Geburtstag für Joey

Today is Joey's true birthday, and to celebrate I'd thought about spending our morning together doing something he'd especially like: maybe a trip to the zoo, or feeding the ducks.  But here's the thing about Joey: he's a really easy-going kid, and he's pretty content no matter where we go, especially if he gets to hear a story en route.  So when Susannah suggested taking a trip to the Lindt Factory Store, about four miles south of us on the shore of Lake Zürich, I figured Joey would just as soon go there as anywhere.  And he was, indeed, as happy as a kid in a candy store.

Unfortunately I didn't have much money
left after my purchases. There are no deals
to be had at the Farmer's Market. That's an
$80 pine arrangement.

Unfortunately, while we were downtown, biding our time waiting for Susannah and our bus, I realized that, in a classic Cheryl move, I'd forgotten my wallet at home. Our bus stop was right next to the Tuesday Farmers Market in Bürkliplatz, and I noticed my mistake when I went to pay for some grapes that Joey had grabbed.  But my wallet, when it actually is in its proper place, has a broken clasp, so at any given time I have about $15 in coins floating around in the bottom of my bag.  Plenty for Joey's bunch of grapes, and some fresh-squeezed grape juice, as well. (It's even better than the fresh-squeezed apple cider. It might even rival fresh-squeezed milk.)

A group of school children, touring the market. Their
teacher gave each child a purchasing assignment, perhaps
for a group picnic later.  

Joey eyes some of the chestnuts that are suddenly ubiquitous.
Last week, hot chestnut stands popped up all over Zürich. I
dearly wish I enjoyed chestnuts: there's something so precious
about the idea of purchasing a cone of them. But they're not for me.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas. Right on schedule,
the day after Halloween, they were hanging the Christmas
lights on the Lindt Factory, and I also noticed that
they'd just started stringing up the lights spanning the
streets in downtown Zürich.

I was glad to get those grapes for Joey: so far this morning he'd eaten a Twix bar and two caramels for breakfast, and he had hung his little bag of Halloween candy on the stroller next to him for easy access. He wouldn't let it out of his sight. But perhaps that's what made him content to just browse, once we got to the Lindt factory store.

The factory set up a special Christmas warehouse, and Susannah says they did the same thing for Easter.

And some of the chocolates were oddly reminiscent of Easter.   (These was
Susannah's favorites.)  Oh, no no, those aren't chocolate bunnies...
they're  clearly reindeers! See? They have antlers!

Joey ran around the store happily, looking but not touching, but cooing at all the "Christmas Clauses" and teddy bears. The poor little guy finally got a sweet when we left the store: they had a basket with some tiny chocolate heart samples. When I handed one to Joey, he cried out "Ya-hoo! A chocolate heart!"  And gobbled it up.

A very timely package arrived today! A book

and a new monkey league uniform arrived from

Joey's dear friend Kael ("Ya-hoo!"), while Dennis 

and I got some of our favorite chocolates (Theo...

yum!  and as Brie and Geoff, put it, enough chips to 

bake cookies for all of Switzerland. Whee! 

Thanks, guys!!  

Thanks to Susannah's clever guidance, I now know exactly what everyone is getting for Christmas this year...if I can only remember my money.

Playing "catch me" with big brother on the way home

After lunch, I had still another errand to run, a birthday gift for one of Alex's friends.  But Joey still didn't seem to mind the chores: toy stores are hardly tedious, after all, particularly Swiss toy stores. And he certainly didn't mind stopping at Starbucks on the way home. I figured, given the day's gluttony, what was one more donut for Joey. And I decided I deserved a birth day mocha, cashing in, still, on that full two hours and fifteen minutes of labor, three years ago.

We rounded out the afternoon with a little cupcake baking, and after dinner we sang "Happy Birthday" to our three year old one last time.  (Joey's new best joke is holding up two fingers, or four, or five, with a cheeky smile, whenever we ask him how old he is now.)

Opening gifts from home, with supervision from big brother.

Sometimes wrapping paper can be tricky,
so we decided Joey is old enough for
scissors, now.

Joey had almost fallen asleep in his chair during dinner, but magically revived when it came time for cake and presents.  The kids were really excited to give Joey their presents: Alex gave Joey his carefully hoarded motorcycle, and Ella had added the Plants vs. Zombies board game she made months ago to the enormous pile of gifts she'd accumulated for her baby brother.

And Joey was appropriately grateful for everything, calling out his word of the day. "Yay, presents! Ya-hoo!"