Pardon My French

2011-11-15T20:48:00.002Z

Woo hoo! I finally took the time to figure out how to reclaim my blog back after [long, boring story so I won't go into it].

Guess what - I had a baby, my eldest is in her second year of school, I'm busier than ever with a variety of projects AND we're all going home for Thanksgiving! For a month! Yes, I said "home" in reference to Virginia as always but to be fair nowadays I refer to France as home, too. My daughter seems to be able to keep it straight so I'm going with it. She's in the middle of her Princessy Princess phase and I'm just going with that, too. I've found if I play Wicked Stepmother to her Snow White I can get her to do what needs to be done and she doesn't get too moody about it.

My youngest, who we call Fang as his canines are coming in before his front teeth (those are, what, cuspids?), is a pistol and doing well. I'm actually torn between calling him Fang and Hillbilly as he teeters on the edge of looking more like the guy who catches snapping turtles (we saw him on Jay Leno) than a vampire. Today he only tried to access the cat's water bowl 12 times before giving up, which is an improvement over 19. Still progress, right?

2011-02-08T08:59:00.002Z

Where the heck have I been?

Well, unfortunately I've been sucked into Facebook. I still love reading blogs, but I'm so slow at writing that status updates just seem so more efficient. Boo, I know. Things are going well -- Bo Bella started school which is going well for the most part. She has an awesome teacher and class assistant, but there are just so many kids there and she's having to learn the hard way to fend for herself. I know the world isn't all sunshine and roses, but sheesh, she's only 3.

As for the other news...I've broken out into labor dances again, with even more feeling than the first time because now I know what happens when people are induced. We're in week 40, and Junior still doesn't seem that interested in coming out -- eek! Otherwise things are going really well, except for the normal end-of-pregnancy stuff. I look forward to seeing my ankles again someday, as well as sneezing without fear.

2010-07-31T23:12:00.002+01:00

We're baaaaack

Although we had a blast in good ol' Virginny, both of us were thrilled to be back home in France. Weird, huh. I looked back through some of my older blog posts and a lot of them involved complaining. Okay, fine. Pretty much all of them involved complaining. Nowadays, though, I don't have that much to complain about. Things are going fine -- hubs is good, the cat doesn't seem depressed, Ella is hilarious, and I am finally getting used to my short hair. Ella starts school in September, and I am both dreading it and getting excited for her. She desperately wants to go, but I can't help but worry that this will be the start of the decline of her English. After 6 weeks in the US, English is her language of choice and the one she expresses her most complicated ideas in. French is coming back, though, and she's going to spend one week with the in-laws which is pretty much the best version of French camp you could ask for. When hubs told my MIL that Ella was speaking mainly English, MIL said (in French, obviously) "Well, that will give me a chance to practice my English, then!" I thought that was an awesome response on her part.

While we were away, hubs painted the bedrooms and they look great. We managed to hide most of the lumpiness and I love the look of the clean walls. The downstairs still looks like crap, but that gives us something to do and goals are important, as I always say. Today was our 6-year wedding anniversary and we're planning on celebrating by buying a new dishwasher in the near future. I couldn't be more excited. If things go well we're also planning another trip to Belgium, just the two of us. Hubs has been so great over all the years and I'm looking forward to some "us" time, which has been sorely needed. Since I've gotten back I'm really determined to embrace France as much as I can, and one of the big benefits is being able to drive to another country in under 4 hours. We're going to do it!

2010-07-08T05:02:00.002+01:00

Heavens to Betsy

Has it really been, oh, say 6 whole months since I posted? I blame it on Facebook and just being busy in general. Right now I'm back in the good ol' US of A and am loving the greenery and blue skies, although I'm a bit guilty of staying indoors too much at the moment because of the wicked heat here on the East Coast. I also have to say that I also love the fact that Bo Bella has been relatively up close and personal with assorted country critters (including a black snake climbing a tree -- you don't see that every day here, not to mention in the suburbs of Paris). We've also heard some good bluegrass and even a jug band.

I do miss the food in France along with dark bedrooms. It's hard for me to understand why the French don't do screens and Americans don't do the dark shutters. Some kind of combo of the two would be perfect for me! I am absolutely in love with my local library here, what with the story hour and summer reading program and books that are shelved where they are supposed to be and on-line catalogue that works. With no yearly fee! And random people who just walk up to recommend good books! It seems too good to be true. Today they had a children's music concert and it was awesome.

Bo Bella has also been introduced to Nickelodeon and M & Ms (I'm not naming names, but it wasn't me), and has her own private swing set to play on and creek to splash around in. She is being spoiled rotten by her Granny and is loving life here. My trump card is that there is no VCR on which to watch my old Cinderella VHS tape, so between that, her dad and the cat I might be able to convince her to willingly come back to France. Not that our life there is not good by any means, but she does seem to be having a great time here as evidenced by the fact that she recently said, "Momma, I don't ever want to leave Virginia." Honeychild, I know what you mean! But she is 3 and we both are missing her papa and she is missing her French family, and she is just waiting for school to start in September. Yikes! I have mixed feelings about that, but I know she will do well.

So that's it in a nutshell -- we're on vacation and I've got some time for blogging. Hope all of you are doing well!

2009-12-18T13:42:00.002Z

Christmas Time's A Comin'

And while I'm not going home, I'm still pretty excited about it all. I think I mentioned I've all of a sudden been motivated to do some solo sewing, because in the past I came up with an idea and then relied heavily on my mother for supervision and for part of the actual work. If not all of it. Whereas having a mom who sewed was not the most desirable thing for a 13-year-old ("I'm not going to buy that when I can make it"), 20+ years after that it becomes pretty awesome. I'm all for "I'm not going to buy that when I [or my mom] can make it" now! For Halloween, I had the itch to make Ella an owl costume and then it just kind of snowballed from there. I'm still sticking to easy projects like felt finger puppets and softies, plus I've been commissioned by Santa for the big project of making her a fabric baby carrier for Christmas. I've been learning from my (many, many) mistakes and there've still been some conference calls home, but it's been mostly solo work on my part.

I've been getting to know my sewing machine and am proud to be able to say that I'm no longer sewing on the slowest turtle speed and am not so afraid of sewing my own finger (although we all know I shouldn't get overly confident about that). I've also been getting to know the ladies at the local sewing shop and that always feels nice here. Oh, and I do have to mention that my mom did send me some video tutorials on how to make a bag with a boxy bottom as well as the proper use of a bodkin, so I still am somewhat dependent. But it's still progress from the days when it took me an hour just to thread the machine and fill a bobbin. And it tickles me to no end that Granny is sending me video tutorials. I love them!

In other news, we have a bathtub! Hoorah! I could not be more excited about this, because although I'm aware in this instance I have lost perspective about what constitutes a true tragedy in the world, I just could not develop enough flexibility to adapt to life with that crappy, tiny shower. I know, I know, first it was the gravel in the backyard and then it was the bathtub and you really should feel sorry for my husband -- but now I really will try my best to be content with the house as is. Except for the lack of paint on the walls, but to be fair, that also bugs the hubster so I don't feel too badly about that.

I also have vowed to be more vigilant about my hairy legs now that the bathroom is a more welcoming place. You know it's bad when your daughter says, "Oh, Momma, your legs are so fuzzy," albeit in an affectionate way like she says it to the cat. So yes, you really should feel sorry for my husband, because contrary to what seems to be a popular misconception back home, French women are not at all covered in body hair and from what I can tell it seems to be the other extreme (skirts are popular, even when it's freezing out).

The coolest thing is that the cheap IKEA baby bathtub has now been repurposed into a sled! We did get some snow and Stinkerbella was convinced she was going to go outside and make a giant snowman. Which we sort of did, except it's less like Frosty and more like one of the magi or perhaps Gandalf from Lord of the Rings. And it wasn't so much a matter of her making a snowman as it was me making the snowwizard while she stood around and asked questions. While I am absolutely thrilled that she is chatting up a storm in English I do sometimes wonder if she will end up with poor muscle tone so eventually we gave up on the snowfellow and I convinced her to follow any kind of animal track that we found in the snow. "Oooh, catprints -- let's see where it went!" Any other ideas are welcome but for now I'll just see if she can learn to walk and talk at the same time.

2009-12-06T16:26:00.002Z

So Many Reasons to Love My Husband...

Here are but two:

1) He dug up and carried all the cursed gravel out of the back yard (through the house, bucketful by bucketful). Then he put in a patio. It's not worth a photo yet since the flowerbeds and veggie patch look terrible and I'm too ashamed of that, but we are all pretty impressed with him. And I'm so happy that the gravel is out of there, although technically it's not actually gone since it's piled up in the front yard like our own miniature Buffalo Mountain. I'm sure the neighbors love us (but won't they be jealous when they see that patio).

2) Today he built me a sewing desk since I didn't have anywhere to put my machine. It's very basic -- we bought the legs at IKEA and then he cut a board to the size I wanted, but it's dead cheap and I couldn't find anything that fit the dimensions I wanted, and I wouldn't have been able to make one as nice as he did, that's for sure.

Love you, sweet cheeks.

2009-10-09T20:24:00.002+01:00

Photo(s) du jour

2009-10-08T14:00:00.004+01:00

Another Milestone for Momma

So, the other week I drove in Paris as well as on the peripherique (bypass) by myself for the first time. I was not technically by myself as I had my charming 3-foot-tall companion with me, but that fact just ratcheted up my anxiety level even more (and she's not yet at the point where she can really assist with merging into traffic). Things worked out fine considering the car was malfunctioning, but all clouds *did* have a silver lining that day -- in my case it was a cloud of black smoke billowing out the exhaust pipe so that the cars around me tended to give me a wide berth.

Driving in France was stressful for me in the beginning. I had to adjust to driving a straight gear, adjust to the differences in driving regulations, adjust to the fact that I was driving a car smaller than my former US refrigerator on smaller roads around people who tended to leave smaller margins of error (and at speeds that can only be described as zippy). Perhaps it wasn't as much a cultural difference between countries as it was a cultural difference between city driving and country driving.

My husband and I had an interesting discussion this week about driving differences between the Paris region and Virginia. I was talking about the epiphany I had that radically altered my ability to cope with roundabouts and crowded roads here. Back home, turn signals indicated an intent to change direction whereas here turn signals seem to indicate an act. "At some point I would like to change lanes" versus "I am changing lanes; yes, I mean right now, back off." He mentioned that he felt it was more difficult to change lanes back in Virginia because people wouldn't necessarily let you over if you had your turn signal on. For example, let's say you were at a certain multi-lane traffic light for the first time and you realized you were in the wrong lane and needed to get over so you could go to Wal-Mart and buy a bag of ice. Let's say you put on your turn signal and the light turns green -- what happens next?

Well, in many cases (unless you were driving a granny car and some nice person assumed you were elderly and let you in) you'd probably have to wait your turn and when the light turned yellow, you might be able to get over. Otherwise it looks like you're butting in line and people don't like that, right? Here, on the other hand, if I put on my turn signal and just change lanes, the people behind me are expecting it and I'm able to switch without too much of a problem. I guess everyone does it so it somehow all works out.

My wonderful friend, Kathy, taught me one surefire trick for changing lanes in stopped traffic and it does still work here: make eye contact with the other driver, smile, point to where you want to go and mouth the words, "Can I please get over?" In Virginia, it worked like a charm and without fail, every single person smiled back and let me in. Here, no one smiles back and they look at me like I'm this huge weirdo (which I guess in all fairness I am, in this respect) but they do let me over. Of course, I haven't used this trick once I realized all I had to do was put on my turn signal and go...no eye contact or smiling was necessary. But the whole issue of what a smile means is a completely different topic...

2009-09-10T14:35:00.002+01:00

Just Another Late State of the Union Address

We've just returned from our second vacation down south to the in-laws' for a wedding. Who would have ever thought I'd have a life in which we'd take our cat on vacation to the Mediterranean (and the Alps, for that matter)?

The week before we left, I harvested close to 4 kilos of tomatoes from the garden. Some friends of the family helped us out while we were gone and picked the ripe ones, and I am still picking 'maters! This weekend I'm going to make sauce and freeze it. And I don't want mean to brag (well, maybe only a little) -- but they are seriously the best tomatoes I've ever had in my life. Food is just so much better when you grow it yourself!

Bo Bella is still a hoot. As soon as we got back, she noticed that the cat's bowl was empty and took it upon herself to fill it up. She went over to the bag, unfastened the zip-lock opening, took the scoop and made several trips over to the bowl, and then even closed the bag back up. I know it isn't rocket science or anything, but it's just fascinating to me to see her do little stuff like this on her own, without being asked or shown. They do grow up so fast!

This week she returned to the halte-garderie, where she'll now go for one full day a week. We also took her trike out to the forest and collected various bits and bobs to make a nest for the squirrels, which was a lot of fun for us both. Yesterday we went to a recently opened indoor playground with several other anglophone mothers and today we made scones with a Scottish friend and her son. Life is good!

2009-08-18T19:47:00.002+01:00

Just Call Me the Space Cowboy

We went to mail a couple of packages today, and Stinkerbella didn't stop jabbering away the whole time we were there. There was a man in front of us with long, stringy hair who kept turning around to look at us. Even though he looked a little like Killer BOB from Twin Peaks he seemed fairly harmless. At first, Ella just kept asking "Momma, is that a man up there? Him a man?" Then when he left, she demanded, "HEY MOMMA, WHERE DID WILD, WILD WEST GO?" And I was all like, "I dunno, honey, maybe he had to go find his horse."

Just kidding about the horse part; I was too busy trying not to laugh to give any kind of good answer. But it was pretty funny...

2009-08-13T20:04:00.003+01:00

Okay, Then, Just So's You Know...

Stinkerbella (attaching herself to my knees): I love you, momma.

Me (overwhelmed): Oh, honey, I really, really, really love you, too.

Stinkerbella (shrugging): Well...I know.

2009-07-30T06:46:00.002+01:00

State of the Garden Address

So. I spent an entire month in Virginia and just ask me how much time I devoted to absorbing garden knowledge from my parents. I know, I know; it's just sad. Granted, their entire veggie garden is surrounded by an electric fence (deer issues) which makes it a little difficult to just pop in and walk up and down the rows, but still...

Thus I have returned to my own tiny plot none the wiser but still determined to grow food. Initially I put in 8 tiny tomato plants, thinking not all of them would survive. I chose not to prune the suckers, whatever those things are, because I once read in a book that I didn't technically have to. Those 8 tomato plants are now looking wildly out of control, but I'm managing to keep them upright thanks to some spare yarn I had around the house. Right now my plan of attack is to water and pray.

It's amazing how many weeds can grow in one months' time. Seriously. When I left, I had carefully nurtured some leeks, sunflowers, and sweet peas, but upon my homecoming they were nowhere to be found and uninvited guests were growing in their place. My mint and parsley had flowered, and now I'm trying to figure out what I should do with those. As far as happy surprises go, the clematis in the front yard is blooming again along with one I didn't even know about in the back yard. So that's good.

The biggest news is that we finally ordered a garden shed from England, it has arrived, and my husband is working hard at assembling the thing. It does take up a significant chunk of garden in a prime sunlight location, but there's no getting around the fact that we need some storage space. Once that's installed, I hope to work on enlarging some of the beds and getting rid of that gravel, to which I still just cannot see any benefit. I have to weed it, it's a pain in the rear to try to sit on, it gets stuck in my shoes and we track it in the house, and doesn't prevent mud. Ack.

And the really big news is that once we get rid of that horrid stuff, I'm not sure it's worth the effort to try to get grass to grow in its place and might opt for a terrace instead. In the end, we'd have a workable "backyard" area more quickly and with a lot less effort. I'll get my green fix with more plants in containers and am going to work on maximizing the little actual gardening space I have. I've spent a lot of time agonizing over what to do with my patch of land that in all probability is about the size of my parents' living room and this just makes the most sense at the moment. I know I should post a picture of it in its current state, what with the shed-in-progress, patchy, weed-filled gravel, unruly tomato plants next to flowering mint, and giant pile of dirt smack dab in the middle, but I'm just too ashamed. Y'all would definitely think I'm crazy for spending so much time writing about it.

2009-07-28T06:10:00.004+01:00

The weeds have taken over

(This was my first thought upon arriving home.)

Well, we made it through another very long 19-hour trip! This time I was solo with the babe, but it was just fine -- except the incident with the baggage cart at the very, very end. Thankfully my husband was there to save me.

So much has happened, I don't know where to start. The biggest news is that Bo Bella does in fact seem to be potty trained. It feels a little bit like cheating, actually. I'm pretty sure the karmic dial just clicked over to "You are so screwed for the teenage years," not that I had very much to do with the fact she's trained. She's had very few accidents so far and the trend seems to be continuing here in France, though I think she really prefers Granny's comfy bathroom to our water closet. I have some work to do in figuring out how to handle excursions, what with the famous lack of available public restrooms around.

