Thursday

Finally the sun has come out again! After two days of rain and cold weather, we were finally able to leave the house for more than just a trip to buy a baguette. I took Mia to the Bordelais park this morning on the bike and let her collect "gocks" until our basket was practically full. I was hoping to show here the animals in the petting zoo - bunnies, goats and ducks - but I couldn't find them. I didn't remember the park being so big! We did find a neat playground with lots of toys for children just her age. She loved the slide in the shape of a cat that she was able to go up and slide down all by herself. There was a lot of head nodding and, "I do" when we found that one...

This afternoon we're visiting a house for sale on the other side of the Chartrons with 4 bedrooms, an office and a huge backyard. The pictures have Thomas all in a dither but I'd rather wait to see the place before I get too excited. Knowing that I'm the one who would have to pack the house up makes me stay grounded.

Playtime before bedtime

I took this tonight while Mia and I were playing outside on the terrace. She was meowing like a cat and saying, "ear, ear".

Hello Grandma!

Today we were able to talk to Grandma for the second time online with video. Mia loves to see Honeybunch, the dog, and then blows lots of kisses to her grandma. Today she even showed off her latest baby sign: cuddle. She wraps her arms around her chest and swings. I think Grandma was very impressed!

Snack time

Mia woke up from her nap with a bit of a temperature so we're just hanging low this afternoon. She's kind of grouchy so I took the bunny and started feeding it a cookie. That got her to laugh and she started feeding her own cookie to the bunny too. But when the bunny asked her for more, "moh-moh", she shook her head no and said, "all done!" A girl should never share her cookie.

I've been busy looking for a new house today. We had dinner with friends last night who recently bought a house in the suburbs and re-did the entire place. My revelation was that by buying a new house I could design my own kitchen and buy a HUGE oven and gas range. So I had our place estimated today and we're visiting a 5 bedroom with a garden tomorrow.

Walking the dog

My day basically consists of trying to finish a project. Mia's goal is to make that impossible for me. Today is a day like any other, with my list of unfinished projects getting longer and longer. So when Mia woke up early from her nap (right after I had begun working on my project-du-jour) I gave her a project of her own: walking her stuffed-animal dog. I wish I had been able to get a picture because it really was so cute to see her walking around trailing a dog tied to a piece of ribbon saying, "woo woo, galk, down down". She even turned around and patted her thigh to call him like I showed her!

I did finish today's project!

Her letter for La Maison des Enfants arrived today in the mail. We have a week of adaptation beginning on the 18th of September and then she'll be on her own every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon until June '08.

Getting back into the routine

I suppose it's easier to accept that vacation is over with this weather. The sun did come out this afternoon enough for us to go to the store to buy shelves. (Oh oui, for those of you who think my life here is so exotic, I still get to do fun things like errands to Leroy Merlin.) We stopped at the JP on the way home so Mia could run. No surprise here: she collected "gocks" but did scream with glee when she saw the merry-go-round and the swings. She even went down the slide all on her own!

We also stopped by the bakery for some fresh bread tonight. He's a baker who understands his clients, or maybe the fact that he has twins at home has helped him keep the creative juices flowing. On the table just in front of you - at eye level for a kid in a stroller - are two baskets full of tiny, fresh baguettes. Any kid going into a bakery knows they will get the crusty savoury end bits for a snack. So Gascgon has cut out the middle man. When I saw the baskets my first reaction was, "How perfect! Now I don't have to break the loaf." But when I saw the other 6 kids in the store each with a mini baguette in hand, I understood his genius.

That's all for now!

I hope I've (somewhat) made up for the long absence of posts. We start back to work tomorrow - Mia will have her first real rentree going back to Nounou's house.

And now, bonne nuit, it's time to go to bed!

Jump on in

Mia loves to swim in the pool! But some days the water was a little too cool so after juming in she would immediately say, "all done" so we would stand her back on the edge. Of course, she would always jump back into our arms two seconds later!

But we had a lot of sunny days too...

I think the girls were plotting how best to distract us from doing anything other than playing with them in the pool.

Because the sun didn't always shine in the PO

France is having a rather cool summer, with lots of rain, so we had to entertain the girls indoors from time to time. So Mia was able to discover the joy of finger paints....

Mia and her gocks

When Mia says, "gocks", she can mean one of three things depending on the context: rocks, socks, or walk. Usually she's talking about rocks which is why, when we saw this pile of stones on one of our walks, we couldn't resist the photo op.

JJ&A

The place that we rented was in the middle of nowhere (with a pool!) so we were able to take a lot of hikes without having to drive to a trailhead. These two pictures are of Jerome, Joanna and Anouk.

Photo time!

This is from the modern art museum in ceret where we were almost asked to leave because Mia was, well, screeching at the top of her lungs. She had skipped her nap and was a little loopy. The gards were anything but child-friendly and in the last room we actually had two of them following us around.

The guard sitting in the back of this picture actually told me that art is not for litle children.

And...we're back!

It's so good to be home and know that I don't have to pack another suitcase in the near future. Or the distant future either.

We had a great two weeks in the mountains with out friends Joanna, Jerome and their daughter Anouk. We did a lot of hiking, sleeping, swimming, and cooking. The adults had a great time but Anouk (who is 4) was getting tired of having Mia follow her every move. I have lots of pictures that I'll post here shortly.

Bordeaux is rainy and cold so it really seems like la rentree and the end of vacation. Nano and Bomp are still out at the Marina house and are babysitting two of the cousins so we took Mia out to see them today. It was so cold that we had to eat lunch indoors and the girls all played outside wrapped up in sweaters. The post-nap game was Mia's idea: collecting rocks, "gocks", in buckets and then putting them into the wheelbarrow to dump them in the garden.

Thomas just came upstairs from Mia's room and called his adorable daughter a salope. She had been in bed for about 10 minutes and started calling for me so he went in to see what she wanted. When he picked her up she asked for me again so he said that I was "night-night" and coudn't come. She actually pushed him away and tried to wiggle out of his arms saying, "all done, all done". We haven't heard anything from her since...

Journee noire

Today is a huge traffic day in France - a black day - due to the vacation schedules. Thomas wanted to leave at 6am this morning but I put a veto on that knowing that it would be better to hit traffic feeling well-rested. So we're having coffee and croissants before we finish packing. We may even go over for a quick visit to Thomas' grandmother before leaving. If we time this right, we'll miss most of the traffic and hit some of Mia's nap.

Bon voyage!

Already Thursday!

It's been another busy week. Getting ready for another two weeks of vacation that is! On Saturday we leave for the mountains and two weeks of hiking and gourmet eating with our friends Joanna, Jerome and their little girl Anouk.

So Mia and I have been spending the week doing laundry, putting things away, getting other things out, going to the police station (someone stole our trash bin), and playing. We're actually doing a lot of that last one.

This morning she put on a pair of my shorts and tried to wear them around the house. She got really upset when they wouldn't stay on so I found a clothespin to hold them up around her waist. She spent all morning dancing around the living room in them! She makes me laugh so hard it brings tears to my eyes. I'm so lucky I can stay home with her!