sept. 12.  2012

day 3

we made it out of the flat by 11:00 this morning.  breakfast-croissants were so yummy and flaky, along with the chocolate chip baguettes.  oh man, i will be pillsbury doughboy’s twin by the time we leave.  we metro’d over and caught the train out to versailles.  we walked through the small town where all the markets are, getting our bread, fruit, meat and cheese for lunch.  we also took the girls to get a nutella crepe where jarom and i remember having one two years ago.  oh, they are just delectable!  we made our way to the grounds of versaille, ate our lunch outside on the stairs behind the chateau overlooking the grand canal, and then made our way inside.  we got our little audio guide and started the tour of the beautiful palace.

as they say…louis the xiv built it, xv enjoyed it, and xvi payed for it.

the hall of mirrors was beautiful, and they have added 3d short videos in some of the rooms, which they didn’t have two years ago.  it was so interesting to see that when louis the xiv built his hunting lodge in the country, it was a decent size, but after others having added to it, it is now what has become versaille.

the crisp fall air was a bit chilly, so we were glad to have brought layers.  the 45 min. train ride back into paris was a bit quiet, as a couple of us fell asleep riding back into the city.  we did a lot of walking today, which was great.  we were going to try and rent bikes like jarom and i did before, and ride around the grounds, but with four kids in tow, it worked out great just walking and touring the large chateau alone on foot today.

we ended the day with our fave salad of potato, ham, egg, and tomato, and a baguette with nutella on it.  we got in a movie, beauty and the beast, which half of us fell asleep to, and we are on our way to bed.  it was a good day, but we are all a bit tired still.  hopefully tomorrow we will feel a little more rested!

sept. 11.  2012

day 2

setting no alarms, and having curtains closed is not a good combination!  we all slept until noon!  which is probably what we needed with the jet lag and not sleeping the night before, so we allowed ourselves the break, but only for today.  by the time we got ready and going, and of course, had the girls run down to the patisserie for some croissants, baguettes, and a chocolate baguette, we left the flat at about 4:00pm.  we took the metro to get to the musee d’orsay, and on the way, decided to have dinner, stopping in a small little bistro.  two women started talking to us, one who was english, and ended up being from ft. collins, colorado.  she heard nadia say something about byu, and came over and told us she was mormon too, and her friend was also.  we got to chat for awhile about life, it was fantastic!

we then headed over to the d’orsay, got our museum pass, and realized it was 5:58 and it closed at 6:00.  we decided to walk around the city, saw the square where marie antoinette and others were guillotined, and walked to the eiffel tower.  it was rainy at first, and then just overcast and breezy, turning into a beautiful evening.  we took a million shots of the eiffel, grabbed some more food, and went back to the eiffel for some night shots.  on our way to the metro, oh man, we got a crepe smothered in nutella.  the girls thought it was the best thing on earth!  yum-mmmy!  it was fun just hanging and chatting with the girls on our 16 metro stops back to abbesses, and hitting the market on our way home for some bottled water.  i guess it will be more bread tomorrow for breakfast, since fruit is too expensive for six people.  is it possible to be a little sick of bread already-on day 2?  because i think i am!  that doesn’t mean i still won’t stuff my face though!  hoping all the walking will burn some of it off!

sept. 9-10th

we have started our five and a half week journey to Europe with our girls!  sunday, sept. 9th, we boarded our plane on Icelandair at 5pm, had a layover in Iceland(oh beautiful but cold!), and made it to Paris on monday the 10th around 1pm.  by the time we got to our cute apartment, it was 3:30, took a nap until 5:00 , and then we headed up more of Montmartre a little more.  we found the place jarom and i loved to eat when we were here two years ago-oh that yummy salad with ham, egg, puff potato slices and i don’t know what else.  we found a patisserie for a couple of baguettes, and a couple of chocolate desserts.  we headed up to the Basilique du Sacre-Coeur, and sat on the steps eating our dessert overlooking the city.  we then took the girls through the magnificent church, and i still can’t believe we are here, and with our girls!…it seems like just yesterday jarom and i were here(it was two years ago).  i loved it so much, and am excited to take the girls around to places we have been, and haven’t been.