Virginia was wonderful, with mostly wonderful weather. We were able to hang with friends and family, I did a little shopping, and caught the newest Harry Potter with my sister. Bo Bella saw her first fireworks, had her first haircut, swam in the lake, had her first horse and pony ride, went down to the creek just about every day, and did lots and lots of swinging and playing with friends. She also displayed a fondness for cars, just like my dad, so the legacy lives on.

Oh, and we did do some fancy dancing to bluegrass music. Originally we were just sitting in the grass and watching, but before long Bo Bella had marched up to the dancing platform, managed to climb up on it, and demanded, "HEY, MOMMA. Get on up here! Come on up here and DANCE TOGETHER!" The person next to me turned and said, 'Yeah, Momma...get on up there and dance." There is nothing to do except comply in this circumstance, what with the cuteness on the stage and all those people sitting in lawn chairs looking at you. She did just fine, moved her feet and kicked her legs and everything.

Personally, I really needed that trip home and if I can swing it, I'd spend every single summer there. It's good to be back here, even with some serious work to do. I'm off to try to salvage my garden -- though good news! I've got green tomatoes!! And we've eaten our first carrots, shrimpy though they were. RIP to my rhubarb...

2009-06-27T14:45:00.003+01:00

Granny is magical

I swear I am not going to bore anyone with daily updates, but there is some news I just have to share. I don't want to jinx anything, but my mother pretty much put my daughter in some Elmo underwear the other day and told her to let us know if she had to go potty.

And for two whole days (excepting naps and sleep), my daughter has done just that. I know it's coming, but not even one single accident...just a complete 180 from diapers to using the potty full-time when she's awake.

I do not know how long this will last and I'm going to try not to get my hopes up, but dang, my mother is good.

2009-06-26T13:36:00.002+01:00

Day 2

For the babe:

A ride in Paw-paw's Model A and blowing the "a-OOga" horn
A trip to our fabulous small town playground
More playing with the cat
Throwing rocks in the creek and shouting "KaBOOM" and "KerPLUNK"
Meeting family friends, who graciously taught her other fabulous words such as "Ala-ka-ZAM"
Lots of jumping and running and singing outside in the yard

For her parents:

Picking out candy from barrels in the country store uptown (this was very much me, not my French husband)
Buying good quality sneakers that were so cheap it still almost makes me fall over (this was him)
Endulging in milkshakes and Dr. Pepper (you'll have to guess on this one)
Buying books at the Goodwill for 35 cents
Driving windy country roads in my parents' boat of a Buick

2009-06-25T12:13:00.004+01:00

Home again

2-hour car trip to the airport
2-hour wait at the airport
9-hour airplane ride
4-hour layover
1-hour plane ride (with propellers -- yikes)
1-hour car trip to Granny and Paw-paw's house

=

19 hours of traveling with a 2-year-old.

It definitely could have been worse! Stinkerbella was a champion, though I guess the people to really ask are the people who sat near us on the airplane. She loved it and entertained herself fairly well. Two activities stood out as favorites: playing hide-and-seek with the airplane blanket and putting stickers all over her legs.

Our first day here she went to her first story hour (I love our public library and wouldn't mind living there), was reintroduced to Tigger the Cat and spent a lot of time outside in the backyard wandering around. On my part, I've had my first Dr. Pepper and am just taking it easy, enjoying the weather and the scenery. It's great to be back in Appalachian paradise.

2009-06-15T06:02:00.003+01:00

It's the Small Things

Harvest from the garden as of 6/14/09

*8 radishes! Woo! I actually grew something from seed and ate it!

*The herb garden is full of mint, parsley and chives. The thyme is also starting to come back.

Hopeful signs of vegetables

*I think my tomatoes are actually going to bloom at some point

*Numerous carrots seem to be growing

*There are a couple of pink raspberries mixed in with a bunch of green ones

*A friend gave me some baby lettuce, so as long as I can keep those alive, we'll have salad!

In other plant news...

My orchid has another leaf! It really looks like it's at death's door, but apparently this little guy has a lot of will to live.

The bizarre stink plant's blooms have died off and now it just looks (and smells) like any old random plant.

The rose bushes also have a will to live and have all grown back with a vengeance. I didn't inherit any with a gorgeous smell, though the neighbor's giant pink rose bush is divine and helps make up for the fact that my yard will apparently smell like a sewage treatment plant for one week in late spring every year.

The california poppies are spreading with a vengeance. Good thing I like poppies.

I'm still letting lots of random things grow out of control but this past weekend I finally bit the bullet, decided unknown plant x was definitely a weed and then pulled it all out. I'm still too ashamed to post photos but maybe one day...

2009-06-05T12:45:00.003+01:00

Is it June already?!

Yeah, so for a while there I was taking medication for a sinus infection and was surviving on 5 hours of sleep...and ended up with lots of extra time for blogging. Now I'm back to being a big, old lazy butt and still haven't gotten around to writing posts about that bachelorette party or book reviews. Not even sure they're going to happen anytime soon!

In the meantime, we are doing very well. It's amazing how chipper I feel as long as I can see some blue sky. My Saturday classes are wrapping up and I am ashamed to admit how much I am looking forward to having my weekends back for my family. We are also gearing up for our big trip back to Virginia this month -- woo hoo and yee haw!

The kitchen paint issue is still on hold. The yellow is not actually for the walls, it's for a part of our ugly cabinet doors since we're trying to make do with what we have instead of redo everything. I think my husband was just trying to make me feel better about my poor choice of paint (though technically he is color blind). Now I'm trying to figure out a plan B.

On the garden front, it looks like I might actually have an edible radish or two coming up! And last week in the front yard, my weird-looking plant finally bloomed. I was sitting outside with some visitors and kept noticing this horrible odor that made me think someone somewhere either had a sewer failure or had left meat out to rot. There were these gusts of wind that made it extremely intense and unpleasant. It was driving me absolutely crazy until I figured out it was coming from that plant.

I was torn between horror and excitement that I might possibly have inherited a carnivorous plant, until I checked with Google University and discovered that it was something called a Devil's Tongue and is not in fact insect-eating. Luckily, the odor lasts only a few days and now we can play outside again.

Off to wash floors and make spaghetti sauce! Hope everyone is well.

2009-05-22T13:44:00.004+01:00

Learning the Hard Way About Paint

Our kitchen is fairly dark, and the inherited color scheme is brown, darker brown, brown that is a little bit lighter than that, and then more brown. We (okay, so it was really mainly me) decided to paint some of the darkest wood trim on the cupboards a nice sunflower yellow to brighten it up. Today I cracked open the pot and gave it a go.

Turns out it's more of a school bus yellow than sunflower.

OMG.

And holy crap.

It does not make me want to stand around cooking delicious food, it makes me want to cover my eyes and flee.

Turns out I'm much better at removing ugly wallpaper than choosing colors and applying paint, but I guess one has to start somewhere.

ETA: I've decided it's more of a "tennis ball yellow" than school bus. My husband says it's going to look nice. How am Iever going to get him to decide to try another color and think it's his idea??

2009-05-19T22:08:00.002+01:00

The Family

Another new post is up on Pardon My Franglais! I briefly introduced my husband and me -- the basic story of how we met, what language we speak together, and our current state of bilingualism.

Soon to come on Pardon My French: my first French bachelorette party!

2009-05-15T06:45:00.002+01:00

Dusting off Lazarus

I've just put a new post up on my other blog, Pardon-My-Franglais. Initially I wanted to use it as a place to help keep me motivated and upbeat about teaching, but as my hours decreased so did my blogging mojo.

From henceforth it's going to serve as my bilingual momma internet space and I hope to figure out how to put speech samples on there soon. So, if you know me and want to read about Stinkerbella's language progress, check it out. And if you don't know me but still are interested -- or have bilingual children of your own -- check it out and by all means leave me words of advice and encouragement.

For now I shall leave you with a video of (someone else's child) singing her new favorite tune, Sleeping Bunnies (I can't believe how well that baby can hop!):

2009-05-13T14:45:00.004+01:00

Wordless Wednesday -- Mary, Mary, quite contrary (May)

2009-05-13T06:05:00.002+01:00

My Favorite Etsy Goodness

In true to "normally I just ramble about what's going on in my life for my parents' behalf, but every once in a while I wake up and decide to be like Oprah and tell the world about my favorite things, only without the free stuff under your chair" form, I'd like to feature a couple of Etsy shops that I think are very deserving. I realize getting people addicted to Etsy has its own problems in the long run , so I promise to limit myself.

Mom, have we talked about Etsy? You probably already know about it, but just in case, let me explain that it's an online marketplace for people to buy and sell *handmade* items. So yeah, there is a lot of crafty goodness on there.

Today's featured Etsy crafter is this chickadee, whose blog I've been following and drooling over for ages. There are times when I've thought under different life circumstances that I would show up on her doorstep like it was a buddhist monastery and ask her if I could live in her garage and learn from her as an apprentice. (Sorry, don't mean to scare you, chickadee...I'm not really going to do that). But she has a lot of crafty talent and I love to see what she comes up with.

If you click on this link to her blog you can check out her bowls (more labels on her right sidebar), metalhead bags, and the various and sundry cute stuff that's filed under "happy homemaker." I'd also like to point out that she uses both gorgeous contemporary fabric along with repurposed material so the satisfaction of not spending money on mass-produced, impersonal items is just that much greater. If I had been smarter, I would have written this post before Mother's Day but it's never too late to spoil one's Dear Momma.

Right now during May she is busy adding one new item per day to her Etsy shop, with free shipping on that item until the end of the month. Here's her little blurb from her blog:

this chickadee is a one woman sweatless-sweatshop whose goal is to make the world a cuter place, one loving stitch at a time.

it all began as a way to find alternatives to mass market accoutrements for myself and my home. now the love is spreading and this chickadee is hoping to branch out and brighten your little corner of the forest too.

This chickadee definitely has my support! I hope you'll find her as delightful as I do.

2009-05-11T21:02:00.007+01:00

Meme-type thing

The very cool Beth from BurkinaMom in France tagged me to answer this set of random questions. So, here goes:

1. What are your current obsessions? Trying to get enough English in my daughter's head before she goes off to French kindergarten and reading up on beekeeping and gardening. I inherited a sad-looking little orchid and am trying to get it to grow another leaf or root, or at least perk up a little.

2. Which item from your wardrobe do you wear the most often? Jeans. They no longer fit, but I'm waiting to go home to buy more.

3. What's for dinner? Leftover lamb, cake riche, and cauliflower and potatoes. Plus wine and cheese, of course.

4. Last thing you bought? Paint -- we're in the middle of ripping out more ugly wallpaper and slapping coats of white up on the walls. Though today my husband and I teamed up and finally chose our first colors...a very bold yellow for the kitchen accent and a soothing green for the veranda one.

5. What are you listening to? I did most of the work on the water closet (trust me, "closet" is the word for this particular room) to disc 2 of the Crosby, Stills and Nash box set. Good stuff.

6. If you were a god / goddess what would you be? Can I pick 2? I'd be the Goddess of Good Intentions and work as an elevator operator in a fancy hotel. You'd stroll in after starting that enormous cross-stitch project for a friend's baby, and see me standing there in my matching hat and gloves. I'd smile perkily at you, push the button for the basement and BAM! You're in hell, rushing around trying to buy a last-minute baby gift that is just as thoughtful as that unfinished cross-stitch would have been.

Second pick: a Japanese kami from Shintoism, most definitely! I'd hang out by my rock or tree, drink the free sake and watch people try not to piss me off. Not sure if that is more of a "spirit" or a "god," but it's so much more me than being living up on Mount Olympus. Too much happening up there.

7. Favourite holiday spots? In France, I loved visiting Burgundy and Bretagne. In the US, I loved camping along the Blue Ridge Parkway plus skiing in Colorado. Anywhere, Japan is pretty great and I am also partial to St John.

8. Reading right now? Robbing the Bees by Holley Bishop. I highly recommend it!

9. Four words to describe you? At the moment: wired (too much coffee), tired (not enough sleep). In general: shy, loyal.

10. Guilty pleasure? It used to be reading US magazine weekly (online) until the whole Elizabeth Edwards thing disgusted me and I quit cold turkey. Then it was la Nouvelle Star, until our TV broke. I'm currently in the market for guilty pleasures -- suggestions are welcome.

11. Who or what makes you laugh? Total cliche, but my husband and my daughter are at the top of my list right now. Then there's Chris Rock.

12. Favourite spring thing to do? Uncurl myself from the fetal position, spit out the chicken bones, stand up, and see some blue sky. Winters here are tough on me.

13. Planning to travel next? Home, baby, home -- Blue Ridge Mountains for a month in the summer.

14. Best thing you ate or drank lately? I'm going to have to copy Beth and say that Speculoos spread.

15. Last time you were tipsy? Ooooooh now, let's see...I think it was during our lovely trip to Provins, what with the free booze and lovely bottle of wine. Though I have to admit I'm pretty much a lightweight.

16. Favourite ever film? Singing in the Rain, I think, though I adore lots of other musicals. My daughter and I could watch the "Good Morning" song-and-dance every single day. She even hauled herself up in her crib the other morning when I went in to open her window and said something along the lines of "Good morning, Momma! It's great to get up late!" which is the version I usually sing to her.

17. Biggest life lesson you've learned from your kids? That apparently I can learn to monitor the things that come out of my mouth. She hasn't said "Oh, shit!" in a long time!

18. Song you can't get out of your head? At the moment, it's "Meunier, tu dors," a French kiddie song that Mamie and Papi have been singing to Stinkerbella. It's cute -- apparently some miller falls asleep at his windmill and it starts turning too fast, so you can imagine the corresponding gestures.

19. Spiders -- do you squish or relocate? I try to relocate but in all honesty it depends on how big the spider is and if it was silly enough to intrude on my personal space. If it's just hanging out in the corner I will go to great lengths to find it a new home, but if it wanders onto the couch next to my leg...I'm not promising anything.

I'm now tagging my homegirl Kathy, my e-friends Michelle and Angela, and double-tagging Reb since I've missed seeing her around.

(Rules of the meme: Respond and rework. Answer questions on your own blog. Replace one question. Add one question. Tag 8 people... or whatever. )

2009-05-06T13:35:00.002+01:00

15-minute Post: bilingualism & gardening

Stinkerbella is at daycare and I have a few minutes before I am going to rush off to clean the house for the in-laws' arrival! I'm sure you can see why blogging sounds so much more tempting to do than cleaning...

After my 3-day garden rampage, I'm not at all concerned about the gigantic mystery root I hacked to pieces (though I'm sure it will have at least a little effect on the plant it was attached to) and am doing good growing dances for the radishes, tomatoes and basil that I planted. So far, the tomatoes seem to be hanging on, I think the basil is going to kick the bucket any day so I'll just start some more inside, and only time will tell about the radishes. After all the hacking and digging, I sustained some kind of weird deforming wrist injury that caused the pharmacist to recoil in horror when I showed it to him, but the magic cream he sold me seems to be helping. Unfortunately the weather has been rather crappy so my dreams of me and Stinkerbella frolicking around our property in sunhats are as of yet unrealized. But soon, perhaps!

Our TV is still out and that has been the best thing ever. During the winter it was so tempting to just collapse on the couch and not do anything productive, so the fact that our antennae thing stopped working has been a godsend. I've read, baked, cleaned, gardened, and am working on making lots of felt board stories. It's great! The only downside I can think of is that it also gives us more time to peruse the houses for sale and see how much more yard we could buy now with the money we spent on this place. But again, without the TV we hear less talk about the economic crisis and I can still putter around and be happy with what we have. Couldn't predict the future a year ago and still can't, so I'm hoping if and when we sell this place the market will have gone back up. Otherwise, we'll just call it good for the character.

I have not posted on my 'franglais' blog for ages, mainly because I'm not really teaching much these days and have no immediate plans to go back for more hours. Next year I'd like to cut out all weekend teaching completely, in fact. I like the kids, but still feel a little frustrated with feeling like I'm really not being able to make a lot of progress with the limited amount of time I have. I'd like to do more. And so obviously I have my own little language learner at home that fascinates me and motivates me, and it's easy to put more and more energy in seeing her English develop. I'm now thinking of using the 'franglais' blog as a place to ramble about our family's journey toward bilingualism, because it's so important to me that I do want to keep it somewhat separate from my other boring babbles. So that's another project on the horizon...

Today I got up early and subscribed to Multilingual Living Magazine, which you have probably already come across if you have done internet searches on bilingual families. Even though I prefer print to on-line magazines (and it's apparently going quarterly), I am pretty happy with the quality. For $12, you receive a yearly subscription along with access to all the back issues. I've had this bookmarked for ages now and am glad I finally got around to subscribing.

