a lazy photo entry

I have been in a rotten mood all day which is no small part due to the fact that it is still gray outside. A quite large part is also due to an irritating email that I had last night. Of course, it showed up just as I was getting ready for bed and I read it and proceeded to dream angry dreams all night. I hate when that happens. Worst part is, I tried to do something nice but my 'friend' misunderstood my message and took it as a giant insult, which required a grovelling apology on my part because she went on and on about how bad things had been for her recently. Well, you know, things ain't a bed of roses around here either, sweetheart. I do understand that emails can be misconstrued if someone gets the wrong end of the stick- there is no 'tone' to help clear up ambiquities. But Christ almighty, I was trying to do something nice and I'm the bad buy? I just wonder, does she think that I took time out of my day to organize a bunch of stuff and then sit down to write her a message with the sole intent of being mean? Talk about raging narcissism. If I had that much time to waste, the first thing I would do is get a manicure, not dream up elaborate plans to ruin someone else's day.

Georgia only started screaming when I got the camera. 30 seconds before this shot, she was smiling and posing for me because I told her that she looked pretty with the flower in her hair. she has been so good lately about leaving clips and bands in her hair, I think because the fringe is getting long and hangs in her eyes otherwise. I don't know when or why she developed the sudden phobia for the camera. She better shake it off, because Momma is asking for a new camera for Mother's Day and there are going to be some serious photo shoots going on soon...

Here is a photo of Ella putting cherry chapstick on Georgia. I know- 90% of my photos of the girls together are taken in the bathtub but that is the only time when I have them corraled together. I think that this is so sweet with Georgia holding very very still and Ella concentrating hard on doing it just right.

And, finally, last night B and Ella went out and 'harvested' a few strawberries. Ella ate them without hardly chewing them and said, 'Next time, lets leave them to get bigger.' I'm not sure that I succeeded in teaching her anything about enjoying the fruits of your labor- literally or figuratively. And of course, this led to a 30 minute conversation on the different kinds of strawberries and the associated 'whys?' and 'how comes?' stretched us to limits of our knowledge on horticulture. So hard to patiently answer all those questions at 8 pm when all I want to do is throw them into bed and turn out the night.

Speaking of sleeping, after fighting her naps all day long, Georgia just fell asleep at 6:15 pm. If I don't let her nap, she'll be awake at 3 am because she is so over-tired. If I let her sleep for an hour, I might just get a teeny bit of lie-in tomorrow morning. Oh please please please Universe, let me get a bit of extra sleep on a vacation day.

Spring cleaned my little heart out and now I can't find anything

It is another grey and rainy day in Paris and I wanted to go to a playgroup this afternoon but I can't find the raincover for Georgia's stroller. I had packed it away in the fall because I figured that between the hood and the foot muff, Georgia was fully protected from the elements. But where did I put it? It so big I don't see where I could have hidden it away. And I don't see how it could have gotten mistaken for a random piece of plastic and put in the trash, since it is so stiff and impossible to fold up. It has GOT to be somewhere. But where?!! There are not alot of hiding spots in our teeny tiny apartment.

And missing this playgroup is out of the question. Its been a battle to keep this group going. There was a nice group last spring, but I think three of the moms moved back to their home country and since they were three regulars, it really shook things up. Suddenly there were only two of us who went regularly. Then this fall, it seemed to pick up and then suddenly, there were quite a few moms who went back to work, which makes the group suddenly much smaller. Now, its spring again and with all the holidays and school breaks, its been impossible to get on a regular schedule. Before Georgia was born, I didn't know if I would be interested in joining a playgroup because I already had a group of mom friends, which had been my original goal when I joined after Ella's birth. But now I realize that it adds a bit of structure to my week and gets me out among people which sometimes doesn't happen when I am busy at the house, lost in the eternal struggle to get Georgia napping and fed. It bums me out when no one seems interested in hosting or meeting up. I don't take it personally, because I get it. Somedays, its just hard to get your shit together and even to commit to something fun. But I do wish that there were atleast a few people willing to make the effort.

Which is why I cannot miss today. I have been harrassing the group with emails every week and now that someone else is hosting, I need to actually go, rain cover or no rain cover. I'll wrap the stroller in SaranWrap if I have to.

Hmm, I wonder if all this angst over a rain cover is not a sign that I am in more desperate need of that beach holiday than I originally suspected? Must keep doing the countdown in my head as we FINALLY have everything booked: On the 29th we leave for a week's holiday at this gorgeous hotel!

