Six Year Old Whirlwind!

Congratulations to us, we have survived six years!!

Noah insisted on making his own birthday cake this year.

In true Noah fashion, he decided to "invent" his own recipe for it. It was a chocolate cinnamon cake, which he gave the working title of "Rafistolage" (sort of like "patching up").

His final name for it is "Gateau Cinnamonté". (Cinnamon is really "cannelle" in French, but isn't "cinnamonté" much cuter than "cannellé"?)

Those hieroglyphics on the right hand side spell out Noah. When you're just learning cursive, and just learning to decorate cakes, combining the two might be a bit of a lofty goal.

We had our friends over for cake and ice cream with us, and Noah was thrilled with his presents, particularly the tractor and the construction machine.



Frédéric, Benjamin, and Noah also went out to see the Lego movie earlier this week as part of Noah's birthday celebration.

February Vacation

Since the boys went skiing over Christmas, there was no traveling during February vacation this year.

Instead, Noah baked another original creation...

Benjamin and Frédéric built a model airplane ....

 

Noah lost his first tooth, so got a visit from the little mouse / Tooth Fairy / Mommy (depending on who you ask)....

And Noah stole my camera one morning and took his first selfie. (When I was his age, that word hadn't even been invented yet.)

 

Slavedrivers Strike Again

Click to see a larger version

Benjamin decided that losing teeth wasn't working out well as a get-rich-quick scheme. So when I suggested he could do some chores around the house to earn money, he jumped at the chance. He was on my case for several days until I came up with a good chore chart. In the meantime, he made a list of things he thought he could do for us around the house.

His list included (please don't mind all the spelling errors):

• installé la table
• garder ma chambre propre
• brosser mes dents sens qu'elle me le dise de le fair
• me coucher sâgement
• aider les autre personne dans la maison
• faire moins d'ordinateur
• regarder moins de télé
• ranger la table
• ranger la cuisine
• nettoyer les vitrine
• ameliorer la maison pour aider mes parents à aller plus vite
• ouvrir volets

(set the table, keep my room clean, brush my teeth without her telling me to, go to bed nicely, help the other people in the house, do less computer, watch less TV, clear the table, clean the kitchen, clean the windows, improve the house to help my parents go faster, open the shutters)

The "improve the house" one refers to furniture placement, painting, any type of home decorating. He loves to watch Househunters-type shows and makes (hilarious) comments on house prices, how a home is decorated, whether he would buy it or not and why.

Click to see a larger version

Not to be outdone, of course, Noah made up his own list, which included:

• essuié la table
• rangé la meson
• fabricé des armes
• instale la table
• ouvrir las vole

(wipe the table, clean the house, make weapons (????!!!!), set the table, open the shutters).

(I informed Noah that under no circumstances would I be paying him to make weapons...)

Later, they added notes to their lists about what they thought would be fair payment for each chore. Benjamin's scale ranged from 5 cents to 20 cents per task. Noah's ranged from 24 € (setting the table) to 100 € (opening the shutters).

Not being oil sheiks or having won the lottery lately, we decided to align ourselves with Benjamin's suggestions rather than Noah's.

Noah's First Written Recipe

Noah whipped up these tasty chocolate chip muffins without ANY adult input. He decided on all the ingredients (and we're thankful he decided that 2 tablespoons of salt would be a little too much), and chose his oven temperature.

Frédéric and Noah brought some to one of our neighbors, who couldn't believe he had made them all by himself. But he did, he did.

And this time, we finally wrote down the recipe! (Well, as best as he and Frédéric could remember, anyway...) So maybe they can be replicated at some point.

If he can do this at 5 1/2, does that mean we'll see him on Master Chef in a few years?

Chocolate Dirt

No one has ever said Noah's mind works just like that of everyone else.

During our Thanksgiving trip, he licked one of the picnic tables in front of the dining hall. It was covered in dirt. I didn't witness this, but someone else did, and told me about it.

Later, I asked him about it...

Me: Why did you do that?
Noah: Because I thought it was chocolate cake.
Me: Was that a disappointment to you?
Noah: No, because it was very delicious!!