Well, I think that's all the procrastination I can muster for the moment. Wait -- have I checked the mail? Am I hungry? Let me think about this and I'll get back to you...

2009-05-02T21:21:00.002+01:00

Sometimes I should just shut up and listen

Sissy, this post is for you! Back in March, my sister and I started getting my small vegetable patch-to-be in order. Now, I'm sure I've mentioned numerous times that there's a lot I would like to do with my backyard. I am having to work hard at not calling it my "backyard" since it just seems so far from what a real yard should be. There was an old, half-broken laundry pole, lots and lots of gravel, and some raised flower beds. We've taken down the laundry pole, I've started working in the flower beds, and I try not to resent the gravel too much.

The front yard was filled with some sort of interlocked planters. I didn't want to throw them away, but I definitely didn't want to keep them in the front yard, either. My sister, the Master Gardner, had the brilliant idea of using those containers in the backyard and the idea of having a little terraced patch suited me just fine.

While we were digging around trying to get them installed, Sissy pulled up some kind of root and said, "Oh, you have lily of the valley," which impressed me since she identified it by this teeny weeny thing that looked to me like any random root (my failure to be able to distinguish roots will become important at the end of this post). And it turns out I have A LOT of this plant, running smack dab throughout the place I wanted to put my veggie patch.

As we were digging it up, it became clear that I had more lily of the valley than I could use. I didn't want to just throw it away because it seems so wasteful, but my sister advised me to just go ahead and get rid of it. Did I listen? No, I did not -- I tried my best to salvage what I could and now I am very sorry for my rampant willfulness. It came up through my planters, behind, beside and in front of my planters, and even without the toxicity aspect I just do not want anything else growing up where my squash and tomatoes should be. Not yet, anyway.

The irony of this story is that May 1st in France is a holiday -- Labor Day -- and there are always little stands on the side of the road selling lily of the valley. It's everywhere this weekend, and if I had been smart about it I could have opened up my own roadside stand because I have THAT MUCH. And even after I get it out of my vegetables I'll still have enough to sell, although maybe I won't need an actual stand, just some big boxes and a couple of chairs.

I've been tearing apart my vegetable patch and removing those hideously heavy planters in an effort to remove the lily of the valley for two days. I worked until 9:30 p.m. today and still don't know when I'll be finished. I have also encountered what appear to be multiple ants nests, which didn't bother me until I discovered that my digging seemed to irritate them and they retaliated by biting. Then I discovered little larva-like things that the ants were dragging around and decided that couldn't be good, but in the end I just gave up on the larva problem and hope it will somehow end up actually being beneficial.

As if I didn't have enough issues with the digging and the ants, I then found what I was convinced was the mother load of the lily of the valley roots and started trying to rip it out. It was a bit bigger than all the other roots but was right there with the lily of the valley, so it soon became a target. When it got big enough to require the assistance of the hatchet, I determined that it is either a) futile to try to remove the lily of the valley or b) not related to lily of the valley at all. Yes, I know, at some point I really should have known it was option b).

But since I had started with the chopping, I decided to keep at it and found that it started to get bigger as I got closer to the wall. There were some hollyhocks that were fairly sizable and I thought maybe it was another one of those, but it has now occurred to me that the giant mystery root belongs to one of my neighbor's plants across the wall separating my vegetable patch to be and his/her garden. Whoops. I didn't intentionally try to kill any of his/her plants on purpose, but it's still not very neighborly... not to mention the horrible gardening karma that's going to come back to me for that in addition to the lily of the valley removal.

The moral of the story is that if I had listened to my sister in the first place, I would not be in such dire straits with gardening karma. I don't know if I should 'fess up to my neighbors or anonymously donate a few homegrown vegetables to them because I'm too chicken to tell them face-to-face. Ah, well, perhaps I can find a way to make amends tomorrow...

2009-04-29T20:24:00.002+01:00

Stinkerbella Talks

I have been sadly lax about noting down her language development, even though I've been paying attention. Some of the new things she's been saying lately:

Where he go?
Go back home!
It's mines!
Rock it! (wanting me to rock her in the chair)
C'mere -- I wuv you (whispered)
Oh my GOODness! (much better than the *other* thing she was saying)
Zoe's big booger -- excuse me! (pretending to blow her doll's nose)
Bless you, momma.
Granny, Sissy onna airplane!

I think she's going to be an ace at charades because she generally manages to make herself understood and strangers are starting to be able to follow, though sometimes I still have to translate. She really wants to participate in conversations and to talk to people or animals or whatever she sees. Right now she's very much into greetings and will say "Hi!" and "Goodbye" to people, horses, or whatever inanimate objects catch her fancy. She's also very much into imaginative play with her dolls and stuffed animals. We bought her a doctor's kit for her birthday (on the suggestion of the pediatrician, so I'm sure you can fill in the blanks as to why) and she loves it and will diagnose Elmo & co for surprisingly long periods of time.

Yesterday we were upstairs and she came up to me and said, "Blue one -- where he go??" I already had a hunch of what she was talking about, and sure enough it turns out that she had started off drawing on her chalkboard, moved over to the radiator and decorated it, and then dropped her colored chalk inside. I'm sure when she got on her hands and knees and figured out it wasn't coming out, she went to get me. Today she came up to me and said, "[Babble babble] inna trash can" and while I'm not quite positive what it was that she threw away, I think it was just some string she found on the floor. Which was helpful, really. But you just never know...

And I haven't even started on her French, which I think is probably just as good as her English on some levels. I was a bit worried for a while because while she's always had more English vocab (manhole cover, for example, still shocks me) it seemed as if she was making more sentences in French, but I think if I check around it might be a normal phase for French/English bilingual children. She can also ask where things are in French, say who things belong to, and some simple sentences...the equivalent of "He's gone/hidden; It's finished; Put the shoes on" and so forth.

She knows a surprising amount of songs and also apparently knows which CDs they are on. Yesterday she went, found the Kool & the Gang CD (which was shelved on the CD rack, spine out), brought it to me and requested "Let's Go Dancing." Today it was "Baby Boogoola" (Baby Beluga).

So, yeah, it's been pretty fun around here. I am missing her babble just because it was so random and hilarious, but true sentences are pretty cool, too. Oh, and I almost forgot one of the funniest things...she called her great-grandmother on the phone while I had my back turned. The number is programmed in, so she managed to grab the phone (which is right beside the art desk, so tempting to a little one who's supposed to be coloring) and hit the right combination of buttons. I heard her jibber-jabbering away and found her on the phone with a very confused great-grammie on the line!

2009-04-28T13:07:00.003+01:00

Eco-Reading Challenge

I must be crazy to join a reading challenge at the moment, but then again I don't think I've really marketed myself as the most logical of people so no one should be surprised.

My e-friend Chris over at book-a-rama is hosting an environmentally-themed reading challenge in honor of Earth Day and I've decided to join. The rules are simple enough: pick 5 books with an environmental theme, read them in 5 months, and post your reviews to the blog. She's also asking people to commit to acts of green reading -- changing our reading habits in ways that will positively impact the earth.

I'm going to ponder my options for acts of green reading, but the very first one is to only choose books I already have just sitting on my bookshelf. I have this very large stock, see, and I need to just go ahead and read them already. So that's one. The other one is to make a formal attempt to pry myself away from the computer and spend less of my scant free time in the evenings reading status updates on-line and more time reading actual print magazines and books that I already have. If I have to, I'm going to ask my husband to hide the power cord (but he says he wants to see it in writing first. He's a smart fella and learns fast). Not sure this really counts as a 'green' act but it needs to happen and I'm going to use the challenge as motivation.

Here are the books I've got so far:

In Praise of Slowness by Carl Honore. I'm really looking forward to this one.

Robbing the Bees by Holley Bishop, in honor of my good friend who has just started beekeeping.

Voyage aux pays du coton by Erik Orsenna. I bought this one for my husband a few years back and it seems interesting.

I've still got two slots left. One of them will more than likely go to a book on gardening and the other one might be filled with A Silent Spring, something I've been meaning to read for ages but have never gotten around to.

Come on and join the fun!

2009-04-19T19:17:00.001+01:00

Just for Judy

2009-04-19T13:05:00.002+01:00

A Post in 15 Minutes or Less

That is what I'm giving myself! We'll see how this works, as I'm hanging on to my blog by my fingernails. There's just so much I want to do in a day and I don't seem to organize myself very well. Surely I can manage to spare 15 minutes, right? And Mom, I swear I'm going to put some photos up. I haven't forgotten you.

So, I now have a 2-year-old and just like clockwork she is wanting to do more things independently and claiming her territory, just like she's supposed to. It's still fun for the moment; I'm holding my breath to see how long it lasts.

We're making slow, slow progress on the house and I'm managing both to grow and kill plants at the moment. I have this ficus I inherited that did just fine until now, and is shedding leaves like crazy although nothing has changed. I tell myself it's just a phase. I started some tomato plants from seed - 2 batches because the first batch took forever to grow and now I have aplenty (for now). My peonies are surviving, although the clematis has seen better days. The jasmine is scenting up the veranda but the orchid looks ready to kick the bucket any second. Ah, we all need challenges.

And another life-changing discovery has been the start of yard sale season. I'm calling it a yard sale since it's people selling their old stuff, though technically it's not in anyone's yard. The second-hand shop is old news! It's a perfect weekend activity, because I get my retail therapy and Sunday drive in a two-for-one punch. I scored a children's clock for 50 centimes (it works and everything!), a potty seat, big bag of legos in great condition, an easel and chalkboard, and toddler puzzle -- all for well under 10 euros. And I've learned that people offer you a better deal if you hesitate a bit just because they don't want to take their junk home again. It's win-win for everyone. And needless to say, everyone is really nice because they are personally invested in getting rid of their stuff. I did have a brief moment of sorrow when I saw the art desk, since I'm sure it was lots cheaper than at the second-hand store.

The other bonus is that I've been to different little towns in the surrounding area, and once the weather is nicer we'll be able to discover different playgrounds and such. A lot of the play structures in our town are for older kids so Bo Bella still needs supervision and assistance, but we've been able to spot fun-looking places on our travels. It's been good to get out of our routine for a little bit.

I've gone over my 15-minute limit but at least I've gotten a post up. I'll have to wait until later to confess my love/hate relationship with the Twilight series, to mention that we have no TV thus I'm not able to watch La Nouvelle Star and actually am surviving, and to entertain you with various and sundry other mundane facts of my little French life. Maybe next time...

2009-04-03T22:00:00.002+01:00

Why Stop When I'm On a Roll?

Bouncing off my earlier customer service post, I'll explain about my lucky shopping day. Bo Bella will be 2 on Tuesday, so I thought I'd take advantage of her full day at the public day care (thank you, socialism) to find her a few presents. At the secondhand shop, I found a little toddler art desk for 10 euros. Twice as much as the kitchen still seems pretty cheap, so I dragged it home.

Then I went to one of the dreaded box stores I mentioned, but still managed to negotiate myself a discount on a display model of a toddler-sized, fold-up garden chair. As Andi commented below, I did say my bonjour and I chose my employee carefully. It was still more expensive than I wanted to pay and not a necessity by any means, but I wanted her to have it. Silly, I know, especially since the point is to run around and lie on the grass. When she is tired from all that playing and running and laying, then she can sit in her chair. Everyone needs a chair, right? That's what I am telling myself.

On that front, she is definitely playing inside the yard now instead of trying to figure out how to unlock the gate and escape into the big, wide world. I think she's just toying with me until she figures out how to drag a box over to the gate and get it open while my back is turned.

On the not-so-successful socializing front, I was criticized for my choice of parking spot by another mom at the day care. The day care parking drama is something I haven't talked about, primarily because it's boring and partly because I'm too ashamed to admit that I seem to have either depth perception or personal space issues when it comes to parking. I'll avoid parallel parking at all costs and pull in behind someone whenever I can. Which is what I did today, lost in my thoughts, and Other Mom not-so-nicely informed me I was bothering others with my choice of parking and should move into one of the other parallel spots. Which I did (despite the fact I was in a legally marked parking space and she had parked facing the wrong direction, so technically my inconveniencing her was her own damn fault), but she could have been nicer about it.

Now I've really got to stop procrastinating and finish preparing for my class!

2009-04-03T05:59:00.002+01:00

Customer Service in France Secret #1

Oh, who am I kidding? I have only one secret regarding customer service here in France, and it's not even a secret: avoid chain stores whenever possible and try to frequent small, family-owned businesses. It only makes sense that people who have a vested interest in customers/clients will be pleasant and helpful. Sometimes I have no choice but to frequent a big box store but when I do, I go with low expectations. Oh, wait, maybe that's secret #2 -- aim low so you can be pleasantly surprised.

Anyway, in my everyday life I am usually surrounded by nice, helpful people. Maybe it's because I'm in the countryside, maybe it's because I try to shop at smaller places, maybe it's because I'm usually with a babbling toddler who totally counterbalances my own lack of charm, I dunno. Bo Bella gets all the attention and I use that to our advantage. It's a known fact that you will get better bread if you take a baby along. (Oooooh, look, I've got a #3! I'm going to stop now and save them all up for a book).

As far as traveling goes, my husband and I discovered the hard way that chambres d'hotes are the only way to go. For a while we tried using the cheap hotels featured in the Lonely Planet guides, and all I have to say about that is OMG. They are cheap for a reason, people. Last summer we stayed in Bordeaux at a hotel that had a really good recommendation in the Michelin Guide. You had to choose between two kinds of rooms, though -- "standard" and "comfort." We chose standard, and it was the wrong choice as our room didn't come with many amenities but it did come with a mold problem. Shortly afterwards, I came down with my first ever sinus infection. Secret #4: if you ever encounter a choice similar to the one above, always go with comfort. Trust me on this one; I'm not even especially picky. Your sinuses will thank you.

Back to the hotel thing though...a chambre d'hote is a bed and breakfast and we've had great experiences so far with them. All of the owners have been very different but all were very nice and helpful. The breakfasts were all top-notch and the rooms were all clean and comfortable. No mold, no sharing a bathroom, no ducking your head when going through the front door. They're easy to find, thanks to the Gites de France website. You can search for chambres d'hotes by location and there's an option to search in English. We've met some interesting families and I always have good intentions to post a recommendation for them, but I think I've already established which road I'm walking on.

To wrap up, if you're looking for great customer service:

Shop small
Aim low
Take a baby
Chambres d'Hotes

As if on cue, Bo Bella has just woken up. I will now go enjoy my baby and the beautiful spring weather, and plan my book that will earn me millions of euros another day.

2009-04-02T18:11:00.003+01:00

A Month Already?!

It's been crazy busy around here, but in a good way. Had a great visit with my MIL, then my family, then my MIL again until today, and then my FIL is supposed to come back with my MIL on Sunday. No shortage of laps to sit on around here... (for the baby, not for me, that is)

My goal of weekly blogging has sadly fallen short.

2009-03-02T22:10:00.002Z

You're My Blue Sky

You're my sunny day... It's about time, too. My MIL kindly came up to help with le kid and it was fabulous, even if nice weather was scant during her entire stay. She also cooked and helped with the dishes so it was like vacation without having to pack. Ella took twice-daily long walks and got to ride on the carousel, thanks to her mamie. Ella'll tell you the story in great detail, too, complete with gestures and cute facial expressions about the horse that went around and around and up and down.

We also gave her the play kitchen I found in a second-hand shop for 5 euros. Seriously, you can't buy anything for 5 euros! I cleaned it up and set it out yesterday during her nap, and then forgot and left to take stuff to the dump with my husband and we missed the whole surprise thing. But mamie took pictures so we could see her excitement. She loves it and cried when she had to go upstairs for bed at night because she was afraid it would go away. (La cuisine PARTI?!) It's times like this that make me appreciate the fact that she can more or less communicate so I know what she is feeling. We reassured her that it would still be there when she woke up and she trotted off to bed. She calls it "Ella's chicken" in English. Life is good.

2009-02-27T13:32:00.002Z

Quick update

It's been a busy but wonderful couple of weeks. My MIL is here helping with the baby (and cooking!) and I've had some time to do the things I really want to do but haven't gotten around to.

In summary:

* My husband and I went away for a quick weekend trip. It was great. Wonderful customer service does exist in France! I'm going to promise myself that I'll blog about it within a month, if only because the b&b we stayed at deserves a shout out.

* On Monday I won a children's book from a blog contest at Vintage Kids' Books My Kid Loves! Another blog post coming about that, as well as about my ultra-cool scarf from This Chickadee. I'm about a year late in showing my appreciation and it does shame me. Check out their Etsy shops!

