Joseph turns 37!

Okay, maybe you can sense my exhaustion by now with birthday and baking fever.  I didn't give up though.  Instead, I saved the best culinary birthday creation for last: the three layered German Chocolate Cake with the caramel, pecan coconut frosting.  It is quite a feat to put this together but it is so good.  I don't have any pictures with candles and Joseph because I had to cut it before he got home.  He had a meeting on his birthday and then was home for a brief minute before a youth activity (he is in the Young Men's Presidency.)  Now he gets to take Abigail with him, yea.  So we sang to an absentee daddy and had some cake with the kids before he came home.  Kind of strange, I know.  

Magdalene turns 10!

 Magdalene helped make this lemon cake and decorated it herself.  She really wanted a candle that said "10" this year.  Just like her Mama, she loves herbs and carefully picked some mint herbs to put on her cake.  Her friend in our neighborhood and in our ward, Lily, came over to celebrate with us.  

 Magdalene is all smiles on her birthday.

This picture turned out a little dark, but it is a picture of Magdalene and her two closest friends at school.  I took them all to Subway for lunch at the school on her birthday.  It was free dress and Magdalene wanted to wear her new shirt/dress from India that she got for her birthday.  

Abigail turns 12!

This is the birthday blitz on my blog. We sure have a lot of birthdays to celebrate in a 6 weeks period.  Abigail had a big birthday, turning 12 and entering the Young Women's program in our church.  Unfortunately, she was sick on her birthday.  She stayed home from school and mostly read on the couch and took a nap.  Now that she is 12, her life has sure become busier.  She is in Middle School which entails more homework and coordinating.  She still plays the cello, in advanced strings at school with weekly lessons, and loves to go to climbing club after school.  She recently made the select soccer team at school and with practices twice a week and games against other international schools here in Singapore throughout the next few months, she is one busy girl.

She wanted carrot cake for her birthday.  Yummy.

 Juliet is a little bit into candles, especially lit candles.  She did this herself to her piece of cake and wanted us to light them.

 Always a crowd around the birthday girl when the presents come out.

 Abigail and her good friend Caitlyn, from New Zealand.  She is in our ward and lives down the street from us.

 Ella enjoyed wrapping herself us in all the wrapping scraps.

I took Abigail and her friends out to lunch at the High School Subway for her birthday.  I had a fun time getting to know her friends and seeing how much fun they have together.  (It was Chinese New Year celebration that day so some of the girls dressed up for it,)

Juliet turns 2!

Christmas festivities are barely over before it is time to wrap some more presents and bake another treat--a birthday cake for little Juliet.  Every Christmas, I can't help but remember how close she was to being a Christmas baby and how difficult that  Christmas day was before she came into our lives.  She was excited about her birthday and all the attention.  The 26th being a holiday, we decided to go to the Jurong Bird Park since we haven't been there yet.  We stayed until it got unbearably crowded and saw most of it.  Lots lots of birds, especially exotic and colorful ones.  

Later that evening we had hot dogs and watermelon, her two current favorite foods.  Juliet was fascinated with her cake, especially sticking her finger into the chocolate frosting and getting "tasties."

She got a bubble machine for her birthday.  Such a fun girl.


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Rambutan

A delicious Southeast Asian fruit we have discovered out here.  And it grows on a huge tree from the neighbor's yard that hangs into our backyard.  These are some I gathered this morning.  When you peel off the outer red skin, you get a fruit the size of a cherry with a seed that tastes like a grape married a pear.  Delicious.  

Chinese New Year

Another Chinese New Year descends upon us in Singapore.  Our 5th and year of the dragon.  The most notable thing is the changes at the grocery store.  Part of tradition is that you get all your shopping and cutting done before the lunar new year, then during the 3 day holiday you serve your family and friends food.  The first year I was here, I was baffled at the crowds and the changes in traffic patterns.  Now I got it all down.  I know what I have to brave to get some groceries.


The day before Chinese New Year, waiting in line.

The day after Chinese New Year holiday, taken from roughly the same spot.

Christmas 2011

Our 5th Christmas in Singapore continued with the same traditions that we have enjoyed over these past years in our home away from home.

Making sugar cookies with Bruschke cousins.

Eating ice cream on Orchard Road as we enjoyed all the lights and decorations.

 Purple people eaters.  Joseph thought we looked alike,  I think it is more the purple shirts though.

 One of the many decorated elephants that were along the main road, Orchard Road, in downtown Singapore.

 Christmas Eve we again enjoyed a Bethlehem dinner with lamb, pita and hummus, goat cheese, grapes, pomegranate seeds, fava bean salad, olive relish and barley soup.  It was deliciousness.

 Lots of smiles and happy kids on Christmas morning.

 What a two year old does when no one is looking, which happens to be a lot of the time in a household as busy as ours.

 An afternoon Christmas walk.  Maggie is enjoying her new camera that she got for Christmas.

 Dinner with the Bruschkes finished our Christmas festivities.