My Mom is here

My Mom arrived safe and sound from Atlanta...well....almost. As per usual they lost her luggage and then decided to keep her in the baggage claim for well over an hour filling out the proper forms. This happened to her the last time she visited France so she claims next time she'll come naked or not at all....stay tuned.

Turns out that since the first plane made a late connection she made it to the plane but not the bags...they were delivered the next evening.

We were all so happy to see her and have tried to catch up on our year apart, even though we talk all the time on the phone. The first few days or so she suffered from a major case of Jet Lag and spent many a wonderful hours napping...sometimes in bed sometimes on the beach (the 2nd shall not be repeated as she was burnt to a crisp)

Abigail obviously is in heaven having her Grandmere here, and has enjoyed playing with her as well as her help in learning her poems for school.

Maman has also thus far made her special mayonaise for us (which is almost gone) and her fried banana split. Still to come is a fondue and a Buche de Noel which I'm chomping at the bit for.

And now she is off to see her sisters...more posting later

It is unbelievable to me but my baby girl is now 10 years old! So to mark this momentous birthday we went on a worldwind trip to Italy...our neighbor.

Abigail was so exited, she 

was going to take her first train ride! So off we went to the shopping capital of Italy...Milan. Ohh the stores!

This is beautiful place is actually a type of mall. It is amazing! It included such stores as Prada, Louis Vitton and a token McDonalds for us poor folks.

This beautiful and amazing church is the 3rd largest church in the world and THE largest Gothic church in the world.  It is about 2 city blocks long and all carved with very intricate sculptures and scenes.

Then we were off to Florence where we saw many wonderful things including "David" and "The Birth of Venus" then we were off to Pisa

(this is the copy of David)

When we arrived in Pisa, we took a wrong turn somehow and ended up in an area that was a bit sketchy...it resembled a 3rd world country. I 

suddenly thought this was a mistake, then I saw the Leaning tower...and those thoughts popped out of my head.

It just was the coolest thing to me. We of course had to take the obligatory hold up/knock down the tower pictures. Of course you feel quite silly as you do this but there are people all around you doing the same thing.

Marie-Claude (my aunt) told us we really should climb the tower even though it is a hefty 15 euro pp price. We almost bypassed it but chose to do it anyways and it was SO WORTH IT! It was amazing as you climb the stairs with no outside view and you are thrown back and forth from side to side as you changed sides of the tower.

When you reach the top you have a wonderful view of Pisa...we pretended to re-enact the Galileo. Though I must say we questioned his intelligence as we noted how scary it was at the top and that was WITH the addition of the safty barrier!

Then a worldwind trip back to France, and I for one was so grateful to be back on French soil.

And that was Abigail's 10th birthday...what will it be next year?

Nicholas arrived safe and sound!

Just a quick note to say that Nicholas arrived safe and sound in the south of France. Abigail and I are extremely excited to have him here "for good"....he does miss the 'motherland though.

Since he has been here we've   gone to Beziers to visit family, celebrate a birthday and May day and visit the town which was lovely. We got to see a beautiful church where many people were massacred for their faith and the 9 locks on the Canal de Midi.

Much more with photos 

on this later..it's late.

And tomorrow we're off to see Milan, Pisa (the Leaning tower of Pisa) and hopefully Florence for Abigail's 10th 

birthday. So I'm hoping that the camera will not run out of pics. 

Stay tuned.