Thursday, March 13, 2008

My Birthday Celebration

Just to let y'all know. I had a great birthday. Kalem finally let me
go out in public! He took me to dinner very near to Republic Square
to a restaurant frequented by American's. It is called Square One.
We dined on onion rings, chicken Caesar salad, and tagiatelli Alfredo
with chicken and mushrooms...I mean it was no Macaroni Grill, and for
surely not Palintino's but not bad attempt at American Fare. We
walked around the square and found a book store that sells Russian,
Armenia and AMERICAN books. We bought a little paperback of Wind in
The Willows, by Kenneth Grahame (born in SCOTLAND...Diller's is there
a memorial to him there?) We have been at a loss as of late since we
only brought one "chapter book" to read together as a family (the rest
are homeschooling and great books I have had for 20 years and not yet
cracked). On Sunday we finished reading Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang (of
which Frankie calls it, CHITTY-BITTY-BANG-BANG) by Ian Flemming (I had
no idea this was the final book of the legendary JAMES BOND author, in
fact he died BEFORE it was printed.) Another side note, the book, as
always, is Very different from the movie, of which I STILL AM SCARED
OF THAT BLACK CLAD CHILD-CATCHER!!! It was so fun to read this to the
kids. Of course I had to read it in my very best English dialect,
Thank you JANE SEYMOUR! All that to say we were done with the book
and bed time was a little sad without the adventures of the Cracctacus
Pott Family. So a new book for our family reading time...all of us
piled into our bed (I HAVE to blog about our BED sometime!!!)
listening so intently to the twists and turns and if I have learned
one thing from the countless Bible Missionary Stories from KNAR
GUEKGUEZIAN, at VBS is you have to stop each night at the most "Cliff-
hangery" place possible. When I stop the kids, and Kalem erupt into a
chorus of, "Noooooooooo, read more Mommy Pleeeeeas!" I love that
part! So, back to my birthday. We went back to our relatives house,
where Jude, Pete & Franko were and the whole family had assembled
around one of NANA'S FAMOUS CAKES!!! Each one is a masterpiece, a
unique work of art. It was HUGE, vanilla cake with a layer of
delicious pudding cream and a layer of MARANGE...I don't know how they
do this but it is crunchy and light, and another layer of cake on
top. The coolest thing is that we have available to us a myriad of
amazing pyrotechnics available for common household uses
like,,,,,CANDLES!!!! The Sparkler SHOWER ON TOP of my Cake was just
like the 4th of July (perhaps the shower was so large because of my
advanced years???!!!! I will have to look into this also! Needless
to say it was an amazing display of dessert goodness! And our
relatives bought me very cool drinking glasses, like theirs, with
oranges all over them. Our other cousins, Vram & Jemma (more on them
later...they are OUR ARMENIAN TEACHERS too) bought me gorgeous
demitasse, Armenian Coffee cups. So beautiful and generous of them
all. BUT the BEST GIFT was a BEAUTIFUL, HUGE, LUSCIOUS, GREEN CALA-
LILLY from MY SISTER KIMMY from FRESNO!!!!!! She's got more
connections than the mafia! (and I should know!) She and her boss,
Lily arranged for Lily's sister-in-law in Armenia to get this amazing
plant to my front door! I was blown away by their love and ingenuity
to make my Armenian birthday so 38-SPECIAL! Thank you LILY & QIM!!!!
Thank you all for your wonderful gifts, calls, emails & faxes!!!! It
truly was a special birthday, I will place it at #11 on my list...A
note to you all...Diller has NOT been DISPLACED from his birthday
giving Throne! : ) Love you all, Jonelle!

5 comments:

Kendra Fletcher said...

Oh, no kidding! That creepy child-catcher haunted me for years. But THIS may have been worse:


http://branthansen.typepad.com/letters_from_kamp_krusty/2008/03/mission-accompl.html

Kazarian Family said...

Oh, my goodness. I was peeing my pants reading that Letters from Kamp Krusty!!!! A Thief in The NighT did scare the Bageebees out of me. Literally, I came home from school one day in the 6th or 7th grade and no one was home and either the radio was on or the tv and I thought..."for reals, I wasn't good enough and God didn't take me to heaven." I remember actually crying when my mom came in and telling her everything. I know I didn't cry when Philip came in because if I was left then FOR SURE he would be too!
Thanks for the SCARY Memories KENJ!

Anthony said...

I cannot remember if I ever took note that your birthday was so close to mine. I just turned 40, as in the big FOUR O, on the 12th.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JONELLE!!

Janet said...

Hope that you had a wonderful day Jonelle!!! And a Great Happy Birthday Week!!
Sure sounds like you did!!
We are right behind you all in the kids and church blog and kids sitting and learning! We do not "bring" thing to keep them occupied. They have their bibles. They might have a piece of paper in their bibles - but that is it. They are welcome to do the pastor's outline with us if they choose! But..........2 HOURS..I think my hubby might even ask that grandma for some fishies!!! You have your children trained well!! Let the nosey-roseies go & play with their toothbrushes!

C-ya!!
Hugs & Blessings & Prayers from the Kiessling family from fresno, California

Janet said...

One more thing - Jonelle, Could you please pray for this Homeschool problem here in California? It all started with a family that was getting a divorce - there were kids involved that were being homeschooled. One parent wanted them homeschooled - the other didn't. It has gotten really ugly. If it doesn't get resolved - it will be illegal to homeschool in California. Supposedly our school is safe because we have a teacher that over sees the kids work.
Just please pray that this BIG MESS gets resolved - the right way and with God's WILL!!

Thank you so much! Janet Kiessling