Birthday Weekend

We had a very fatiguing, enervating weekend! But now I feel good, It's winter vacation, now I can breathe easy...

Our daughter Clémentine turned 4 last Friday. We celebrated her big day on the day itself tranquillement, just among us 4. It was just a simple birthday dinner, a 4-course dinner. We had smoked salmon pour l'entrée (for appetizer), the main course was entrecôte steak with mashed carrots & potatoes, Bresse Bleu, Munster and Camembert cheeses for the third course then finally finished with a small birthday cake. Cléms, very excitingly, blew out her "four" birthday candles and opened her cadeaux (presents).



Saturday morning, friends (GGiant's childhood friends) from Paris called up, to tell us that they wanted to come over to give Cléms her presents. Zut!, "I haven't gone to the supermarket yet, the fridge's empty! They should have called up yesterday!" I told the hubby. "Oh, isn't that nice of them to think of our daughter on her birthday?"he answered. Yeah, but I hate situations like this, people calling up at the last minute. "Purée!, I haven't even taken a shower!" I yelled into the phone. Anyway, we had no choice for they insisted, "begged" I guess is the appropriate term, telling us that they'll be having loads of work for the next three weeks and twas preferable to see each other that day. What else can we do? So, I finally rushed to the supermarket (after my shower, of course hehe) and did the grocery shopping earlier than planned.

We asked them to come at around 4 o'clock for the afternoon goûter (snack, merienda, teatime; whatever you want to call it). But they arrived 1 & 1/2 hours late. Mon Dieu! Can you believe that? Ok, fine. Even if these guys happen to be the most farfelu (wacky, no dull moments guaranteed!) persons I've ever met in my whole life, they're just so adorable, so gentil (kindhearted). So even if you wanna get furious, you just can't! And, since they were late and it was no longer time for a goûter, I decided to prepare the dinner instead. Fortunately, I bought a whole chicken, almost 2 kilos in weight. I rubbed it with olive oil, seasoned with salt & pepper, put stalks of rosemary, put it in the oven and basta! I also prepared tomato & mozzarella salad, avec (with) lots of European basil et voilà!

We started with apéros (cocktail drinks and aperitifs) and finished the dinner with another birthday cake. For the second time, our daughter blew out the candles and thanked them for the presents. Oh, It was already quarter past one in the morning when we wished them, "bonne nuit" (good night).



Sunday, as planned, as what we really planned...the relatives, coming over to celebrate with us our daughter's birthday. Again? Yes, we invited them the week before. So as early as 3 o'clock in the afternoon, everybody was present. Hehe, at least they were punctual eh?

Ok, we started with coffee, that took a bit long for there were ones who had two to three servings. And at around 5 o'clock, our daughter blew out her birthday candles and received her gifts...for the third time. Glasses of champagne were served with the cake.

Since not everyone's on vacation and that there were still some who would be working early the day after, I chose not to delay things. Alright, I gave them time to catch their breath after this sumptuous gâteau (cake) and served the apéros at around seven. But this time it took really looong. We only started the dinner at about half past nine. Heureusement (Fortunately), the hubby had convinced me for a spaghetti carbonara and pizza dinner. Simple and easy to prepare. He did all the cooking. He cooked the carbonara sauce and prepared the pizzas early in the morning. So we just had to boil the water for the noodles and put the pizzas in the oven. Just the same, it was almost midnight when everybody decided to get up from their seats to finally go home.



Whew! That was one long, exhausting, "caloric" weekend! (Thanks Ting Aling! ^_^) I've been too lazy to exercise lately, no wonder why I suddenly feel motivated...