* Tuesday I went to a Mardi Gras party and had the best gumbo I've ever eaten. There were crawdads, king cake, and chocolate bread pudding (with pecan caramel sauce) and I enjoyed every last bite.

* Wednesday we went to a toddler play group in English, which I think will be a big help with her bilingualism. She learns an amazing amount of French from other kids, so this is a nice balance as well.

* Yesterday I had lunch at a Tex-Mex restaurant with a friend and we scoped out the local gardening supply stores. We have big plans!

Whoops, I'm being called. Another post hastily ended...

2009-02-10T23:22:00.003Z

And it just gets better...

My mother and sister are coming for two weeks in March! It's been over a year since I've been home and I miss my folks and friends something awful, not to mention I'm desperate to get Ella in an English-only environment for a few weeks and show her my neck of the woods. It's going to be a real red-headed family reunion and I can't wait. I almost got Ella to flatfoot the other day -- she basically stands on one leg and stomps with the other; just humor me and go with it -- and I'm sure my sister will succeed where I did not.

Tomorrow she has been invited to her first birthday party. Tonight before bed we practiced the birthday song, which is always hilarious. She got most of the words and what she didn't know she made up for in enthusiasm, as usual. If I can only talk her into karaoke, I'll have it made.

2009-02-09T23:20:00.003Z

A Day of Board-dom

So I've been mostly motivated to get things done around the house...except for today, which was one of those blah, rainy, stay-inside sorts of days. I decided I would much rather play with Ella than do anything else. When she was younger and immobile I had all the time in the world to document her progress, and once she was mobile and talking and even more fascinating I totally slacked off on that. Today was such a great day I wanted to write about it just so I can remember it for later.

In the morning, I had a friend over for English conversation and Ella pretty much entertained herself with her toys and the Art Box. She is no longer afraid of Play-doh, by the way. Afterwards we played hide-and-seek with her stuffed opossum, Pottum, and she is getting much better at being able to look for things without getting distracted by the other toys. The great thing about Pottum is that his rat-like tail tends to peek out of hiding places, so it's not too hard and not too easy to find him.

We branched out to hiding ourselves and after a couple of tries she stopped standing in the middle of the room and progressed to curling up in a little ball in the middle of the room when it was her turn to hide. And then I stopped to wonder if it's really that smart to teach her to hide, though I'm sure she'll figure out other ways to give her parents a heart-attack later on.

In the afternoon we played for ages with a board that had been sitting out in the very cold sunroom (which is now doubling as an extra fridge). I took the biggest book we had and made a ramp, and she had a blast just walking up that thing and stepping off the edge. Then we took her alphabet blocks, made towers, and tried to knock them down by driving her cars down the ramp. I took some electrical tape and made a starting line and she seemed to get the idea of what to do. I don't know how long we played with that old board but it was pretty awesome.

We also found the time in our busy schedule to dance around to some Kool and the Gang. She's getting more into dancing and a couple times a week our little family will dance around in a circle until we get dizzy. I tried teaching her to bust a few moves but she's definitely more interested in doing her own thing and making other random objects dance with her. There are times when I think this has to be the best point in my life, having her around all day and getting to know her and having this little dance partner who loves to spin in circles until she falls down.

2009-02-07T23:06:00.003Z

I am not dead, I'm just crafting

It's late, or I would write this totally fascinating post about how home ownership changes people both for the better and the worse. Never in my life had I ever had the desire to crack open a magazine devoted to home interiors (snore...) but now? Now I must think about colors and choose paint and it all seems complicated and magazines make me feel more prepared.

And the gardening... I have more gardening magazines than you can shake a stick at. Okay, I have 7, but that still seems like a lot. Not that I have done anything much with the garden, except for planting a raspberry bush and then trying to transplant bulbs in the flower beds. I have no idea what I'm doing. On the plus side, Ella has finally agreed to actually stay in the yard and seem somewhat happy about it, whereas before she would head straight to the gate and try to escape. So that's progress.

And I have finally unpacked my sewing machine and found some of my crafting stuff. Each time I move, I get all proud thinking I've finally managed to weed out the excess. I haven't. In the meantime, I've phone my mother about a billion times asking about fabric and she has not once told me to shut up and stop bothering her, instead listening to me and offering patient advice. I've definitely made progress from the days where I was terrified of threading the machine.

And although I know this is one of the most boring updates ever, I am relieved to finally feel that I have a normal life, that I can settle in and put holes in the walls and plants in the ground instead of spinning my wheels, biding my time. I know as well that a next step for me is to come back out of my shell and try to enjoy France for what it is. When I first moved here, I read tons of French books, I paid attention to music and movies and events, I went places, I did things...and after I had a baby I just tried to keep everything together. I'm working on finding a balance between sharing my culture with her and continuing to find a place for myself here.

Tomorrow I might put my post-baby bottom in a swimsuit and go to the pool with my family. This is progress.

ETA: Oh, I really need to do an authentic Ella update soon with this impressive language explosion that is happening. A recent addition to her vocabulary is manhole cover, although maybe I'm the only one who understands her when she says it. It seems a strange choice but there's one in front of our house that has great puddles for splashing, so she likes that.

And random French strangers are beginning to understand her French sentences. She has a larger English vocabulary but has been making lots of real sentences in French, which just bowls me over when I hear it. On the other hand she's finally started saying "There you go" instead of just "Voila," which makes me think of My Big Fat Greek Wedding. And for weeks and weeks she has been begging to listen to "that song" by James Brown, but I think I would just shrivel up at the thought of what my parents would say if she ever said those words aloud. Shake your money maker...

2009-01-21T12:35:00.003Z

Six Random Things

Way back in November, the lovely and talented Beth from Burkina Mom In France tagged me for my very first meme (in which I post 6 random things about myself) and I'm just now getting around to it. Initially I toyed with the idea of listing "I'm a procrastinator" as number 1 but that just didn't seem fair. So here goes:

1. I love KC & the Sunshine Band more than any person probably should. Right now I'm on a KC hiatus, though, given the fact that his lyrics are extremely simple, repetitive and raunchy and I'm living with a ~~human sponge~~ 21-month-old.

2. I was really into clogging for a while, and still miss it. The spark happened during a family trip to Dollywood, and my mother found some other parents willing to carpool their kids to take lessons an hour away. I still have my fancy shoes here -- unfortunately I didn't think of this during my labor dances, because I am sure I could have found fame on Youtube if I had. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, go here:

3. For a couple of years, I was a member of a volunteer rescue squad. Boy, do I have some stories from that. Any thoughts of being a doctor were firmly squelched during that time as I learned that although not particularly squeamish at the sight of blood or bone or various other gory sights, I was not comfortable when I was the highest level person on a scene and felt the pressure of really, really not wanting to make a mistake. My sangfroid does not extend to my daughter, though, and I need to work on that. And although I learned how to start IVs, I tend not to look when people are poking me with needles trying to find my veins. It's just the idea that they are having to search for them that bugs me.

4. I've been to Obama, Japan and can confirm that its citizens tend to be nice people. Check it out if you are interested in getting out of the city and checking out the Japanese countryside.

5. Once I received a whole, extremely fresh squid as a gift while teaching in Japan. The principal helped me cut it up and poke out the ink sacks, then I took it to a friend's house and we ate as much of it as we could...first as sushi and then as calamari.

6. Cows frighten me a little. They seem big and unpredictable.

I'm supposed to tag six people, but for the moment I'm just tagging my former rescue buddy, Kathy.

2009-01-11T20:01:00.002Z

Not much to report lately, except that my in-laws are coming up to very kindly watch the babe while my husband and I celebrate my upcoming birthday. A very small part of me wants to do something new and exciting and visit Austria or England (heck, I'd take Belgium again despite being robbed there), but the very tired, less motivated part of me is winning out and we're planning a short weekend in Paris, an old friend. I've even got a substitute for my Saturday classes.

Otherwise, new developments in motherhood are as follows: I am a little burned out on reading Green Eggs and Ham, but it is currently Ella's fave and she asks for it incessantly. On the positive side, it sort of has a plot and I'm very happy she seems more interested in those now. Big Red Barn still gets a thumbs down every time, though.

She has also asked to listen to the James Brown CD two mornings in a row, which led to some confusion at first since she did so by leaning in my face and saying, "Get UP." Confused? I was, until the (very dim) light bulb went off over my head and I realized she meant, "Get up, get on up.*" At this point, she isn't cursing any more (okay, not so much, at least) but clearly I have some work to do in getting my act together. Once I could have sworn she said "Shake your money maker," but I perhaps wrongly discounted it. More Raffi it is, then. It's especially shameful when I think about all the cute French kids' songs she knows and how sweet she sounds then.

Today a little friend who is about 2.5 years older than she is gave her the "bises" (French kissy-kissy on the cheek thing) when we were leaving, and Ella got a look of pure happiness on her face. She's been interacting a bit with her playmates but lately she seems to be a lot more socially aware and I can see that she wants to communicate and play with them and loves signs of affection from them as well. She's really changed the last month, but I think I say that every month.

*************
*Mom, I am sorry to have to tell you that this comes from a song called "Sex Machine." I know, I know. If we look on the positive side, she cannot quote any lines from KC and the Sunshine Band, at least for the moment.

2009-01-04T22:58:00.002Z

It's because the glass was just too clean

On our brief daily outing we went to feed the ducks and geese at a local farm. Once the stale baguettes were gone, we decided to drool over the fancy food at the gift shop. We were not the only ones with that idea...a little guy in glasses, probably around 7, came in with his dad while we were browsing the wines. The dad started checking out wine as well when we heard a loud THWACK and looked up to see the poor kid holding his forehead and staggering around.

Apparently he had gotten a little overexcited looking at the fresh goat cheese and failed to notice that it was sitting in a display case. I don't know if he wanted to smell it or what, but he sure took a whack to his head. The guy behind the counter was all "Dude, be careful or you'll hurt yourself" and his dad scolded him and made him lurch over to stand with him. We left shortly after that but I hope the poor kid at least got his cheese.

2008-12-29T23:46:00.002Z

One good thing about being sick

We can't smell that awful fake Christmas tree anymore.

Or anything, really, although I did manage to get a whiff of Ella's dirty diaper today. Those generally will knock the paint right off of anything, though.

The downside of course is that I'm still up and needing to breathe through my mouth. Dammit.

2008-12-28T22:27:00.002Z

Christmas 2008 Wrap-up

Some of it is better left unwritten, but here are some of the highlights:

Ella's first earache
Ella's first (and I hope to God last) bout of chickenpox
Ella's lip pox that got infected and caused me to panic since it resembled the staph thing
Sinusitis and laryngitis for me
And now a family-wide case of la grippe, otherwise known as the flu.

I was tempted to joke that I now want to dress her in protective gear and an oxygen mask every time we leave the house like the overprotective mother I am, but rethought it after realizing it is sort of true. OMG.

Illness aside, Christmas was wonderful.

2008-12-10T12:49:00.002Z

The neighbors may have hanging Santas, but we have a Holiday Bottom

At present, I can walk out of my house, turn my head and see 5 creepy Santas. I'm sure more will come. But since turnabout is fair play, I'll share with you the reason our neighbors are probably mocking us behind our back.

Sunday was the official Day of Christmas Decorations. We compromised and bought an artificial tree that is fairly tall and very smelly (and so not in a good way). Our next objective was to then compromise on lights.

Me: Ooooohhh, can we please have outdoor lights?

Him: (happy he had already thought of an excuse so I won't embarrass him with my American tendencies in decorating) No place to plug them up, so no can do.

Me: (disappointed but already plotting a way to overcome this tragic situation) Okay.

Him: Hey, can we buy these lights? They're the kind we used to have on our tree as kids.

Me: (pleased that such an opportunity fell right into my lap) Sure, that would be great!

When we got home, I wasn't even forced to create a cunning plan since the plug adaptor wouldn't work with both sets of lights.

Him: Oh, no problem, I can just saw off the adaptor and then --

Me: (hurriedly interrupting before he has the chance to develop his cunning plan) I know where those would work! Inside the window! Then we wouldn't really need outdoor lights, see?

Him: (giving up early since he's already lived with me for 7 years) Well, okay.

Me: (arrange, arrange, arrange, fiddle...steps back...arrange, arrange arrange) So what d'you think?

Him: Let me try. (arrange, fiddle, arrange...steps back). Hm.

Me: (tilting head) What does that look like to you?

Him: Like we're mooning the neighbors.

Me: (holding a corner a little straighter) Is this any better?

Him: Nope. Still faintly obscene.

So we decided to just keep our Holiday Bottom. I've told myself that we're not in prudish SWVA, we're in France and if anyone can appreciate someone's rear end in colored lights, it would be the French (and perhaps the Italians). No one has knocked on our door yet so right now we're home free.

2008-12-05T09:41:00.003Z

A Random Post on Christmas Decorations

I should really try to take a picture of what seems to be the Christmas decoration of choice here. Please know I don't intend to be snarky, it just strikes me as funny. Anyway, I guess since not very many people have fireplaces anymore, Santa is forced to toss a rope up, hook it to your windowsill, and climb in the window in order to deliver presents. To me, it seems more logical to speculate that perhaps Rudolph's gleaming nose also has magical lock-picking properties and Santa could just walk in through the door like a normal person. Am I the only one that thinks it's a little creepy for some guy to be climbing in your bedroom window while you're asleep? Even if he is bringing you stuff? I know the ventilation system is less romantic than a fireplace, but even that seems like a better entry point.

My point is that I see lots of fake Santas climbing up ropes outside of homes and it's faintly disturbing because they never, ever end up looking like "Hey, here I come to bring you presents and Christmas cheer" but more of a "Help me help me I'm hanging off this rope underneath a helicopter being flown by Jack the Headless Pumpkin" kind of thing. It is very much a desperate Santa.

And now I'm wondering if they just don't do reindeer here. Is that an anglophone culture thing? Do they land someplace else than the roof? The thought just struck me that Santa is not climbing up to get in your window but instead rappelling down, which is slightly more comforting but the whole rope thing still throws me as does the fact all the Santas seem to be alarmed instead of confident.

*going off to ponder*

2008-12-03T12:10:00.002Z

A New Vow

Google has changed my life for the better in many ways, but at the same time there's a dark side that goes along with it. Someone really needs to invent filters for pregnant women and hypochondriacs that would exclude all the really negative, scary results (it'satumor.com, it'sdefinitelyatumor.com, wellmaybeit'sjustthatflesheatingdisease.org, and so forth). if I could do it, I definitely would (and believe me, I would try my best to get some big bucks out of it).

Today I'm adding on "parenting filter" to my list of Things to Invent since the internet is filled with parents of 20-month-0lds who are able to recognize all 26 letters out of order, count to 30, name all colors and shapes, hold conversations and have started work on their first novel. Okay, I made that last one up, but still. It's totally cool if people want to brag about their kid in one of those open forums, I just want a way to block out all the perfect geniuses when I'm looking for ideas on how to deal with the fact my little darling is now openly ignoring me. I think she's one step away from putting her fingers in her ears and saying "Nah nah nah old woman, I can see your mouth moving but I can't hear what you're saying." So, yeah, I will not be turning to Google for parenting advice any time soon.

The good news is that the big, ugly, p0ssibly cat-carrier-related bruise on her forehead is disappearing, and now she's saying "Oh, shoot" approximately 75% of the time when something falls on the floor. It's all over if she catches on to my cunning plan, so I'm trying hard to be discreet about it.

2008-11-25T12:19:00.002Z

You Can't Win 'Em All

Yeah, so yesterday was not exactly my best day as a parent. I think I accidentally knocked EllaBella over with the cat carrier...one minute she was beside me, then I turned to fasten the gate and she ended up face-down in the lane in front of our house; very drawn-out and dramatic and public.

And I knew this was coming, but she's definitely in that stage where she absorbs everything we say like a sponge even if it doesn't look like she's listening. Yesterday she dropped something and said "Oh, shit" as clear as a bell, so I'm trying to do damage control.

Otherwise, she's fine. The vet complimented her on her verbal skills and then asked, "Does she always talk this much?" as the kid chattered to herself for the entire visit. And yes, she does talk pretty much 95% of the time she's awake, which is useful in that when I cannot hear her jabbering to herself then I know she's up to no good. The pediatrician said something similar last week ("Oh, she's going to be a talker") and then day care has also mentioned her tendency to yammer under her breath as she goes about her business.

The cat has officially been diagnosed as depressed on the other hand, and I'm under orders to find ways to stimulate her. I've got birdseed so right now I'm off to see if I can attract some feathered friends to (the patch of gravel that passes as) our backyard.

2008-11-16T21:54:00.002Z

Because I'm Feeling Guilty...

since I haven't been good at keeping up with the blog. Things are crazy busy and there have been ups and downs but overall things are grand. Progress is slowly being made, boxes are disappearing, and I've started compulsive list-making again. There are some awards I need to give out and my very first meme (yay) coming up; just don't know when. But they're coming!

