We were blessed with a lot more family time and delicious food this month, including Papi's (Marc's dad) 81st birthday and Teah's 6th birthday party. Here's a photo collage of our month.
The amazing array of French pastries never gets old.
Lola helping Teah with her homework.
Sandwich shop. Have to admit I love these baguette sandwiches.
Skyping with their buddy Reese and doing drawings together over the computer. Love that!
Cite de l'eau is the closest indoor swimming facility in Publier (20 minute drive). We finally made it there. I was really starting to crave a swim. It felt so good. Lola and I are actually heading there again this afternoon.
Besides the lap pool and diving well they have a wave pool, 2 hot tubs, and a water park for the little ones.
And a real water slide. The girls loved that!
Craving burgers one night and found an "American Diner" close by.
I love that they put little American flags on top. Ha!!
Some pics of the amazing cheese shop (fromagerie) in Thonon that is actually known nation-wide. Apparently the original owner of this shop used to supply top chefs throughout France with his cheese. His cheese is special because he uses a special technique to "finish" (age) them for another year or two in his caves, which I guess all fromagerie owners don't do. This process enhances the flavor and not being an expert myself all I can say is the cheese we bought here was in fact quite delicious!
The fondue we made with the cheese we bought at the above shop. We have an annual tradition back home to enjoy a New Year's Eve fondue with our neighbors. It is always quite yummy but admittedly this one was insanely good. Still, we will miss sharing our tradition this year with our neighbors.
Walk with Ton Ton and cousin Margeaux by the lake.
Skyping with their friend Sadie back home. They ate some dinner while Sadie was eating breakfast.
TV time with cousin Mila.
A shot of the sweet trail that follows the lake. It's a really nice walk and we are fortunate to be able to access it from our house.
More fun with the chickens.
They are some pretty girls if I do say so myself.
Papi's Birthday Party:
Papi with all his granddaughters!
Teah's Birthday Party:
What initially started as just a birthday dinner with the family turned into a party with 5 friends from school, where 4 of them actually stayed for a sleep-over. I have to admit this was the first time I wasn't frantically trying to pull things together last minute for the party. Marc basically took over the entire planning and prep. He helped Teah make her invitations, plan the party, and bought all the goodies for the day. He communicated with all the moms and honestly had to handle most of the communication during the party. It was by-far the most relaxed I've ever been at one of my children's birthday parties before. ;)
Showing off her present from her sister and the masks the girls made at her party.
Although not officially a birthday present, the girls were lucky to receive this amazing Barbie house plus a ton of Barbies, clothes, and accessories from a family friend who's daughter is a teenager now.
Marc showing the girls how to make the masks. It actually kept them engaged for a full hour!
Pizza, pasta, and salad. The dinner of champions!
Enjoying her birthday cupcakes.
Finished the night with a Barbie movie. :)
Her second birthday treat! This was the cake she had picked out for her party but then Ton Ton surprised her with cupcakes from Geneva!
That's right! Cake #3. This one from Mamie to follow the dinner I made for the family on Sunday. I'm telling you, the French take their sweets very seriously!!
Class Field Trip:
Marc joined Lola and Teah's class for a school field trip to a local organic farm and museum. Of course Marc was the default photographer. The farm itself was so impressive it deserves it's own post. I will speak to that again soon. Here are Marc's thoughts of the trip.
The field trip was great, but super cold as the "Bise" (not the kiss from above post, but a super annoying cold wind from the east that is usually pretty strong and always lasts 3-6 or 9 days. Side note here, have you noticed that this word is used for 2 really annoying things, never go eat at a restaurant called La Bise!) was beating on us the whole day, even with with the sun out.
The museum was very interesting and the exposition was about clothing in local villages in 18th and 19th century. I think a lot of the kids were a bit young for this, particularly Teah's class, but she did get a few things out of it.
What was "fun" was the way the 2 teachers managed their class (25 first graders and 25 second graders) with the help of 5 parents. Lots of yelling would be a good way to sum up the day. I would be lying if I said it didn't bring back some deep emotional trauma that obviously was buried under a pile of more crap - don't worry I won't blog about that. The teachers had a real hard time not yelling from the time we got on the bus to the time we got off. The boys of course took the brunt of that barking, but when at some point in the afternoon I pulled 4 rambunctious boys aside and asked them if they were not tired of being yelled at all day, they looked at me as if I had just asked "so guys, how does it feel to breath air all day?". There was really no good answer, because that's all they knew. This has been one of the most striking differences between my experience with Open classroom back in California where I got to see first hand our teachers managing the kids (which, by the way, can be just as crazy as the french kids) by focusing on their emotional growth, versus the less organic approach these teachers have here. Of course, the subject is complex and I'm probably not being fair in my observation. But I kept thinking about the saying "you catch more bees with honey".
Wonderful to see all that you are doing! Party looked so cute :)
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