It's my birthday in Paris

I turned what... 2009-1971. That's how I have to figure out how old I am. I think after you're like 25, you start to forget your age until you hit a big round number like 30, 40, 50, etc. 65 is another biggie or is it 67 now for social security or retirement? Anyway so today I turned 38. Two more years til the big four oh. It's the end of the day in Paris. John is putting the kids to sleep. I got a voicemail from my sister with her singing happy birthday and an email. Also got an email from my brother and chatted with him last night. I'm signing on to Instant Messenger to see if my dad remembers but he's not online. Birthdays was my mom's thing. I miss her calling me up to wish me Happy Birthday. Oh, just checked my hotmail and there's a birthday message from my dad. Hooray!

John took me and the kids to a nice restaurant nearby for lunch.

You can see where we were sitting, right by the door. I'm not a fan of eating outside because of the cars driving by and the great view of the garbage cans. Some of the restaurants are a little farther from the street, so we might eat outside then. Asia also isn't a fan of eating outside. Unless it's specifically a picnic in a grassy area.

The place was called Maison Chardenoux. Here's a pic of some of the menu:

Here's Zach playing on John's cell phone. He now officially calls it WT - Waste Time. He'll signal a W and then a T with his fingers, meaning, "Dad, can I waste time?" It keeps him quiet at the restaurants. The appetizer here is the muskmelon balls, sauternes jelly and basil sorbet. It was really good. The basil sorbet was in this little shot glass and Asia eventually drank it all up.

This is the foie gras - duck liver with fig chutney. Very smooth and silky.
Another great appetizer was the panned squid with Espelette pimiento. The squid was fresh and not rubbery at all.

This is one of the main dishes - Casseroled codfish with fresh peas and country bacon. The country bacon was more like stewed ham and was really good.

This is the other main dish - stewed pork with potato puree.

After dinner we went to two parks that the kids don't go to as often. There was a group of Asia women there with there kids. They were speaking Mandarin and maybe Taiwanese. I couldn't always catch what they were saying, but one lady there was really animated and somewhat loud. I could tell that she was quite a character in a good way. Someone who'd keep you laughing and entertained. Afterwards, we went home. The kids played a little computer and I read. It was nice and relaxing. Asia even decided to do the dishes, though she used the hand soap instead of the dish soap. And she wiped down the counters.

The kids started to get bored, so we decided to do some painting. John had bought all these canvasses and paints in a Toronto dollar store thinking that he'd take the kids to the Eiffel tower area and other scenic areas so they could paint what they saw, but he confessed to me later that he wasn't sure how to even get them started if he did take them out to paint. I was the one who usually did craft stuff with the kids. Unfortunately, Asia got frustrated with her paintings and went into a crying fit. I explained to her that you could let the paint dry and then paint over it, but she didn't want to wait for the paint to dry. Plus I think she was hungry so she couldn't cooperate. You can see Zach's 2 paintings on this side - one of a snow-capped mountain and the other of a bug. The picture on the bottom is one I did of the view from the balcony.

Eventually Asia got out of her funk when John came back from the store and I asked her to go help her dad get the birthday dinner ready. Asia loves to help with things like that - decorating, setting the table, etc. She had made me a card earlier and it took her quite an effort to save it til lunchtime for me to read. She kept handing it to me earlier saying that I could read it now or at the restaurant but that it would be better if I waited til the restaurant.

John took this picture of the birthday dinner and cake. Great picture, n'est-ce pas?