Ella is growing up and her personality is becoming more defined every day - she's sweet, funny, pigheaded, and a total chatterbox. She has enough hair for me to fix into ponytails...but just barely, and that's what makes it cute. Never thought I would be into that, but there you go. I am. She's really gotten into imaginative play and will diaper, feed, and push her baby doll and stuffed animals around in a chair that she uses as a pretend stroller. She keeps running into stuff, though, and I'm not sure if she's just imitating her mother (ahem) or if she's inherited my total lack of depth perception.

The cat is almost limp-free and is totally digging the house and windows and stairs and places to hide. She sometimes will tolerate Ella for very short periods of time, which is progress I suppose. We installed a cat door between the kitchen and icy-cold veranda, and she seems to love going in and out. It makes a horrible sound but I'm learning to cope with it, just as I'm learning to cope with our squeaky stairs and the fact that the cat's nighttime prowls are quite audible. And squeaky. But on the plus side, it will be harder for Ella to sneak out when she's a teen, right?

2008-11-01T21:34:00.002Z

We're In

And have internet! But no TV, which could be a good thing except I'll probably only waste more time in front of the computer. Should probably make a vow to dramatically scale back, seeing as how I had about a billion unread posts on Bloglines after my little hiatus. Crap. The good news is that I'm still celebrity gossip free, so that gives me hope I can kick this habit.

I feel like I've got more roots here in France, anyway, so will try to get on with "real life," whatever that turns out to be. Apparently it involves finding new homes for some of the charming insect/arachnid life currently inhabiting our house. One memorable moment involved carrying a spider outside in an empty baby food jar and trying to shake him into the grass, only to find that he had somehow anchored himself to the glass and instead came back at me like a yo-yo. Haven't seen him back in the house yet, but not convinced he's outside. Spent the next 15 minutes feeling creepy crawly legs on my torso and jumping around and vowing to find a new method of transport for spiders.

I finished Dracula for the RIP challenge but haven't been able to post a review about it yet. Perhaps I'll manage to do a belated one...

My parents are still here and helping out in so many ways. Ella's English is progressing nicely as a result of their visit, which is also great to see. We stayed in Vincennes for a couple of days at the beginning of their visit and had a great time at the playground at the Parc Floral, though I think she'll really profit most when she gets just a little bit older and can climb on some of the bigger (and quite amazing) structures. Today we made a quick trip to Reims to see the cathedral and car museum, and will probably go back again when it's less rainy and cold.

It's good to have a bedroom. And closet space. And be able to see walls again, although that only means we'll have to paint them. Our veranda is colder than our refrigerator at this point, so my dreams of making a cool play area for Ella will have to wait, at least until we figure out how to get it insulated and heated. Wait, there's an unintended pun in that sentence, but you know what I mean.

Oh, and there were a few trick-or-treaters who stopped by yesterday! I was so excited. Next year I'll be ready for them. When I said, "Happy Halloween" to the last group, one of the girls asked me where I was from and then said, "Oh" rather dejectedly when I told her I was American. Tant pis, as they say...maybe I'll win her over next year. Wish me luck in charming the neighbors!

2008-10-16T22:40:00.003+01:00

File This Under: Random things that could be useful in an emergency

Stayin' Alive really works --

U.S. doctors have found the Bee Gees 1977 disco anthem "Stayin' Alive" provides
an ideal beat to follow while performing chest compressions as part of CPR on a
heart attack victim. The American Heart Association calls for chest
compressions to be given at a rate of 100 per minute in cardiopulmonary
resuscitation (CPR). Stayin' Alive" almost perfectly matches that, with 103
beats per minute.

(Full article from Yahoo! news)

It sounds funny but I think this is a stroke of genius. I've done CPR only once for an extended amount of time but I can see how some kind of framework like this would be useful to just about anybody! Don't know if this study cost more than the price of a CD (though I'm almost willing to bet this dude already had it at home), this is research money well spent, in my opinion. Now we just have to wait and see if the song will end up being part of the standard equipment in a first responder's pack...

*****

Blogging will probably be sporadic as my parents are coming for a visit and then we're moving! I'm going to try to get in a Dracula post before then, though.

2008-10-14T12:14:00.002+01:00

I voted

Godspeed, little ballot! May you travel swiftly over the ocean -- and be counted, since Virginia is apparently now one of the battleground states. According to Wikipedia:

No Democratic presidential candidate has won Virginia since Lyndon Johnson's landslide victory in 1964, and it was the only Southern state that went Republican in 1976. Virginia is no longer as reliably Republican as it once was... [snip, snip] Polls show Obama with a moderate lead in Virginia.

And good luck to all those college students trying to register to vote:

The Supreme Court's position is clear: a 1979 ruling found that all students have the right to vote where they attend college. But local officials often make students travel a rocky road. In recent months, registrars in counties including Montgomery, Va. (home to Virginia Tech) [snip, snip]issued warnings that were off-putting if not outright alarming: students who register in their college town could be ineligible to be claimed as dependents on their parents' tax returns and might be in danger of losing tuition scholarships. The problem, according to youth voter advocates and the IRS, is that these dire warnings are incorrect. After widespread outrage, the registrars backed off. But experts worry that the resulting confusion could sour first-timers on voting altogether.

2008-10-13T10:27:00.001+01:00

Totally Made My Day

Rednecks4Obama

2008-10-07T22:04:00.002+01:00

Am Alive; Still Swimming Swimming Swimming

Who knew how long it would take to scrape fuzzy carpet off of some really ancient (well, considering, they're not all that old) walls? Still a-workin' on the house and a-packin' me some boxes. The carpet came off (ew, ick, cough, cough) and then the paper behind that came off, sorta, which now leaves the glue, not to mention the highly questionable walls. Now thinking how to cover that crap all back up without showing how lumpy and crooked the walls really are. I thought I just wanted plain, smooth, white walls, merely involving a little plaster and some paint but clearly I was insanely optimistic. Thinking about readjusting my goals to something merely light-colored and not fuzzy.

But I promised myself I would not natter on and on about the walls.

Yet.

Today my adorable kid turned 18 months old and took another ride on the carousel, after which she cried because she was Just! So! Sad! it was over, after which I ~~bribed~~ distracted her with a cookie. So much for my resolution not to do that (I did note, however, that it was successful).

I know experts say not to let your kids watch TV before they're 2, but I also chose this milestone to introduce her to Gene Kelley's "Singing in the Rain" routine. She seemed to enjoy it though at her age, who doesn't like splashing in puddles? She really likes music and will request certain songs that she wants to listen to over and over. I can be one of those kinds of people, too, though, so we work pretty well together that way. In particular, she loves "Mr. Sandman" and "Barbara Ann" -- I'll give a virtual cookie to the person who can guess why.

She's adding on words and sometimes I'm surprised when she'll say a new one unexpectedly in its appropriate context. She likes naming animals, body parts, food, items of transportation and all that, and once in a while I swear she'll say a complete sentence. Mainly, though, our conversations go like this: Cookie? No, not yet, it's almost time for dinner. Cookie? No, not yet. Cookiepease? No. Nice try with manners, though. COOKIE? No. COOOOOOKKKKIIIIIIIIEEEEEE? No. Still, no. Now stop hanging onto my pants leg and go play with something. *silence* Juice?!

2008-09-25T21:53:00.002+01:00

Quick Update

I survived la gastro, realizing in the meantime that I no longer get sick days. Welcome to stay-at-home-motherhood, eh?

Kiddie classes have started, so technically I am working...even if it's not a lot and on Saturdays (boo).

La fille is going to daycare for two half days a week, and loves it. Apparently she just lives her life and goes about her business without problem while I'm not there. I'm both extremely proud and slightly jealous that she doesn't seem to miss me.

And last but not least --

We are the proud owners of a house! With a yard! Even if it is small enough that we could probably cut the grass with scissors, I am excited. We got the keys today and it's officially ours. There are still some small setbacks (one being that it's still not empty yet, and although technically I think that makes the stuff left inside ours, I'm sure they'll come back and get it when they can...I hope...because we don't really want any of that stuff and I seriously doubt it would sell on Ebay) but soon enough we will be able to sleep in our very own bedroom. And maybe, just maybe, we can stop jacking up the bed for extra storage space.

2008-09-17T20:21:00.004+01:00

RIP III: The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield

All right. I've decided it's time to come up with me own review system because stars are for math people. There's nothing wrong with being a math person - quite the contrary, I'm married to one - but I work better with words, and wanted a way to distinguish between good books that should be checked out of the library and great books that deserve a permanent place on my shelves. You know, some meaningful way to differentiate between "I liked it" and "I really liked it." The space issue is all too relevant, as I'm completely out of shelf space and have taken to jacking up the bed so we can shove more stuff under there.

The Official PMF Book Ranking Scale ™ (at least until I get a Kindle)

Keeper: Loved the book, highly recommend it, and will be rereading it in the future. Definitely has a place on my bookshelf. Go forth and support your local bookshop with this one.

Charming: Liked the book, enjoyed reading it, but not sure it merits precious shelf space. Something I'd prefer to get from the library instead of buying.

Eh: Didn't hate it, didn't love it, liked it a little. Might recommend getting it from the library to others, but only if all the books you really wanted are already checked out.

There's a bottom category called Recycle for Origami that is self-explanatory; there's only one book I can think of that would fit but I'd feel too mean to post about it publicly. After all, someone spent a lot of time on it, even if I did think it was total rubbish. Now, onto the review.

*************

The Thirteenth Tale is a modern gothic mystery about gothic mysteries, a book about book lovers for book lovers, a ghost story about ghost stories. The heroine is straight out of the classic vein -- neat, intelligent, well-read...a girl with convictions and sensible shoes, in short, one who would never wear lowriders or get her navel pierced. Vida Winter, "the world's most famous living author," has asked our noble heroine to serve as her official biographer; this is no easy task as Ms. Winter is also famous for always, always answering reporters' questions with fanciful spun glass creations. Our noble heroine agrees to take on the task, but only if she can be positive that Ms. Winter is finally telling her the truth. She starts to dig around in the past, only to uncover that the truth may be even more incredible than the lies...and that her own truth may be somehow intertwined in this story.

What makes the novel particularly fun is all the references to gothic classics. Readers of Jane Eyre will be able to recognize certain common elements in both books; apparently Rebecca is also invoked but I've never read that one so those went completely over my head. And there are others, if you are looking for them. The novel is well-written and I enjoyed the descriptions of both characters and setting. Windy moors? Check. Labyrinthian garden and protective cat? Check and check. Violent male character completely off his rocker, but only because he's so consumed with passion for a female character? Check. Although I can't honestly say I was completely engrossed in the story from the first page, once the main character starts her investigation in earnest I did get sucked in and had a hard time putting the book down. The atmosphere is pretty captivating! And oh, the ending -- I totally did not see that one coming. Love it when that happens.

Now, for the critique: there's a lot of hype surrounding this book, and while I did enjoy reading it and am looking forward to reading more of her novels, I'm not sure it completely lived up to my expectations. The main disappointment involved a hypothetical situation in which Ms. Winter proposes a test to see how much Margaret Lea loves books. There is a conveyor belt with a furnace at the end, and on the belt are all the copies of all the books you've ever loved in your entire life. Next to the machine is a man with his hand on the 'on' switch. In your hand you've got a gun. What are you going to do? Are you going to shoot the man or are you going to watch all those books disappear forever?

It seemed a little ridiculous to me. First, I'm holding the guy at gunpoint, so it seems like I'd already have the upper hand. Second, if the point is that I'm a booklover and want to save books, then shouldn't I at least try to take advantage of all my knowledge gleaned from reading and try to outwit him? I'm holding the gun; he's going to listen. Perhaps it would make more sense to just try to disable the machine, or at the very least I could remove the bullets and try to club him over the head with the gun. I'm a booklover, not a psychopath. Mind over muscle and all that. I was just not capable of suspending disbelief and felt it was weirdly out of place in a gothic atmosphere. I loved Fahrenheit 451, but this paled in comparison. There were other mild moments of disappointment I had while reading, but this was the one that I'll remember. Overall it was a bit of a strange reading experience in that I'd be completely captivated by the backstory (which is superbly done) but at times during the 'present' of the book I'd be left unmoved.

Sooooo I have to say that I'd rate this book a very high Charming but not quite a definite Keeper. I really do think it's a worthwhile read but I'm not sure that I'll reread it as often as the books mentioned within, especially now that I know The Secret. It's definitely a good choice for a RIP read!

2008-09-11T19:33:00.002+01:00

What's been going on this week (or how I traumatized my kid today)

La gastro, also known as the stomach flu. It's hanging over my head like the sword of Damocles but I'm trying to be optimistic that all the hand-washing has paid off. My husband was hit hard and the baby currently seems to be recovering well. Am thinking the Japanese mask campaign would work pretty well here and wish it would catch on. Have done lots and lots of laundry.
Woo hoo -- I finally have my 10-year residency card! Will not go into details because I think my fingers would bleed from all the pent-up resentment and frustration unleashed by typing. Now we'll just have to wait and see what other roadblocks the loan people will throw in our path before we can move into our new house WITH A YARD. (Ouch, that hurt...must calm down)
My child is totally weirded out by Play-Doh. I thought it would be a special fun thing to do today, seeing as how we were both up all last night in less than desirable circumstances. But no, she hated the stuff despite my best efforts to show her how wonderful it is. Me: No, really, it's fun! Go ahead, squish it! Her: Ewwwwwww get it away from me, it's pliable and grooooooooosssssssss GOOD GOD WOMAN DON'T LET IT TOUCH MY FOOT run away run away! So, I guess I'll have the Food Factory to myself.

2008-09-09T19:59:00.005+01:00

RIP III Review: Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

I've been thinking about how to review this and have decided I'm going to just jump right in. Who has time to try to be clever and original about a classic when there's a nasty gastrointestinal virus lurking about your household? So here goes...

Main reaction to the book:

Frankenstein is truly a weird little book. This was the first time I'd read it, and I found it complex, complicated and unexpectedly short. But I liked it, and it's going to be something I'll read several times because there were too many themes for me to be able to absorb in one go 'round. The conflict between science and nature, the influence of nature versus nurture, the impact of loneliness and the need for socialization...these are only some of the main themes in the book. And all of the themes I managed to pick out are equally important today as they were when this book was written. I've written about the tragedy at Virginia Tech in previous posts and as I read the novel it kept coming back to mind, so for this reading I suppose the focus was on loneliness, isolation, and failed attempts at communication. Later on my focus could easily change to the prospect of cloned animals already being in our food supply. And later on, something completely different. The possibility is there.

Basic outline (spoiler-free):

It really isn't about the monster at all (who goes unnamed in the story -- apparently we the readers are the ones who have taken the step to give him a name). The plot centers around the creator, Frankenstein, an ambitious, intelligent young man who has devoted himself to the study of natural sciences. He proves himself to be a worthy scholar and throws himself headlong into the discovery of the origins of life, where he finds success. His compulsions and rationalizations in his scientific work are explained to us and then we are drawn into the resulting nightmare along with him. He's not a wholly sympathetic character, though, and so I was unsettled throughout the book, not knowing who really deserved my pity.

An unexpected detail:

The descriptions of natural setting were awesome and added a lot to the unsettling atmosphere of the book. Some of them I've visited fairly recently and some of them are familiar to me through blogging friends, so I felt a deep connection with certain landscapes. Others were completely alien and exotic and thus appropriate for a good RIP read. Throughout the book there were vast changes in setting that I wasn't really prepared for, but felt that they really added to the emotional experience of reading. Sometimes I get annoyed with long, drawn-out descriptions of bushes and shrubs and so forth, but everything worked for me in this case.

Shelley trivia:

She was in her late teens when she wrote Frankenstein.
The novel developed out of a "friendly ghost story competition" that was suggested by Lord Byron.
The inspiration for the novel came from a dream.

Words of advice:

Shelley's life is at least as interesting as her most known work, and it is definitely worth the time and perhaps expense to seek out a copy that includes at least a short biographical essay. Last year I checked out some random, scruffy, dog-eared, teeny-print copy from the library that was so minimal and ugly that I opened the book once, said, "Ugh" and put it away. I found a sale copy of Frankenstein that included an introduction, footnotes and the like, and that was a good decision on my part.
It's not particulary scary or gory, just really unsettling and thought-provoking. I think it's a book that needs to be read towards the end of summer/beginning of autumn; the mood fits this time period rather than closer to Halloween, when I'm ready to get my freak on with scary books. If it's in your pool, read it towards the beginning of the RIP challenge, I think.
Be forewarned that it took me a few minutes to figure out when the book actually started. There's a layered narrative thing going on, which to be honest I found confusing and disliked. I'm willing to overlook that in light of the overall benefit of the novel, but just wanted to encourage people to roll with the beginning because it does get better. I remember hitting Chapter 5 and feeling that this was actually the beginning of the book and the previous pages were a little bit of tedious but necessary scene setting. I guess if you really get frustrated you can go ahead to Chapter 5 and then go back to catch up as needed.
If you do buy a book with an introduction, read it last. My copy had a great introduction that had huge plot spoilers in the first paragraph, unfortunately. Really, they should put these kinds of things at the end where people can appreciate them better. Harumph.