Last week was a rollercoaster trying to finish booking everything, and probably 50% of the reason that I need this break. I would find a hotel and be ready to book and then discover a reason why it was totally the wrong place for us or something else would go wrong with the booking. I even had to borrow my FIL credit card (I was like being 15 again! 'which hotel? are you sure its a real hotel and not a scam to get my credit card number? how much does it cost? Are you sure that it is a good price? what does it include?' and on and on.) due to a last minute snafu. BUT I think it will all be worth it- there is a Kids Club! and a nursery! and babysitters! and a heated pool! and a spa! and a family room so that we don't have to sleep next to both girls snuffling and flopping around all night! Which all means, this may actually be relaxing.

I'm not even going to do a quick comparison with last year's 'vacation' to Crete, organized by my dear clueless husband. I just want that experience to fade from my memory as quickly as possible. Booking the hotel this year nearly sent me into PTSD and I had to force myself to push through the panic and trust that no vacation could ever be as bad as that one. (For one, the girls cannot get the chicken pox a second time, right!)

So now all that I have to do is pack our bags. And pray that our favorite Icelandic volcano calms down- although I have already looked into the ferry routes to Sardinia because I am not kidding when I say that I am going on vacation come hell or high water.

Georgia Eats

Here is a short photo essay to give you an idea of what happens at mealtimes in our house. The first photo is what happens when I offer to feed Georgia myself (you'll just have to imagine the screams. Maybe go and murder a pig if you lack imagination). The next photo is her first attempt. Look at that sweet baby, concentrating so hard. Third photo is about three/quarters of the way through the pot of yogurt. I tried to wipe her face, but Miss G wants to do that herself as well. Please notice that she has actually managed to wipe a small part of her cheek- and then transferred that yogurt to her right ear. Well, she gets an 'A' for effort. Also, she has not put down the spoon as she is a very cynical 14-month-old and she suspects me of using the paper towel as a ploy to steal the spoon back and feed her myself. (She is not entirely wrong. I do tend to take advantage of any moments of distraction in order to quickly shovel bites in her mouth...) Fourth photo, I had to step in before she plastered her head in yogurt and wiped off the face myself. She is attacking that pot to scrape out the last bits of yogurt clinging to the bottom. The bib will go straight to the wash but amazingly the child and her clothing are remarkably clean. We are making progress!

Ugh. Its been a Rough Day.

I went out last night with my French girlfriends for dinner at Cafe des Artistes in the 10th (lovely and definitely worth the hike over to that neighborhood) and had an awesome fun time. But I drank 3 glasses of wine which was just enough to make me cocky about getting home and into bed on time and so I didn't end up closing my eyes til 12:08. Which made Georgia's wake-up scream at 4:51 that much harder to take. Did you do that math? 4 hours and 43 minutes of sleep last night. Painful does not do justice to what I experienced this morning.

Of course, B (that ?ù%*?!) didn't go to bed before me and so he was even crankier about the noise which forced me to get up and deal with things for the entire hour that she sat in bed and groused about god knows what. Finally she had her bottle and squeaked only a tiny bit more before letting us sleep til 8:30 but then we had to jump from bed to get ready for our appointment at the Consulate at 10:30 to renew Ella's passport.

Did I mention that B was being cranky because he stayed up too late watching f-ing Cauet? And that, despite me mentioning this appointment several times over the past few weeks, he had FORGOTTEN about it? So this morning he had to leave early to run to work and sort out opening the shop. Which meant that rather than drive over, I was forced to carry Georgia (who is only adorably fat when she is walking on her own...) all the way there. AND I couldn't bring much in the way of entertainment for the girls because I was at my limit with the baby.

All of which made the 2 and a half hour wait that much more of a torture. Of course, it was easy to do all the documents and stuff but sitting there and amusing the girls for that long while horribly tired and slightly hungover was a true misery.

By the time I got home i knew that there was no way that little G and I were going to make it to our playdate. She needed a nap almost as desperately as me. So I cancelled, but I hate hate hate doing that, only today there was no choice.

I did manage to sleep for two hours before the screeching started again. A giant coffee helped get me through the rest of the afternoon but now I am drooping again and I have dinner and baths to do. I want to cry.

Luckily, my girls were totally worth it. Seriously, how many virgins do I have to kill to appease the gods and get a good nights' sleep?!!!

