Sainte Catherine

If you look at a calendar in France you will first notice that it starts with Mondays (I'm confused and get dates wrong here as I am still not used to starting with Sundays!) and then you might realize that on every day is written the name of a saint. That's why the first thing people do when they're looking for a name for their baby is to go through the calendar. I remember doing that with my family for my brother. Some people actually name their kids according to the day they were born. It can get tricky sometimes. Take my birthday for example. November 1st is not one saint in particular, it's "All Saints Day" and I know someone whose name is All Saints (Toussaint) because he was born on that day. I don't know what he would have been named had he been born the following day, which is the day of the dead (he would have had to be named "Deceased").

Anyway, if you don't have a calendar, you can also watch the weather guy, he tells you who is to be celebrated the next day. You're supposed to celebrate everyone named after the saint of the day. It's not a big celebration, merely an acknowledgement that it's his or her day that day, that it is his or her "fête." For example, Sainte Julie is April 8th. So, if you see a Julie (or a Julia) on April 8th you're supposed to tell her : "Bonne fête Julia!" And now you know why I am always so confused when I hear french speaking people here say "Bonne fête" for birthdays (the greeting for birthdays in France is "Joyeux Anniversaire"). When people ask me when my fête is I always want to say November 25th. People usually know when their fête is but not necessarily anyone else's. Well, we know Noel, of course. Sainte Catherine is actually well-known too because of the tradition associated to it, called the Catherinettes. If you're 25 or older and still single you go out wearing a hat. So, last year, when the school said they were celebrating Sainte Catherine, I was confused (I get confused a lot here!). But Julia told me what is was. They celebrate Marguerite Bourgeois, who emigrated to Canada from France to help the colonies back in the 1600s. She was the first teacher of what became Montreal. To celebrate Sainte Catherine on November 25th she would make a special candy, called taffy (tire in French) with her students (maybe she didn't like hats). At school Julia is told that this Marguerite invented that special candy in order to attract the natives to the school but I'm not sure that this is accurate. French were at war with the Aroquois, but I did find that she had 2 native students at one point. Anyway, now at the school, they celebrate by pretending to be in the 1600s, dressing as teachers or as native americans and eating tire.



This year, since Keld could stay home with the boys and since I'm so good at cooking and baking, I volunteered to go help make "tire" for the students. It's mainly made with molasses, corn syrup, vinegar, water. Yep, it's sweet.

You mix it all, boil it and then you pull (in French, you "tire")

After that you cut it into small pieces and wrap them.

You can put them all into one big piece too. 

No chocolate, but still, I had a good time on my fête!

First Snow

Because we are at Special's I don't get to do the first steps in the snow (Marley's too early for me :). And because of the park there wasn't enough room for me to make an angel (I'm too big and I had to save the snow from the driveway for our snowman). So, I'm sorry, there won't be any pictures of me enjoying the snow this time. I know, you're disappointed. And on top of it all, no pictures of Zack in the snow either. I didn't want him to get snow in his infected eyes (not sure it would make a difference though) so Keld stayed with him inside, which means no pictures of Keld either (you wouldn't recognize him anyway, his migraine is really making him look terrible). Anyway, here are the pictures of Kelden, Julia and the snowman.

We're never having a snowman competition with Linda! She's too good.

And we're not competing with Grandpa Bruce either :)

Kelden wanted to put his carrot too. He was really sad when he saw a bird taking it.

Here's another picture of Kelden. 

I'm not sure what he thought of the snow. But he tried it more than he wants to try his vegetables. I kept asking if he liked it and this is the answer:

 

More Family Pictures

I have a hard time convincing the kids and especially their dad to take family pictures. One thing that works pretty well with Kelden is the timer. He loves how Keld has to rush back to be on time and he likes to see the results. What motivates Julia is the smiling contest, which she wins every time, or so she says. But I have yet to find something to motivate Keld...
Anyway, since I don't have anything special to post, here are some of our family pictures.

It might look like Keld is having fun, but trust me, he is not. He had fun doing the ones with the mac though.

We did get some OK pictures, like the one I posted earlier.

Any favorites?

The Kids

Zack is 7 months today. He weighed 19 pounds 11 ounces last week. We didn't measure him, but he's probably about 28- 29 inches. He still can't sit on his own or crawl, he just rolls over everywhere. He is learning to eat more solids and for some reason sweet stuff is more easily swallowed than the rest...Nights are approximately 8.30 pm to 5am.

Kelden is now 3. Approximately 39 inches for over 33 pounds. Still screams more than I would like during the day, still loves his brother to death, still hates eating healthy food (his brother must take after him). He also still wakes up at night (he was doing better, but Halloween and scary toys brought the habit back). He now speaks in better sentences in French and is expanding his English vocabulary (but he is still far from being fluent. To the question "How old are you?" he will answer "Tchou tchou" :)

Julia is our 5 year old princess. Keld has been telling her that she can't have any more birthdays and has to stay our little girl forever. She hates it when he says that because she really wants to go to grade 1, which surprises me since she cries almost every day when we put her on the bus. She does love to learn at school though. She can read quite a few things already and is starting to count. She can add now, but only up to ten (if hands had more fingers she would do  more!)

And to end this post, some family pictures.

Kelden's birthday

Unlike Julia, Kelden wasn't impatiently waiting for his birthday; I don't think he had any clue it was coming. And I don't think he realized it was there when he got up and saw this.

At least, he didn't look impressed at all.

Julia, on the other hand, was pretty happy to help. As seen in the previous post, she loves opening presents.

Kelden was even encouraging her to play first. I wonder if he thought we had jinxed his present or something.
But he got into it, on time to like it enough not to want to go to church.

I had to put a picture of Zack somewhere.

Anyway, after church and a baptism, we went to Special's for cake. We had to wait for the birthday boy to finish his nap (he often naps in the truck as he falls asleep on the way home).

As you can see, Special made a cake that went along with the train theme. She actually also offered him a Thomas the train that is supposed to move when you blow the whistle. Supposed to, but unfortunately it didn't work. Kelden likes it anyway.
At Special's, Kelden liked to open the presents.

He was very happy with all he got.

I tried to take a picture of him with his new clothes but he won't let me take him by himself.

Yep, I had to put another picture of Zack :)

Voila. Our birthday week is over (although we do have a niece turning 4 tomorrow). I need to thank Mom for all the cakes. It really must have been a whole birthday cake week for her. Now she can work on something else! I also want to thank the Little Scotts for always celebrating with us, it really makes it a party with them!

Jordan asked me how it is to feel old. I don't feel that much older yet. I think next year might be different (turning 35, closer to 40 than 30, closer to not having babies any more, etc.).
It will probably be the same with Julia and Kelden. She will be in grade 1 and he will be going to school...