2008-09-04T19:25:00.002+01:00

This post made me cry

I'm upset at the injustice in the world. I'm rethinking my own actions as I walk down the street. I'm thinking about what I can do about it, here, because I can recognize that man in the surrounding community.

A hollow invitation to the table

It's written by a former college classmate whom I admire tremendously. Her blog started out documenting her first attempts at gardening and has just taken off. This post is about her experiences at Slow Food Nation in San Francisco. Read it...please. It really is food for thought. The topic is complex, but I have to agree that the situation she describes bothers me. A lot.

2008-09-02T21:52:00.003+01:00

Events of the Day

(pointedly ignoring the $)@%*(#! housing loan application)

* Someone threw themselves under the train my husband was riding to work. That sucked.

* I was cleaning the Babe's nose - not a fun task for either of us - when she said, "Garble gabiwvlmcshu kunchee BOOGER" in a voice that was both pitiful and pissed off. But maybe you had to be there.

* Discovered I have a knitting disability, apparently. Continued working on the Babe's Easter Bunny (oh, well, maybe next year), watching the freaking Phildar video and starting over about 12 times. I'm hopeless.

* Made some pretty tasty food: pumpkin, potato and pea soup with pasta for lunch, and a spinach/quinoa/cottage cheese thing for dinner along with a tomato salad made with one of the best 'maters I have ever tasted.

* Giggled inside at my daughter when she tried to win over strangers by shouting "Bonshooooor" whenever they approached. Middle school aged boys are tough customers, though.

2008-09-02T12:43:00.003+01:00

RIP III Review: Mort by Terry Pratchett

Oh, Mr. Pratchett, where have you been all my life?

Anyone who loves books will understand what it feels like to discover a new series. I've learned to squirrel them away like nuts in winter and take them out at just the right time when they're most needed. I've had Mort in my special literary hidey-hole for some time now and decided that now was the right time! It's definitely going to be a re-read -- once I can find it, that is, as my 17-month old has apparently hidden it away in her special literary hiding place. *looking around...nope, still not in sight*

I guess the best reviews are short ones, so I won't go into too much detail about Pratchett's Discworld novels. They're so full of wit and fun and are at the top of my list of fantasy novels. I saw them once referred to as fluff -- and maybe they are -- but they are the best kind of fluff. Discworld is filled with memorable, quirky characters and just the right amount of new twists on old favorites (dwarfs, wizards, and so forth).

One of the primary characters in Mort is one of my Discworld favorites: Death. He's a rather bony chap, grins a lot, makes odd clattering noises when he walks. Yup, that's right -- he's a skeleton, in robes, with a scythe, carries around hourglasses, the whole bit. The Font Wizards have produced a bit of magical bookery in that he also talks in all caps without seeming angry. As you read his words you can hear bells tolling, but in an oddly cheerful way. I'm sure I'm not explaining it well, but if you see it you'll know what I mean; trust me.

As you can imagine, being Death is not that easy of a job and he decides to take on an apprentice. He chooses Mort*, a gangly fellow who has the best of intentions but just doesn't manage to get the job done correctly. You can imagine the catastrophic results when Death sends him on his first solo job...

I devoured this hilarious book in two days and recommend it to anyone needing a bit of escapist fiction. Don't get me wrong, though -- there are serious questions answered within. Does Death have feelings? Can history be altered? Is it possible to escape Death? Pratchett succeeds in making Death come alive as a character and has written a nice book with a few twists and lots of puns.

Now I'm left with one book less in my hidey-hole...but am eyeing The Colour of Magic or Feet of Clay to fill its spot.

*Mort is the word for death in French and quite possibly other languages, dunno.

2008-08-29T10:49:00.002+01:00

Today's Lessons in Motherhood

Crayons aren't as easy to clean off doors as you would hope.

Teaching your baby to blow bubbles makes up for the crayon.

2008-08-29T07:38:00.004+01:00

File This Under You have GOT to be kidding

I have to share this blog post by L.A. en vie, one of my favorite blogs. While I cannot personally claim to be one of the U.S.' shining stars in geography*, I did grow up in a tiny rural southern town a thousand miles from everywhere and our 3rd grade teachers made sure we knew all of our states and state capitals. Hell, I can even sing the states to you in alphabetical order (Fifty, nifty, United States...) although to be fair things do get jumbled up a bit towards the N's. That's still no excuse for not realizing that New Mexico is actually one of the 50 states. Good Lord.

Don't know much about Geography

And I also have a hard time believing that this company would refuse to recall a brand of sleeper bassinet that two infants have died in within the past year -- the bars are spaced too widely apart and the babies slipped through and became entrapped. SFCA Inc bought the previous company's assets at an public auction and claims that it doesn't have any responsibility for products manufactured prior to their purchase. While I understand that it is probably annoying to recall product lines because the outer black line of dolls' pupils are made with lead paint, this is quite a different story. What's the deal?

Recall details are here

*Remembering a tiny hiccup a long, loooooong time ago, in noting the difference between South Africa and southern Africa when meeting my very first South African. I did in fact realize it was a country, but at the time for whatever reason I thought she was giving me a descriptive term.

The Bulls are Back

2008-08-28T11:14:00.001+01:00

My creation
Originally uploaded by espacemichelle

(blogged from Flickr)

This year's Toro Piscine (bulls in the pool!) was not as funny as last year's, but there were still some amusing moments. It's fun when the bulls seem to figure out what they are supposed to do and go for it! It's not so much fun for me when the bulls clearly just want to go home to their little field and smell the flowers, though...

In one of the photos you can see that the bull/cow/whatever is jumping over people who have thrown themselves down in the pool. There are several games that can be played, but the main idea is to get the bull's attention and convince him to run towards you and then through the swimming pool. In order for this to work, obviously, you'll have to get out of his way, thus the flinging yourself down in the pool while he jumps over you. Most of the time it seemed to work, although sometimes the bull did end up landing on people. They got up and limped away, so I guess they were all right.

One of the other games was putting a plastic ring on one of its horns, which entailed getting close enough to put on the ring while running fast enough not to be poked in the ass (some of those photos are also featured). I should probably note that my prize photo features what is called a "Camargue Suppository" -- I think you can figure out which one that is by yourself.

2008-08-26T16:59:00.004+01:00

RIP Challenge III is here!

Woo hoo - I've been waiting a whole year for this! Last year I completed RIP II, which was my first (and still only) participation in a reading challenge, and had a blast with it. It did wonders for my post-vacation morale and this year's challenge is promising to do the same.

I'm choosing Peril the First, for which I must* read 4 books from any subgenre of scary stories by October 31st. If you're thinking that this kind of thing sounds kind of fun but you don't have the time, you can choose a different peril -- Peril the Third only requires one scary book.

I have been keeping an eye out all year for scary books I want to read, so I'm pretty excited about the pool of books I have to choose from:

The Thirteenth Tale, by Diane Setterfield
Classic Ghost Stories, edited by John Grafton
Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley
Dracula, by Bram Stoker
L'homme aux cercles bleus, by Fred Vargas

and even though this isn't technically a scary book

Mort, by Terry Pratchett

Come and join us!

*Yeah, right, you'll really have to twist my arm for this.

2008-08-26T16:48:00.002+01:00

We're back from a wonderful vacation and the contrast couldn't be bigger. Not that I'm not happy to be back, but after 10 days of short sleeves and sunglasses it's hard to go back to long sleeves and a jacket! Gah.

The highlights of this year include a day trip to Sète and a weekend in Bordeaux, both of which I highly recommend. My heart still belongs to Burgundy, though. I'll try to throw some pictures up soon!

2008-08-13T22:07:00.004+01:00

Oh, you can tell by the way I use my walk

Here is an excerpt from an e-mail I received from my dear momma the other day:

Okay, enough of the election news, I'm ready for some more great pictures of our precious baby.

So. Back to our regularly scheduled programming.

ETA: 48 gossip-free hours and counting

2008-08-12T13:24:00.002+01:00

I am so ashamed...

primarily because it wasn't even *that* good of a dream. I mentioned yesterday that I had a dream about one of the presidential candidates, and while there are bound to be plenty of posts devoted to dreams about Obama, my own particular dream involved McCain. But it's not what you're thinking...

Apparently I was working in some capacity for the Obama campaign when I found myself sharing an elevator with McCain, who was so charismatic and charming in the dream that I told him I'd changed my mind and was going to vote for him instead of Obama, my current employer. We both exited the elevator, leaving me to ponder how I was going to possibly be able to carry off working for Obama while secretly supporting McCain. I know, I know, it sounds completely lame but it was an honest stressful nightmare because I didn't like feeling like a traitor.

The truth is that I haven't been following the election as closely as the last one, which bothers me a little because I feel that I'm slowly losing touch with the US and that hurts. On the other hand, the Edwards confession has pushed me over the edge into a state of despair in an election where publicity campaigns mention Paris Hilton.

So, that's it. I refuse to be part of this mess anymore. My dirty little secret is that much like Miranda from Sex in the City, I used to love perusing celebrity gossip sites. It's my thing, let it go. Well, not any more -- Elizabeth Edwards, this is for you. And not only that, I don't want to see the McCain ad or anything even remotely related to it. I'm going to have to find sources that are as neutral as I can find, and if that means reading newspapers in French instead of English, so be it. I'm done.

2008-08-11T23:10:00.002+01:00

Originally I intended to write my non-baby-related post about my dream involving a certain presidential candidate *cough, cough* but instead it's going to be about my annoyance with Chris Chase who wrote the following comment on a Yahoo! sports blog:

To his credit, Bernard was gracious in defeat, clapping when the Americans
received their gold medals and shaking the hand of Michael Phelps after the
ceremony. Or maybe that was just his way of surrendering. The French are
pretty good at that one too.

Well, now, wasn't that a clever way to end his article? I just have no patience for that kind of thing. In general, the idea of the Olympics does appeal to me, although the reality is often disappointing what with the drugs and commercialism. I can tolerate a bit of "bluster," as he calls it, from athletes as long as it isn't mean-spirited, and I definitely appreciate a show of good sportsmanship. What irks me is this kind of petty barb toward nationalities, but when I think about it, this one is so old and overused that it merely merits an eye-roll. Moving on.

And what is up with the Edwards confession/scandal? That pisses me off more than anything, though not because I entirely buy into the argument that his private life shouldn't have any influence on how people view him as a leader. I don't know what the hell is going on or who to be pissed off at most. I'd like to give a few people a swift kick in the butt, first and foremost Edwards himself.

2008-08-08T20:05:00.003+01:00

Where, oh where...

has my blogging mojo gone? For about a year? I'm going to do my best to get organized and back in the game, because I have totally slacked off on the baby book and need to document what's going on in the cute little girl department. So, here goes, just for posterity...

She's learned a few new words this week: spoon (poo), door (doh), moon, apple, cookie, banana (mah na mah na, just like the song), eyes, and booby (she's weaned, just identifying body parts). Totally cracks me up. She's learned to get a book and then back up to my lap and fall in; I'm always happy to oblige.

The coolest part of my entire existence thus far has been figuring out how to communicate with her. I know that other mothers have done this throughout history, but I still find it fascinating. The other day she walked up to me while I was in the kitchen, leaned against me and said "Beep beep BEEP" and I knew she wanted the timer. She's never asked for it unless it was in her direct line of sight (and then she just points and yells "THIS!!!!") and she's never said "beep beep BEEP" either, so it was cool to see her remember that it was there and figure out a way to get it.

She loves pretend talking on the telephone and rummaging around in the spice cabinet. She's particularly fond of the tin of white pepper, for some reason. She also developed a game that I like to call "Sanford & Son," which consisted of digging through the recycle bin and taking out empty boxes and milk bottles and either throwing them around the kitchen or hiding them in various clever places around the house. That game was nipped in the bud for obvious reasons, though.

I had every good intention of writing about some of the other stuff going on in our lives, but you know what - it's Friday night and I need a beer. So I'll store it up (just like the freaking baby book) and do my best to write a non baby- or house-related post one of these days. Thank you for indulging me.

ETA: Since I honestly am afraid TFC* will go ballistic if I don't at least mention her: The vet removed her bandage and the leg looks awful, just like I guess you'd expect, but she's starting to put weight on it and it's less swollen. The vet, God bless him, said that humans who have this surgery have months of physical therapy (so she'll have a long road ahead of her and I shouldn't expect her to be running around normally for some time yet), but that she'll just do it on her own. And then he stopped and looked at me under his eyebrows and said, "Because she wouldn't tolerate it if you tried," which evidently means he thinks I was going to Google "post-knee surgery physical therapy program" and try it out on TFC, or something along those lines.

And his opinion of me is honestly my fault, since after the whole "cat is stressed by baby/are you nuts lady it's just a cat" discussion, I should just keep my mouth shut. But no, I made the same suppository joke with him (I swear, these things just pop into my head and out of my mouth and I CANNOT CONTROL THEM) and I'm not sure he got that I was joking. Oh, well.

*The freaking cat

2008-08-03T22:10:00.002+01:00

It's been a busy month, but it's August and things are sure to slow down for the simple fact that everyone is on vacation 'round here. The girl is better, almost completely better, although she still hasn't healed 100% and I'm trying not to worry about that too much. At this point I think it's safe to say that the whole hospital stay/illness has faded from her memory (although not from mine). Kids are amazingly resilient, they are. She has a slew of new words and is running around and getting into all kinds of crazy mischief, looking like a teeny-tiny cowboy because of the scarf I keep tied around her neck to protect her scarring skin from the sun. I feel a little embarrassed on her behalf, poor thing, to have a crazy American mother who still hasn't learned the French art of scarf-tying. I am in the process of trying to craft up something to protect her neck that will look better and not be too dangerous or hot. I'm definitely open to ideas.

So, some of you may remember that the cat ended up with ulcers and ended up taking The Girl's old reflux medicine. The vet laughed a bit at my suggestion that she was stressed out by the new addition, but I remain convinced that there's some kind of jealous competitiveness going on. The proof? The cat has gone and got herself her very own operation, although not on her neck. She has a bionic knee and was also prescribed anti-inflammatory medication but since The Girl's was in the form of a suppository I put my foot down and shelled out the euros for special cat pills. I'm sorry, cat, but I have to draw the line somewhere.

The upside to this is that we're now able to price things in a whole new light. You've heard the old cliche, "costs an arm and a leg," which is pure hyperbole and altogether vague. "It costs a cat's knee" is all too precise for this household, unfortunately. I think she'll pull through all right but hasn't quite demonstrated the same kind of resiliency as The Girl.

As for the house, I think things can finally move forward since I managed to successfully leave the Prefecture clutching a form of legal papers in my sweaty yet grateful little palms. It took us a while to figure out who to call in order to get the ball rolling, but the lack of said papers was blocking our loan and we weren't going to be moving anytime soon. I would like to take this time to officially express my appreciation to the nice lady at our local town hall who did her job well and saved me the trouble of having to camp out overnight for a decent spot in line. Merci mille fois, nice mairie lady, and may your vacation be mosquito-free.

2008-07-11T17:30:00.002+01:00

I don't even know where to start, only because so much has happened over the past year and a half and I haven't written about it publicly. The post-partum issues that I briefly mentioned are more anxiety-related than oh, say, the fact that I still get a little nervous if I sneeze right after drinking a big glass of water. So, the past couple of weeks have been difficult for me for a couple of reasons but I think we're both doing well at the moment. Everything's gonna be all right.

Short version: she had an abscessed lymph node in her neck brought on by staph. The whole ordeal involved me taking her to an ER, a couple of days later to a pediatrician, then a couple of days after that to her official pediatrician who sent her directly to the ORL (ear, nose, throat) emergency room at l'hopital Necker in Paris. They then admitted her, did a scan in the evening and operated on her that same night. They kept her for 4 days since she had a drain inserted and started a treatment of 2 different antibiotics.

She was initially on intravenous antibiotics until the line stopped working, and in spite of the best efforts of 2 nurses and an anesthesiologist had to instead get shots. We were told that the shots were quite painful; not the needle but the medicine itself, and from my observation this is true. Since Monday she's been stuck by needles about 18-19 times, has bruises all over her arms, hands and feet, and gets upset whenever a strange woman comes too close to her. I'm hopeful that with time, her mistrust of people will pass. There was a loss of innocence this week that is heartbreaking for me, but I suppose that is part of being a parent.

