absolutely hilarious original version of Cinderella (and other tales) before it was sanitized by 20th Century society.

Trash Can Fun

We seem to have fun with trash cans at our house. Luka still likes to say "trash can" in sign language, and Axel has a new trash can game. He sees it as one big container and he loves to put things in it: letters that go to his French fridge Leapfrog letter came (those are not cheap!), baby-safe cars, trucks, combs, and other smallish items. I have to check teh trash carefully before we dump it in the big bag for Monday's trash pick up! For now, I have moved it to the top of the filing cabinet.