And Christmas is still to come!!
The day of Ale's birthday I excitedly picked up the kids from school and told them that they would be helping me make Ale's cake. They very diligently helped me hand mix the batter, eggs, butter, dust the pan, and finally it was time to start preheating the oven. About a minute after we turned the oven on, the electricity went out in the apartment! I called Fede (who was out studying) and he told me to go ask our doorman (Reyes) for help. Reyes is a class act --a real gentleman who has already helped us out of other binds (like when we locked ourselves out!), so he gladly came up.
Turns out, it was the oven that was causing the problem. Every time we turned it on, the breaker would flip and out would go the lights. Poor Reyes, he took the whole oven out, unscrewed, tightend everything to no avail..finally Fede came home and still nothing. By this point, we needed to move to a Plan B because it was already well-past dinner time and I had not made dinner or baked the cake!
So I ran to the store and bought a little cake, stuck some candy on it and a candle....(sigh)...a far cry from my fondant creations in Houston I dare say, but to Ale it was still a birthday cake and she was happy!
And what happened to the cake batter you may wonder? I certainly did not throw it out ("waste not, want not!"). Instead, I funneled it into an empty milk bottle and took it across town with me to my friend's apartment (Leah) who very graciously baked it for me and so Alejandra's original cake became Fede's birthday cake! haha.
I know what you're thinking, the cakes look the same...but I promise, this one is the homemade cake! For dinner, I tried for the second time to make Paella and I have to conclude that I do not possess the gift of making good Paella...from now on, I'm just going to buy it from some place.
Aside from the excitement of birthdays, I have another (almost equally) exciting tidbit: I found a way to dry clothes without the awful stiffness that characterized all of my laundry! Yes, I have a newfound appreciation for fabric softener (or at least the abuse of it, because I'm pretty sure I'm not following the directions right). I did an experiment on Monday: I washed 5 towels, 3 I took out of the washer like usual and put them to dry on the rack; two I soaked in a good concentration of water to fabric softener for 15 minutes in the kitchen sink, then I simply drained the water (no thorough rinse or anything) and put it in the spin cycle and then put it on the drying rack. To my utter amazement and almost delerious joy, I found that the treated towels were SOFT. I mean, like no stiffness at ALL!
I knew it. I mean, all this time, I kept telling myself that if the Spaniards managed to do their laundry without a dryer, why in heaven's name was I so desperately in need of my American dryer? So fabric softener is indeed the key here and I'm sticking to it, goodbye high electricity bills and appliances, I'm going Old World!
Yesterday I got a call from the kids' school while I was grocery shopping, turned out that a 3 yr old kid poked Antonio in the eye! It was an accident but poor Antonio's eye started to swell and he was crying, perhaps a little hysterical, so I ended up picking him up from school early. I still can't make sense of it because he says that the little kid that poked his eye is named "Tom Thumb" --could this be? Then I found out from the kid's teacher that he's Asian....which makes me wonder if his name is "Tom-tom" or something and Antonio just thinks it's like the storybook? After all, this is coming from a kid who called his previous school (St Elizabeth Ann Seton) "Sally and Seton"!
This brings me to another interesting aspect of life in Madrid: there is a pretty sizeable Chinese population here! I know! Who'd a thunk? Turns out that the Chinese have a monopoly on all of the "dollar stores" here. Many blocks (ours included) have a "Chino" on the corner, which is one of these Chinese-owned and run shops. They carry everything from cheap toys, tupperware, school supplies, clothes (yes, made in China), to picture frames, hardware, plants, and most household items. They are not a euro though... but it is fascinating to hear Chinese people speaking in Spanish! (coming from the U.S. it's kind of a hard concept to grasp, since I'm used to hearing them speak in English). But this population has done really well in Spain, especially because they are of the few places who are open for business on Sundays!
The weather was great today, rather mild compared to the cold and wind that we've had all week. This evening we took a nice walk down Serrano street, which is one of the glitzy commercial streets of Madrid. Everything was decked out for the Holidays and a rather lovely sight to behold. It also happend to be "Constitution Day" today --which I suppose is like our 4th of July in the sense that it's the Nation's feast day, so the kids didn't have school and everyone was out and about. It's great to just see so many people out walking.
As you can see, I am ending the post with this picture of Francisco. He is wearing Antonio's rubber boots...in fact, he always seems to be wearing them. The things are huge on him and he looks ridiculous stomping around, always on the verge of toppling, in them. We haven't found any boots his size but I'm hoping they'll appear soon.
Anyway, it's getting late so I better wrap this up. Hope everyone is well!
Your washing adventures remind me of our time in Scotland...I also soon realized that fabric softener was the secret! Sounds like y'all are having fun! Merry Christmas!
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