we have made it through a couple miss-haps, which always happen of course:)  like leaving for dinner and forgetting the code on the table to enter our apartment building.  thank goodness for a tech-y husband who can log into the mailbox on my mac, and look up all the emails we have saved for this trip.  otherwise, we probably would have been on the streets tonight…ew gross!   i didn’t even pull out my new camera this evening i was so tired, so we took them with jarom’s iphone.

and luggage… i’m not sure how to even fix this issue, i guess i haven’t learned to simplify enough.  we each have a suitcase, and a backpack(ok, i had two bags and a backpack and a suitcase), but it is still a lot with 7 total suitcases, and everyone has a backpack to carry things…and it’s unbearable…so much luggage!  we will have to figure a better configuration, because we have a lot of trains to get around on coming up, and we’re going to have to figure it out.  thank goodness for us standing in the airport looking confused-we were trying to figure out the most economical way to get to our apartment…because we figured 60euro per taxi, times 2 taxi’s…way too much.  i was pushing for us to take the metro, which would have been exhausting, and then someone with a taxi van walked up, and took us where we needed to go for 80euro, to two stops.  we had to pick up our key, and then be dropped off a the apartment.  so it’s still a lot of money, but for our load of people and bags, it was a total deal!

the bottom pic, that says picasso, is from where jarom and i stayed two years ago, which was one of picasso’s atelier’s he had stayed in when he was living here.  i’m sure he stayed in quite a few places, but it was neat, nevertheless.

the good part about not sleeping on an overnight flight, is that i feel like we are already on paris time.  we are heading off to sleep, 10:30 paris time, 2:30 colorado time.  good night.

july 27.  2012

when we called ahead and set up dossier’s for each age group, it made the whole art experience so much more enjoyable.  things i would normally just walk by, the dossier was able to explain why the artist did what he or she did, and things to look for.  we had quite a good sized group, and i was able to go with the older group, which only had two kids in it.  it made it so much more enjoyable being in a small group.

july 20.  2012

we went and saw john reep at a comedy club here in denver,  who’s from hickory!  he was on the comedian tv contest and won.   his bit was great, and clean.  the acts before him weren’t so clean.  why can’t people be funny without swearing?  or crude content?  it was a fun night, i was glad to be out with jarom, and spend time with him.  he’s fun to be with!

july 21.  2012

wow, this exhibit was amazing, beautiful.  da vinci was so inspired, keeping over 40,000 notebooks of ideas and inventions.  i believe what albert einstein said, “Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited, whereas imagination embraces the entire world…”  oh, how you could see this in da vinci’s inventions.  his ideas, thinking, understanding, resolving…it is a world of inspiration.

there are only two da vinci exhibits in the world right now.  one in europe, and one in the u.s., and the u.s. exhibit happened to be here in denver.  and thank goodness for living social deals-i love those too. makes things a little more do-able with a family of six.

this was a fun family outing, and i hope that these things will one day inspire my girls to not only be hardworking and knowledgeable, but a dreamer and a user of their imaginations.  somehow, with the demands of adulthood, comes seriousness.  i also want to dream.

july 20.  2012

the denver butterfly pavillion, largest invertebrate museum was really neat.  i wouldn’t recommend a family pass for the year, because you only need to visit it once, really.  but if you haven’t been, i highly recommend.  it is a lot of fun, and quite interactive with hundreds of live species.  we really enjoyed the butterfly exhibit itself…1,600 free flying tropical butterflies in their rain forest…beautiful!

july.  2012

so much fun to learn about space, planets, and see saturn itself!  it was a fun night field trip, and jarom got to join us, which made it even better.  afterward, we went to the park across the street, and had fun swinging and playing with the kids.  overall, a fun night!  of course, we had to include pic’s of us in the car heading over to the field trip, and the beautiful meadow by our house that we pass everyday.

july.  2012

we had a lot of fun learning about ice cores, taken miles beneath the earth’s surface.  they are taken from greenland and from antarctica.  i can’t imagine the months spent down there in the freezing cold, not a lot of things to do, it’s dark a lot of the time…could get very depressing!  so thank goodness for people who will do anything in the name of science, because i definitely wouldn’t!  going into the -10 and -40 freezers was the highlight, and of course, some were dared to go in without a coat-and they survived!