Groundhog Day or Candlemas?

February 2nd was not only Jordie's birthday, it was also Groundhog Day and Candlemas. I had never heard of Groundhog Day before coming to Canada, but Candlemas is a lot more familiar to me. It's a nice tradition (and yes, by nice I mean it involves food) that people celebrate for religious reasons, or, if they're like me, just for fun. In France, most people celebrate it by making crêpes. There are a series of steps to take to ensure prosperity for your family during the year (like putting the first crêpe on top of a cupboard and leave it all year round, flipping the crêpes with gold in your hands, etc.) I don't do any of that, I just enjoy eating crêpes with my little helpers.

Kelden got to use the mixer to make the dough (he was a bit disappointed that there were no chocolate chips around, but compensated by the Nutella he put on his crêpes later)

Julia wanted to help, but it was a bit hard for 3 people to use the mixer at the same time, so she got to do the dishes:

And no, she's not my slave, she is enjoying herself.  When everything was ready, I flipped the crêpes (or tried to):

I did find a weather connection between Groundhog day and Candlemas. A crêpe is a nice yellow circle:

It symbolizes the return of the sun, which will be sooner or later, depending on what the groundhog has to say...

Happy Birthday Jordie!!!

Well, we wish we were celebrating with Jordie! But we're thinking of him and hope he has a great birthday without us.
Here's Julia's song for you Jordie:

All I have to say is that, for 5 years now, Jordie has been the best nephew ever!!!! Maybe this year will bring some him competition...

What To Do On A Sunday Morning?

While I was trying to do Julia's hair, wishing Ashley lived in our basement, Kelden was trying to keep himself busy. He first tried to play with the toilet bowl:

Then, with the garbage:

Realizing that I wasn't too pleased with that type of activities, he decided to try something else and this is what happened:

He got the stool from the bathroom, the mixer from the cupboard and the measuring cup from the drawer. He probably thought that I couldn't get mad at him for doing something that I quite frequently do myself for his dad...cookies. He was pretty proud:

A good thing the chocolate chips are out of reach!!

Big Balloon

Julia has found me a new nickname: Big Balloon. It's not hard to understand why:

And I'm only on week 29 (out of 40). Unfortunately for me, it doesn't look like it's all due to pregnancy. If I suck it in, like this:

I still can look like I used to for the other two.

This was for Kelden at almost week 28 and this is for Julia a little bit after week 28:

I guess I will have to exercise a bit this summer...because I'm obviously not giving up chocolate!

Kelden, the new Ken

Today, Julia doesn't have school, so we have to play with her toys the "normal" way. Because, usually, this is how Kelden uses her toys:

Looks like I'm not the only one who can't claim to be as slim as Barbie!

A Post for Aunt Emmy or A Cry For Help

January 6th, the Epiphany, is the day of the Kings or Wise Men. In France, we celebrate this day with a nice tradition. You eat a special cake (I told you it was a nice tradition) inside which is a special object, called santon. The person who gets the piece of cake with the santon is the King or Queen (and that person has to bake the next cake and it goes on and on, very nice tradition indeed).

Anyway, the special cake is supposed to be a galette, but since there's no chocolate in galettes, I always make a chocolate cake instead. This year (like every year I suppose) I left the decorating part to Keld. And here is what we got:




I admit I probably would have done worse. Now, we hope that Aunt Emmy can see how much she is needed in Timmins! It's true, Mom has been taking classes on decorating cakes, but still, if you ever want to move, Emmy, we'll have work for you!

Think I Can Do This?

I always send my family tons of pictures every week by email but I never really explain to them the context behind them. So I thought I would start a blog because I like how my American sisters put comments with their pictures on their blogs. (I don't think I can do it as well as they do, but I'll do my best).


I thought maybe my English speaking side of the family might be jealous if I only had a French blog, so here is the English version. I don't know if you will be interested, I'll see with the number of comments, but I already have two fans!