The Cleaner

Georgia is currently in a 'cleaning' phase. How cute. She likes to pick up her toys and put them in the toybox. At dinner, when I ask her to wipe her face, her takes her napkin and sort of rubs it around her mouth. Very very sweet. If she gets her hands on a sponge, she walks around the house wiping things. And she likes to put things in the trashcan.

Things she has put in the trashcan this week, including but not limited to:

1. All of our coffee spoons.
2. My Carte Vitale
3. 7 euro in coins

I should be more clear. These are the things that I FOUND in the trash. I'm not quite sure how many missing items were deposited in the trash before I figured out her new game. Or how many things have sunk to the bottom of the bag and haven't been spotted.

She also has started 'tickling' us- she grabs your bare flesh with her two little paws and kneads it frantically, while giving this little machine-gun laugh. Thats your cue to laugh manically and yell 'Stop! Stop!'. It kind of hurts but its a much cheaper game than her other one.

And she maintains the fine balance between 'tear my hair out with frustration' and 'so cute I want to eat her up'. How does she do it?

So to recap yesterdays post- I thought that I was dying and was grateful that my lovely husband allowed me to wallow in my sickness in peace. But then! He quite wisely put his foot down and called SOS Medicines. When I am sick, I really only want to lay in bed and sleep. Sorting out a visit to the doctor is far and away the last thing on my mind. Thank goodness he was there to make the call. When the doctor showed up, he barely glanced in my throat before exclaiming, 'Good God! That must REALLY hurt!' and prescribed me a giant dose of Amoxicillin (sp? I'm too lazy to get up to go and look at the box... What? I'm still sick. I am) and a few days worth of steroids. My throat is still sore, but thank god for those steroid pills. Within a half hour of taking the first one, I was feeling human again. I slept like a baby and woke up full of energy. Which, thank goodness, because Ella is now home sick.

I may have to work on B a bit more re: the quickie vacation to the beach to celebrate the fact that his safe deposit box was, in fact, still safe.

Funny story. He went yesterday morning to the bank to check his box, having made an appointment with them last week. He took my little Canon Powershot with him and had spent the morning practicing taking sneaky photos, because he REALLY wanted photographic evidence (probably to drag out, along with the musty old story, at every bloody dinner party for the next 30 years...) of the fire. Imagine his dismay to arrive at the bank and see a brand-spanking-new vault. The paint was fresh, the carpet had just been installed, the lighting was high-voltage fluorescent. Even the boxes looked totally new, except for one which had been half-opened with some sort of torch and they apparently couldn't find a way to 'fix' before the visitors started arriving. He opened the box, in the presence of the bank employee, a huissier, a guard, a cleaning lady (huh?) and his father. As he stared to put it all the stuff in his briefcase, the bank employee started giving him the hard sell 'Oh, you aren't leaving your things? You know, you can leave your things. Its perfectly safe now! We've repaired everything.' etc etc. He told them that he would think about it. How different from two weeks ago when he went in to speak with them and they refused to even acknowledge that there had been a break-in. Not so chatty then, huh, little weasly bank man?

In a very small gesture of celebration, he gave me the money to go and buy the ballet tickets that I had looked at for next year. I kept warning him that it was very expensive (the exact figure changes based on a dozen different factors, like how many shows you are getting tickets for, which category, which 'bundle' you choose, things like that) and so when he asked for a figure I told him 'well, for one person, it would be around x amount.' He was a bit shocked and said, 'oh thats more expensive than I thought. Well, here's x+ 30 amount of euro.' And I had to point out that I would be buying tickets for me AND Ella, so he would need to give me twice as much. He took a big gulp of air, but he handed it over.

Well, of course he did. This poor daddy can deny his daughters nothing. Lord help us all, the day that they discover this!
__________________

OK- that was a rough 15 minutes. Georgia started banging on the door to go out to play. So I picked her up, only to discover that a poopy explosion had occurred. So I took her to the bedroom to change her. While I tried to maneuver the offending diaper into the trash, she wiped her hand across her still filthy ass. As I wiped off her hands, she kicked the paper towels off the table and they completely unrolled across the room. I finished wiping her butt to discover it was quite red. So I let her off the table to walk around a minute to dry the skin, while I rolled up the paper towels. When I turned back around, I saw that she had peed on the floor. So I UNrolled the paper towels and mopped it up. I put her on the table, got the tube of diaper cream and put some on her skin, then a diaper, then I looked in her cupboard for some new pants. When I turned back around, I saw that she had grabbed the diaper cream, taken off the lid, and wiped it across her shirt. So I got a new shirt as well. Just then my phone rang. The babysitter was ill and would not be coming today.

