The birthday of Thierry!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This morning, after saying, "Happy birthday, Papa!"
my (Malcolm, that is) first question was,
"What are we going to get him?

A Chinchilla?

A fancy dress ferret?"

When Mom's eyes narrowed with disapproval at my suggestions (we'd already had a fight about this the other morning before school, you see), I quickly offered some suggestions of a less exotic sort, "A puppy? A cat?..." Seeing Mom's reaction, I soon lost all hope that Papa was going to be blessed with a new, four-legged friend for his 47th birthday.
Well, I guess I can still hope for a pet for Max's birthday, or Christmas, or our birthday, or maybe Martin Luther King day....

But it really was Papa's birthday as this card (which Papy made and Mamy sent so it would arrive on the right day) proves beyond the shadow of a doubt!

So, Are you wondering what special things Papa got to do on his special day?

Make us lunch and...

...serve us lunch and...

...take us to the park and...

...play Ping-Pong with us and...

...help Henry with his homework which he doesn't like to do...

...(although he will do it with a little persuasion on Papa's and my part)...

... and run to take us to our music classes and...

...and finally, serve us shonpanya
(Note for George Bush: That's the cool French word for champagne.)!
Because, fact is, we did actually make a bigger deal of Papa on the 16th of September than we usually do, because, fact is, he really IS our...

!!!!!!!!!!!!!
So we got him something he - and all of us - likes very much :

Special Algerian Ramadan pastries! And this year we were especially lucky because Papa's birthday fell during Ramadan and, during the Ramadan period, North African pastries are particularly fresh and tasty! Even Max, who is reknowned among picky eaters(He's got a couple years more practice than you, Shea!), likes Ramadan cookies! Especially when he can pretend...

...he's a cigar smokin' kind a guy, like that famous cigar smokin' Latino you see there in the background.

Even our friend Clédo likes Ramadan patisseries (that's the cool French word for pastry), although he would not smile for the picture.

Actually, Clédo smiles a lot. We like him a lot. For any newcomers (or any old-timers with a touch of you know what...the disease we will not name...), Clédo was the baby Mom heard crying once, all those years back, when she'd finally gotten us, her own twin babies to sleep. She ran to the bedroom to see who was crying again and saw Clédo from across the street through the window of his third floor apartment being rocked by his mother! His birthday is on the 12th of March and he's been in Henry's class since second year of kindergarten. In this next series of photos (called Fun with a Bean Bag) you can see why he and Henry get along so well...





He also likes, Fun in a Normal Bag.
And what, you're wondering, was Mom doing all this time?...



... Mom, tel Ferdinand, was sitting at the park, smelling the flowers... and trying to capture a picture of a bee who was also smelling the flowers. She need not have tried so hard since Stella easily got a really good photo of one back in August at
Crime Expo...

...Oups! I guess that's not a bee, it's a common house fly. But, back when we did the blog about Crime Expo, Mom wouldn't let us post this great photo of the fly because it didn't go with her version of our visit...so we decided to sneak it in here, nonobstant her explicit wishes! But, now back to the birthday boy!

Oups! that's not Flash, that's MOI! At least in the foreground, it's MOI. In the background, you see Papa coming home from music lessons with me and Henry. Mom, Max and Stella surprised us at the door with a chorus of "Happy Birthday" and paparazzi photos! (They wouldn't sell for much these days, red eyes and all!) And what other surprises did they have in store for us?

Papa's birthday present! It's not a pet, it's a genuine, four-legged, hand-woven, African Marabout's chair! In this picture, he was hiding in the master bedroom while Max, Mom and Stella waited for us to come home to pop the surprise! He doesn't have a name yet but if you have any suggestions...

Happy Birthday, Papa!