The good news is that today at home she was her happy self with me and we laughed a lot together. She's learning to shake her butt to music and help herself to the box of baby cookies. I also have to say that I was really impressed by the staff at Necker and have nothing but good things to say about them. They were very kind to my baby, professional and competent in their work, but in addition to that I felt that they made every effort to respect their patients even if they were too small to be able to communicate. It's hard to explain what I really mean here but I really did appreciate that. There was a respect for babies as a person and that was important to me as one of the mothers.

2008-07-10T20:25:00.002+01:00

Okay, now we're really back, this time from a trip to the ER that turned into emergency surgery and a 4-day stay at the children's hospital in Paris. When I said the babe was under the weather, I was just trying to keep my shit together but she's much better now and everything's going to be all right. She's running around full-speed ahead already.

The surgery itself was a relatively minor procedure, unfortunately but necessarily done under general anesthesia. I'll try to update with details soon; we'll be around this weekend if anyone wants the gory details or just to chat. Hug your babies.

2008-07-06T20:51:00.002+01:00

Home again, home again, jiggety jog

We headed down south for a cousin's wedding; the babe and I stayed for a week while the husband brought home the bacon. My in-laws and I took Stinkerbella to the beach for the first time and she had a blast. She loved the water and the sand, collected plenty of seashells, and toddled towards any kids she happened to spot. She can say her name now and has added et voila, la bague ("la ba") and la montre ("la mon") to her vocabulary, along with the inevitable mamie and papi. But only when she wants to. I've been working hard on English but that took a back seat this past week. The only progress is that she will sing "Row, row, row..." but gets mad if I continue with "...your boat, gently down the stream" so it becomes "Row, row, row NO NO NO." Twinkle, twinkle is now for losers, man, and NO duets, please thank you.

The only drawback is that she's been under the weather but holding up rather well in spite of everything. As I said before, she enjoyed the beach and isn't consistently cranky, but tomorrow it needs to be taken care of. Am trying hard not to worry too much; not doing a very good job. Also need to find time to take the cat, who has developed a mysterious limp, to the vet and then at some point this week I suppose I'll be heading to the prefecture to stand in line for my interim papers until the stars align and they grant me the carte de sejour. Still intending to write about the house but have someone to attend to...

2008-06-25T16:18:00.003+01:00

Wordless Wednesday

2008-06-25T10:43:00.004+01:00

So much news and so little time...

that I'll avoid the big stuff altogether and write about something funny that happened at the post office. Something funny always happens at the post office...I think it's because it serves as both a post office and a bank, and as a result has an enormous identity crisis.

I love our town here for so many reasons, but one of them is that I think people are generally nice to one another. And having a baby means that every time I leave the house at least one stranger -- usually a grandparent -- will stop and talk to us. I feel comfortable here and am slowly starting to initiate conversations on my own. It's clear though that I still need to be able to better filter who I do this with.

Today when I went to pick up a registered letter (housing contract -- woo!) there was an elderly woman who was ranting and raving about how the wheelchair lift was broken again. In all fairness I do have to agree that the thing does seem to break down on a regular basis and it took me a couple of times just to figure out how to coax it into working when it is supposedly in operation. Now I try to avoid it altogether and just carry the stroller up the stairs, but I can see how that is not necessarily the ideal solution for someone of her age and size.

The lady helping me -- originally the target of the rant -- said that 5 minutes ago someone had used it with a stroller and it was working fine then. The elderly lady just shouted more loudly and this prompted the post office employee to duck into the back room and get my letter. This left the elderly lady to continue shouting by herself as she shuffled towards the door with her walker/shopping bag.

I don't have a living grandparent and I decided that if she were my grandmother, even as ornery as she clearly was, I would want someone to try to help her. Carrying her on my back was out of the question since she was quite portly, so I opted for trying to be helpful with how to get it to work better. This was obviously the wrong option because she only started shouting more loudly and was offended that I had implied she didn't know how to operate the stupid lift. I was torn between backing away slowly and fleeing. I fled.

Helpful post office lady had returned by that time so I got my things together and left. Crochety old lady was taking a break halfway down the stairs, shouting anew at some man about a different topic. I skittled down the stairs and speed-walked to the safety of my car.

2008-06-21T15:14:00.002+01:00

A conversation with my husband

So, do you like my new haircut?

Yeah, looks good.

[pause]

It's really degrade (layered) in the back, though.

[pause]

You don't like it?

Well...do you remember the movie, This Is Spinal Tap?

2008-06-19T07:00:00.002+01:00

We may soon have a yard

albeit a very tiny one. And partially filled with gravel. No mind, I've already started planning the small vegetable plot and looking online for lilac bushes.

We put an offer on a house. Scary but exciting.

2008-06-18T07:30:00.005+01:00

Wordless Wednesday -- Afternoon at the playground

2008-06-13T22:28:00.003+01:00

This cracked me up

...A LiveJournal community where members wrote their daily post as if they were in the middle of a zombie uprising. Click on the link to read what happened...

2008-06-11T22:46:00.002+01:00

Random bits and bobs, just because I can't sleep

* Today was the end-of-year show. The kids did wonderfully, I'm sure I looked like an idiot. (So what's new, I hear you thinking). Ah, you live, you learn...next time I'll do something different. If there is a next time. Have been sorely tempted by the thought of going into beekeeping. Maybe organic beekeeping. Since I:

-- do not own property, and I'm sure that's a requirement of beekeeping;
-- know nothing about beekeeping or bees in general;
-- am rather a jumpy person and am pretty sure that beekeepers need to be fairly calm

this is more or less just an idea to flirt with until I decide whatever it is that I really want to do. I like working with the kids, but there's still something missing...until then, please keep an eye out at garage sales for those big hats with veils.

* Had the 14-month checkup. Things look good, weight gain was great. The baby tends to (really, really) over-pronate while walking and we'll have to keep an eye on that. Are orthopedic inserts in her future? No big deal, though.

What was a big deal was the screaming fit she threw at the doctor's for the first time, completely out of the blue. I was holding her in my arms and doing my best to calm her down but she was crying and screaming NO NO NO NO NO throughout the entire thing, stethoscope, ear/mouth/tummy check, measurements, the whole bit. The doc said, "She's saying 'no' like that already? Oh, well, she's a bit in advance for this kind of thing" and was more or less goodnatured about it. It made me feel completely incompetent, though. Fun times.

On a happy note, though, she is in general a very sweet baby and has been randomly coming up to me and giving me hugs and kisses. Rarely when I ask for them, but generously on her own. She also has parts of 2 songs down, not necessarily the words but some initial consonants and the general tune, just enough for me to be able to tell what she's singing. If I can figure out how to do it, I'll put them on the blog and let y'all guess the tune.

* The house thing is weighing on us a little bit. We have one we might like but are afraid of making the wrong decision and definitely don't want to rush things. Honestly, though, I have to tell you it would be soooo nice to be able to sleep in an honest-to-god bedroom. When you have a baby, there are plenty of guidebooks on how to feed them and get them to sleep and so forth, but nothing that tells you where to put all the stuff that comes with one. And as they get bigger, they somehow end up with more stuff, no matter how hard you try to avoid it. I am totally not kidding when I tell you that our only option for making more space in the apartment at this point is raising the bed higher off the ground. We've been doing that. As a last resort I guess I can store stuff in the trunk of the car.

* Nouvelle Star 2008 has finished. I think I've mentioned it before, but in case you've forgotten it's the French version of American Idol but so much better. It was kind of a blah year and I didn't really get hooked on any one person as I have in the past, although I did like the last two finalists. Benjamin was a cutie pie of a 20-year-old and Amandine reminded me of Melissa Etheridge. Amandine won, and that's pretty much all you need to know about the show this year.

Except that the judges have changed -- they've grown on me, though -- and I'm surprised that Lio, the female judge, managed to get through the entire year without a single Nipplegate. It's well known that girls make up most of the voting population, and I think the constant tension of "Is one of her boobs going to finally pop out tonight?" was supposed to garner at least more male viewers. Not sure how that's supposed to help them vote, though.

2008-06-10T20:34:00.004+01:00

Wordless Wednesday -- 9:00 p.m. on Tuesday

View from the window. It's hard to show the real beauty of the light.

2008-06-08T20:18:00.002+01:00

Houses, houses, and more houses

My parents have lived in the same house as long as I can remember, so for me that place still has a strong sense of being home. At some point when I was a kid I realized I would grow up, move out and then make my own home. For a long time I always felt that I wanted to buy an older house in the country with a porch and hardwood floors. There'd be an enormous yard with a couple of animals and somehow I would have a fabulous vegetable garden. I tended to gloss over details like mowing, tilling and weeding, though. And God only knows that it never occurred to me that I might marry a Frenchman and move to Europe.

Then I'd collect memories and add them to this imagined home. The magnolia tree was inspired by a conversation I had with a girl at college who was a c0-counselor for the summer Japanese exchange program. We were walking back from town when we passed this enormous magnolia tree, and she told me that when she was a little girl her mother used to cut the blooms and bring them into her room at night in a cup full of water and she'd fall asleep in a room filled with this marvelous smell. She said that her mom did one special thing like that for each sibling that she didn't do for any of the others. It was such a beautiful memory for her and a beautiful story for me that I decided to keep it.

The lilac bush comes from my sister and the forsythia from my grandfather. Any fruits and vegetables that manage to eke out of the ground would be from my parents, particularly strawberries and sweet corn. I believe that my idea of the house comes from my Great-aunt Hattie, whom I barely remember. I do remember visiting her old house one day and deciding I wanted to live in one just like it after my cousins moved in (though as I recall, my parents thought that might not be the best idea). Since living in Japan I secretly long for a tatami room but know while that desire is technically possible, it's going to take some time and money and perhaps a lot of convincing of the husband.

So...as we've started looking at houses there have been signs that perhaps I shouldn't hold on too hard to these tiny details. I'll try to post about them soon. I could have had my lilac bush and could have had the old house with those awesome wooden floors, but it was just all wrong for us. We have seen one place that I didn't like initially but by the time we left, we both saw a lot of potential. It's nothing at all like I imagined, but I think we could be happy there. We'll see...

2008-06-07T12:51:00.001+01:00

Blogger Question

Anyone know why my edited posts aren't showing up in Bloglines? Because my edited ones are just so much better *cough cough* than the original. Although maybe I should just be relieved that the litterbox story didn't show up.

2008-06-07T09:05:00.004+01:00

Week In Review

I want to keep up with this blog, I really do, but somehow it's become the graveyard of well-intentioned but never finished posts. I've been wanting to post photos at least once a week because France is just full of cool photo ops, especially now that all the public spaces are in full bloom. It's a little late for New Year's Resolutions but I'm going to try to get back on track.

Anyway, here's a brief summary of what's happening in our lives:

*Agencies: I contacted a couple and told them what we are looking for. They haven't proposed anything yet, so today the husband is visiting a few others. We'll see if they call him back or not.

*Work: My teaching year is wrapping up (if you can count 2 classes a week a workload) and we're preparing for the end-of-year show. I'm doing something different than the basic song and dance I did in the past; one project is with another teacher, involves a lot of work, and will either be really cool or fail spectacularly. I think the kids are having fun though and that's important when doing this kind of thing in public. Today I've got to work on a kind of Reader's Theatre/Pantomime with the other group and introduce them to Queen. We'll see how it goes.

*Baby: Funny and ornery as usual. She's been waking up happy and toddling around. She clearly has this attitude that it's her job to pick up various objects and carry them from room to room, and she attacks this in all seriousness. She'll walk up with something in each hand, show me what she has, and then go find something else. As far as I know, my role in this is just to provide the commentary. Oh, and then to clean everything up...that part's not always as fun. Annnnnnddd I did catch her playing in the cat box (I know, I know) but thankfully that game hadn't progressed very far.

*Fun Family Visits: My aunt Linda came for a visit! She's in France with some friends and stopped by on Friday. It was great to see her and catch up on everything. She came bearing books, the Miley Cyrus Vanity Fair, and some See's Candy, so a very heartfelt THANK YOU for those! Hope you have a great trip.

Okay, I've got to get organized for my class and don't have time to think of any kind of conclusion. I feel guilty ending posts this way, but don't have enough brain cells left for this kind of thing.

2008-06-05T11:17:00.003+01:00

Before the Baby Wakes...

We visited 2 apartments and 3 houses on Sunday, and I'm getting the feeling that we're going to end up going through an agency just because if the property is really good, it will be sold the day it's put on the market. We saw some nice places but there wasn't a coup de coeur (love at first sight).

There was, however, a strong "like at first sight" only to be tempered by the fact that the monthly charges were way too high. I don't know how to translate charges because my brain is mush at this point, so I'll just have to explain it as the money that apartment owners have to pay to the homeowner's association for things like communal heating, the caretaker's salary, upkeep of the elevators and so forth. [If the translation ends up being something obvious like, oh, monthly charges, then I should probably feel a little stupid. But I've never owned an apartment back home so please just overlook it.]

The charges for this particular apartment were close to 300 euros per month, so that quickly adds up to quite a chunk of change that goes right down the drain. There was another house we really liked but felt we would grow out of in a few years (fingers crossed), so I guess we're now playing Goldilocks and holding out for something Just Right.

One very interesting experience was visiting the apartment of a former green beret, who was not at all bad-looking if you're into the very manly yet slightly dangerous type...perhaps a very clear-eyed Daniel Craig with lots of French charm. Maybe even better than that. He was married and had a lovely family, but he was definitely the one that leaves an impression on a person. The funny thing is that when we first walked in the apartment we both thought, "Wow, these people must really like boats." The decor was nice but definitely had a marine theme, and then everything more or less explained itself when I noticed the green beret (this link's in French) and military honors displayed in the den. The apartment itself was really nice but ultimately too far from the station.

So now we've got feelers out and are just waiting for new things to go on the market. Wish us luck.

2008-06-01T08:41:00.002+01:00

First Steps

Not only for the baby, but for us too -- we're going house/apartment hunting today.

The baby is walking more than crawling now, and it's both awesome and weird to see her growing up so fast. Yesterday we played a bluegrass CD for the first time in ages and immediately she started grinning and wiggling in her chair. Sunday mornings are usually reggae mornings but today we're jamming to some Waylon (not sure if this is a welcome change for the neighbors or not). This new stage is presenting new challenges, but there's also a whole new level of fun, too.

I know I haven't blogged a lot about the changes we've had going on, although I have started posts, but was interrupted and then never got around to finishing them. We ended up making the choice to stay in la region Parisienne instead of moving to les Vosges and it was not necessarily an easy one to make. I still miss the mountains and still long for a lilac bush to a degree that I know is silly, but in the end we felt it was best for everyone to stay around here.

We still have choices to make now, though, since my husband's daily commute is so long (3 hours total per day). We love our town but it's just so far from his job. On the other hand, it's a perfect mix of town/country for both of our needs...I'm a country girl and need to see some trees on a daily basis, and my husband is a city boy and wants to be able to walk to the bakery.

We've looked around the area where my husband works, and what we've discovered is that we can't afford to buy anything much bigger than what we have right now that's close enough to warrant moving out of town. Since we're currently sleeping in the living room after giving up the (one) bedroom to the baby, it's looking like proximity is less important that the fact that we need 3 bedrooms.

So, we made some calls and are starting the process of finding out what we can have here and how that will impact the commute. Maybe we'll still move somewhere else, maybe not...but it's exciting and a little scary to start the visits. Wish us luck, and if anyone has good advice of what to look for, it's certainly welcome!

2008-05-27T10:40:00.002+01:00

Rainy Day

On the menu for today: lentil curry with sweet potatoes, and if I get organized enough, chocolate chip banana bread. Sounds like a plan to me.

2008-05-22T15:53:00.003+01:00

These Shoes Are Made for Walking
(but only when she feels like it)

French baby shoes are just too cute. These were a (very) generous birthday gift from her Mamie and Papy, lovingly chosen for the ankle support and sturdy rubber tips.

2008-05-14T20:59:00.007+01:00

Okay. I'm back and feeling better. I've started several blog posts about on-going post-pregnancy issues but am not sure if I want to write about those publicly or not. Anyway...

THANK GOD FOR THE SUN. We've had a run of brilliant weather and have really tried to take advantage of it. It was wonderful to finally get out and hike around in the woods again after a long absence. We bought a pack for The Babe and my husband totes her around on his back and she rubs his head and yells like a wild animal. We've kept it more or less local, except for one fateful trip to the Normandy Coast where we tried to eat at a restaurant and I immediately realized that ham sandwiches and bottled water will be the norm for the next 17 years.

Oh, and I didn't blog about this, but my mom came for the baby's first birthday! I was so excited to have her here, and the baby sure appreciated it as well. Granny taught her to say "Up!" and she's saying it all. the. time. To me, to my friends, to random people we come across in the park who don't exactly understand but are nice enough to smile at her anyway...

Little Napoleon(ne)* is jabbering more and more. Her first word that she managed to use (mostly) correctly was go. She's also got bye-bye, bravo, this, and no no no down pat along with the ever-present UP!, along with her own versions of cracker and balloon. Sometimes I wonder if there are more French words that she's saying and I'm just too slow to pick up on it. Dunno.

I've still been going to the market every week and love that with all of my heart and soul. It seems like a small thing, but has made a big difference in our overall quality of life, I think. I've been discovering new vegetables and getting a better handle on seasonal vegetables. Although you can't really deny the convenience of being able to buy celery or green beans whenever you feel like it, I'm starting to prefer being able to talk to the person that grows my vegetables and plan menus around whatever is growing at the moment. Plus it's nice to have the farmers recognize us when we show up!

Here are a few photos from our walks. I hope to start posting more Wednesday photos again and maybe I'll even get off my butt and try videos soon!

Here are some of the birds I actually recognized at the Chateau de Sauvage...gorgeous area but I totally needed some help identifying some of the wildlife.

Well, I knew this one too, obviously.

I felt like I was in the land of the fairies.

A view of some of the fountains at Versailles. If I'm not mistaken, these are some of the ones that American funding helped to restore.

*She may be small, but she tries to intimidate.

2008-04-08T10:46:00.005+01:00

One-derful Birthday

She had her first ride on the carousel, her first bite of birthday cake (which was the worst thing I've ever made...sugar-free and that will be the last one), and presents. She also fed herself some scrambled eggs for dinner, which was a great present for me!

2008-04-07T07:47:00.004+01:00

One of the Happiest Days of My Life

Happy Birthday, Baby Girl! You are our shining star.

2008-04-02T10:50:00.004+01:00

Wordless Wednesday -- Trip to Market

Name that vegetable (I didn't eat these on a weekly basis until I moved to France)...

2008-03-30T21:22:00.002+01:00

Only 8 more days to go...

of cat antibiotics.

THANK. GOD.

We ended up wrapping her up in a towel and shooting the pill down her throat with an adapted cough syrup syringe, but it involved so much drama that my husband finally said, "I don't care how much that $#!@ special food at the vet costs, buy it." I never thought of her as particularly clever, but she proved me wrong. I can still give her the Mopral without fail, it's just the antibiotic that is nigh impossible.

So we now have some special stuff from the vet that works pretty much like Play-Doh...I stuff the pill inside it and make it look like one of her kitty kibbles. It works for the most part, although this morning's antibiotics had to go down the hatch with the towel method since she ate all the kibbles except the special two and wouldn't touch them.

She seems to be a little bit better and is not as mopey, so that at least is a weight off my shoulders. And although the vet swears that she isn't as stressed as I think she is, today she jumped a good 2 1/2 feet in the air when the baby let out one of her trademark piercing screeches. Honestly, I think she's just one whisker away from kitty Valium.

2008-03-28T12:53:00.003Z

Update, in case you were wondering

Well, the cat took the gel capsule of Mopral without too much trouble. The antibiotic, however, is another story. Crushing it up and putting it in tuna didn't work. Hiding it in cheese didn't work. Chopping it up and trying to stuff it in one of those gel capsules didn't work. Currently she has the cheese in her food bowl and I'm waiting to see if she'll give in and eat it once she gets hungry enough. [ETA: At the moment she is woefully sprawled out in front of her food dish, trying to guilt me into putting food into it. I will not be manipulated by my cat.] I feel like Beeyotch McMeany, but have run out of ideas. Once my husband gets home I guess we'll try the tried-and-true option again but I'm pretty sure it's taking hours off of all of our lives.

And I'm also fairly grumpy what with a trip to the doctor's for myself, the efforts with the cat, and a baby who isn't interested in either sleeping or eating. The babe did kindly go down for a miniscule nap so I managed to scarf down an early lunch and I'm getting ready to traipse back outside to deliver a test to the lab, pick up my own medicine and also beg for more of those little gel caplets. I'm going to play pharmacist again and try to get those stupid antibiotics hidden in a caplet and pray she'll take those as well as the Mopral. Then I'll come back home and wash the cat ralph (revenge? Quite possibly) off of my mother's handmade quilt.

2008-03-27T21:37:00.003Z

Pharmacy for Cats

One of the nicer American stereotypes is that we're optimists, or have the 'can-do spirit,' as one of my friends put it. Clearly I'm very American in this way (or have a stunning lack of insight, take your pick) since most French people would have picked up on the veterinarian's tone when he said, "And make sure the pharmacists separate the medicine into smaller pills for you -- it's their job." I just thought, "Okay, right, I just need to ask the pharmacist to do this, no problem."

I scrounged up our leftover Mopral and toddled on down to the pharmacy where the nice lady told me it was very tedious, mind-numbing work and would cost me twice as much as the medicine itself. It would take at least an hour, she said, and would be very expensive but she would sell me the gel capsules and I could take it home and do it myself. That would be much better, in her opinion.

Do you know those change-counting machines at supermarkets, where you just dump your change in and it counts and organizes your change for you? I had imagined that pharmacists have the same kind of magic machine in back where they dump medicine in and it comes out the other end in an appropriate format. Apparently they don't have one of those things. So I toddled right back home and made a photo journal of my experience, which is perhaps not the most fascinating of subjects but at least you'll know what you missed out on by not going to pharmacy school.

Gather the medicine as well as the gel capsules.

Open up the original medicine capsule and start counting. The prescription said to divide it into four parts.

I won't bore you with my method, but I ended up with 4 groups of 17 with a remainder of 3. This came in useful for replacing the ones that fell on the floor, never to be seen again.

The hardest part was obviously getting the appropriate number of beads into the smaller capsule. Originally I had intended to use a paper funnel, but it immediately proved impossible to remove an entire set of medicine without causing all the other beads to roll off the paper. My next tactic was to just try to shovel them in using the capsule itself:

which worked okay but the beads tended to dart off in different directions. It was kind of like the world's smallest game of pool, with lots of frustration.

Finally I decided to just jam the beads with my finger in hopes that they would stick, and then scrape them off individually into the capsule. I'm pretty sure this violates your basic standards of hygiene, so I sincerely hope this isn't what the pharmacists are doing.

I managed to finish half of the treatment before I turned into Scarlett O'Hara and decided to put the rest off until much, much later.

Now I'll just have to figure out how to trick the cat into taking the stupid pills. Tonight's first treatment of antibiotics was a complete disaster. I've only had to give her pills once before...tranquilizers for the flight over, and I just put them into some hairball treatment and she gobbled it right up. The antibiotics apparently taste much worse, so this technique was a flop and we had to revert to the tried and true technique of trying to shove it down her throat.

The problem was that the damn pill was covered in hairball goop and kept sticking to my fingers. The cat obviously was not being cooperative at this point so the pill would get stuck to her fur, my husband would let go of her and then I'd have to chase the cat down, find the pill, remove the largest clumps of attached fur and try again. I don't know how many times we did this until I managed to successfully fling the pill into her mouth and rub her throat to get her to swallow. Although I did technically manage to get the pill in her mouth, I apparently didn't get it far enough back as she immediately started foaming at the mouth and running around the apartment in distress. Who needs TV when you've got this kind of excitement at home? Tomorrow I think I'm just going to open up a can of tuna and be done with it. Sheesh.

2008-03-27T14:01:00.002Z

I've been feeling a little like a groundhog who saw her shadow one fateful winter's day and then went back into hibernation until warmer weather arrived. I can see blue sky as I type, so I'm going to emerge from my blogging black hole and post an update. Here goes:

We all traipsed to the prefecture today (only had a 2-hour wait, even with my appointment, which is not too bad) and I drove back home feeling hopeful that I will actually get my 10-year residency card this year. I don't think I elaborated on all the things I was asked to bring -- I'd say about 15 extra items that I wasn't asked for last year -- but my husband and I made a good faith effort to collect all requested documents plus extra copies and anything that might come in handy just in case the person decided to surprise us with a new request. We had quite a packet of papers that we ended up lugging to our appointment, and of course we weren't asked for at least 1/3 of it. This was quite predictable, but the trouble is that I am not willing to gamble on which third of the documents won't be necessary. One guy got hauled out of there in handcuffs by 2 people in plainclothes...not sure if he did something really bad or if he failed to provide his handwritten letter of motivation or whatever, but let that serve as a reminder to me not to take any chances.

One of the new things I was asked to provide was a translation of a certified copy of my birth certificate no more than 3 months old. Or something along those lines, at any rate. I have the original copy of my birth certificate, so when I asked if I could provide that instead, the very nice woman at the prefecture said oh, no, it was definitely important to have a new certified copy. I explained that there was no way for me to be able to receive the copy and have it translated in time for my actual appointment, and she told me to bring the original as well as proof that we requested the certified copy from the US, and then turn in the translation when I pick up my card. I'll spare you all the rigamarole of what I went through to try to get this stupid copy of my b.c., but it did involve effort on the part of multiple persons. Did today's lady even ask for my birth certificate at all? No...no, she did not. As soon as I got home from the prefecture, though, the postman rang my doorbell and delivered the certified copy. Maybe it will come in handy someday.

Now it seems that the mayor of the town I live in has to approve my request, and then they can process it for printing. If he so desires, he may request a personal interview with me within two months. If he doesn't get back to them within this time frame, then they'll just go ahead and print my residency card. So there you go. I'm still a bit nervous since I applied for my residency card last year and they only told me I was getting a regular 1-year card when I arrived to pick it up. I hope there won't be any nasty surprise like that this year; at any rate at least I'm ready with my stupid certified copy of my birth certificate.

In other news, my cat apparently has an ulcer. I will also spare you the gruesome but terribly evident details of how I knew she was sick, but I ended up dragging her back to the vet this afternoon. We went in January with slightly less icky signs of her malaise, and the vet didn't find anything despite a battery of tests. Today, however, he did find actual evidence of a gastric problem so we left with a prescription for 2 kinds of pills and special easily-digestible food. Now, our vet seems to be a good one and I like him very much, but according to him Tallulah is not affected by any kind of new baby stress because cats just aren't easily stressed out by that kind of stuff. And maybe cats don't get ulcers out of stress, but I've been pretty sure that Baby Hot Foot has been a source of anxiety and I have to wonder if this is the result. Dunno.

The lucky thing for us is that she's supposed to take the same kind of medicine for her ulcer as The Babe did for her reflux, so I can take those leftover pills to the pharmacy and ask them to transform them into itty bitty kitty pills. How often do you see that kind of coincidence, huh? They're Mopral sisters. Weird.

2008-03-12T20:24:00.004Z

Wordless Wednesday -- Path of the Tasmanian Devil

Look what happened on the way to the living room, Ma...

2008-03-07T07:47:00.002Z

Good News

I'm feeling marginally better than the Mrs. Grumpy Buns I've been for the past few days. My MIL very kindly got up at an ungodly hour and watched the babe for me while I returned to the prefecture. The good news is that I managed to see someone at the Information Desk and she was very nice. I only had to wait for 3 hours, even managing to actually sit down in a chair for a whole 15 minutes of that wait, and only a relatively short time of it was spent outside freezing my rear end off. During the cold portion of the wait I decided to work on my positive attitude and find things I was grateful for instead of being miserable about the temperature. The first thing I decided I was grateful for was the fact that at least it wasn't raining, and after that it was a piece of cake to come up with the others.

The other good news is that I am apparently eligible for my 10 year resident card, although some of the hoops I have to jump through are pretty funny. I'm asked to provide any documentation as proof of my integration into French society. Any posts where I refer to my living room as "Little Virginia" probably won't count, eh? I've been thinking about carrying around a form where local businesspeople can testify to my always saying, "Bonjour" and "Au revoir," just like a French person would. Well, maybe not *just* like a French person would because sometimes I still get tricked into saying Bonsoir when the other person says Bonjour and vice versa, but clearly I'm making the effort. Otherwise, the fact that I curse almost entirely in French now should count for something, but I'm going to guess that this kind of thing isn't exactly what they are looking for.

The bad news is that the sore throat that I had been ignoring for a while has turned into some kind of nasty strep-like infection, which I will promptly blame on all the waiting in the cold because I'm still just a little bit grouchy about that. In all fairness, though, I will say that I ended up visiting a very nice doctor who prescribed medicine that I didn't have to pay one single centime for. The office visit cost me 22 euros and all of that will be reimbursed either by social security or by our health insurance. These kinds of things really help put the visit to the prefecture into perspective: I've said this at least 10 times but the French medical system really is as good as they say. People are right to try to protect it.

2008-03-04T19:59:00.002Z

Liberty, Equality & a Lot of Standing in Line

Yes, folks, it's that time of year, the annual Pardon My French bitchfest about going to the prefecture to renew my carte de sejour.

This year, though, it's going to be abbreviated. There's just no point in bitching about the same stuff that happens year after year.

Except now it's with a baby. We stood in line for a very long time. I had her bundled up, so the cold part wasn't too bad. A very nice man who was standing in line just in front of us made room for me to bring the stroller inside so she could be warm. She smiled her gap-toothed smile at him and babbled away. Another very nice lady standing just in back of us helped me navigate my stroller since my arms were full with a baby who no longer wanted to sit and stare at someone's butt. I hope they both were able to get what they were after.

When I got to the "accueil" window (accueil means welcome, but don't be fooled) I was informed that today's standing in line was all for naught since the information desk was closed. Come back tomorrow morning, she said. Now, I'm still into this good karma business so I didn't go into the dance of the albatross or anything like that. I just decided that since we made the trip and stood in line, I might as well try to get some extra information. I should have kept my mouth shut.

Last year (2007), I was encouraged to apply for my 10-year card at the information window. The person who delivered my actual card said, "Sorry, you can have it next year (2008)." Today's lady said, "Oh, this year is too early. You can have it next year (2009)." Whatever.

Then she told me something I already knew: for the rest of my questions, she said the person at the information window would decide what to do with me. Will I get a receipt showing I've applied? Will I get an appointment? Will something else happen? There are no hard and fast rules; it's all up to the person I see tomorrow. Let's hope this person will be in a good mood. And that I can keep my good karma thing going on.

2008-02-29T20:38:00.025Z

A Blast for Baby

Last Sunday was an absolute miracle of a sunny February day in Ile-de-France, so we packed a lunch and headed into the Jardin d'Acclimatation in the Bois de Boulogne near Paris. I just randomly picked it by chance out of a guide book since it seemed to be kid-friendly. Both my husband and I were pleasantly surprised at what an overwhelmingly positive experience it turned out to be for all of us.

Look at that sky!

There's not a lot of things to do that are especially designed for people under 2 years of age. I guess they don't really need anything super fancy, but it would be nice for apartment-dwellers like me to have a nice green space for the kids to run around in without having to dodge dog droppings. The "Jardac" ended up being a mix between a regular French park, an amusement park, and a state fair, except from what I recall it was cleaner than the above tend to be. I don't remember having to swerve around dog poop even once! I don't remember seeing any trash at all on the ground, either. This in itself makes the nominal entrance fee of 2,70 euros (per person over the age of 3) completely worthwhile, in my opinion.

Now, if Lil Snagglepuss Speed Racer Hot Feet were a bit older, this excursion could have cost us a pretty penny. There are tons of appealing rides and you have to buy a ticket for each person who rides (accompanying parents need one, too). But LSSRHF is only a mere almost-11 months so we were able to just stroll her around and enjoy her being completely wide-eyed with wonder at all the new sights. Put yourself in a baby's slippers and check out some of the things she saw:

A giant thing that whizzes past...

Little wheeled things that also zoom

Kids , kids...

and more kids

Oooohhh, something that isn't a cat...

and doesn't say "Meow"

Happy Thanksgiving!

The turkey and his mate were just wandering around outside, and hearing the noise they made took me back to my days at my babysitter's farm. I had to laugh a little bit at the city people who excitedly reminisced about the time they had seen one of those "things" before, all the way in Belgium. I didn't know they had turkeys in Belgium, but why not.

Other things we enjoyed:

Lunch in this park

Playing on the "Little Kid" playground

Watching big kids play on their turf

There were bears and llamas and electric boats and even golf. We walked around twice, and by the end we had one very tired baby who actually fell asleep in her stroller. I can't remember the last time this happened because usually she is wide-eyed and bushy-tailed and too terribly afraid she'll miss something to do something so bourgeois as sleep.

She fought the snooze...but the snooze won!

I think we'll definitely take a picnic blanket and go back. We need to get all the fun we can while it's still cheap.