This kid. I am not going to detail the horrific torture that is mealtime, now that Mademoiselle has decided that she only wants to eat if she can feed herself. And even then, its 'Non!' for about 90% of what I offer. It is a lesson in perseverance and patience, let me tell you. I find myself spending my free moments fantasizing about these Wile E. Coyote scenarios wherein I drop an anvil on her head, or knock her out with a giant mallet. In my version, after the stars disappear, she sees the error of her screechy ways and starts to eat like a little angel, from a spoon that I have offered her filled with lovely nutritious food that will NOT give her fire butt.

People, a few years ago, I had a normal fantasy life like all of you. I am constantly reminding myself that these are 'the good ole days'. Enjoy them.

And if at first you don't succeed

try, try again.

I always tend to like the rejected photos better than the 'final shot'. (Yes, the middle photo is a shot of Georgia throwing her boiled decorated Easter egg on the tile floor. No, I am afraid to say that the egg did not survive...)

Family time

Good lord. What a weekend. I think that the girls had a great time, atleast. B and I, on the otherhand, are ready for the sanatorium. The traffic was horrific, for a start, and Georgia is no good in the car which makes for a hellish voyage, no matter what. The weather kept us more or less trapped in the house, because if you dared skip out into the sunshine, the rain was sure to appear 30 seconds later. We missed ¾ of Easter Mass because not only did no one actually check the church schedule, pretty much assuring us problems, but both the time AND the locale was different from normal. Oh well, atleast that meant no wiggly kids to deal with. Church ended before we got to that point. There was no internet at the country house, which was a shock to my system. I really could have used an escape mechanism over the last few days. I suppose it really isn’t any wonder that I got into rather shouty discussions (OK, one of them was an out and out fight) with two members of the stepfamily. I was still having stress dreams about it all last night. Hmm. The only good thing to come out of it all? I will no longer be even a teensy tiny bit guilty about spending every Christmas in the States. Its one thing to have a rather miserable Easter holiday but I will not let these lunatics wreck Christmas.

But there were good things too, so let me make a list to remind myself to not be so whiny:

1. I downloaded The Blind Side on to my laptop and we LOVED it. It was a good film and it made you think and it made me grateful for what I’ve got. I suppose more to the point, it made me feel that rather than worrying about my ‘career’ I should be more worried about what exactly I’m doing to make the world a better place.

2. The girls looked adorable in their Easter dresses and I got some great shots.

3. The Easter egg hunt was a big hit and so were the baskets.

4. My MIL liked the coffee cups! (but she sent the mugs home with me. I’ll never figure this woman out.)

5. It was nice to be out of the city and the apartment to enjoy a bit of space and fresh air.

6. We ate one fantastic meal after another and I didn’t have to cook a single one. Heaven.

And actually, if I’m honest, it does feel good to finally stand up and tell off someone who has been asking for it for ages because he finally steps so far over the line. I would love to tell the whole story here, but I am going to give it a bit more of a think first. I appreciate family harmony as much as the next guy- hey, probably even more because I have a huge family that spends lots and lots of time together. I will never understand people who find it easier to go out of their way to be jerks, rather than just be nice. I’m always telling the girls, ‘Just, be nice.’ Maybe that’s not such a trite thing to say. Its actually great advice. You don’t have to knock yourself out doing amazing things or being brilliantly entertaining. Just, be nice and people will like to have you around. It is that simple.

Easter's on its way

So, I think I finally have the finish line in site, regarding all my Easter projects. A quick rundown:

1. I finished decorating the girls' Easter baskets. I had to make one from scratch for Georgia, since last year I didn't bother to do anything. I found the basket at the quincallerie on rue des Ecoles last week and popped up to Rougier et Plé on Monday to pick up some crepe paper to make the flowers. I spread everything out on the dining room table( crepe paper, wire, florist tape, yarn, beads, and my green Happy Tape) and have been knocking out a few flowers every time I get a few quiet moments. I think that they turned out so well! I made daisies, lilies, clematis, forget-me-nots, a sort of hyacinth/lilac thing, and tulips plus some regular generic sort of flowers. After I got Ella's basket out of the cave, I thought it looked a bit scruffy next to Georgia's so I spruced it up a bit with some new things. Now, the next big hurdle will be transporting them to the country this weekend (and back again) without having them completely destroyed. It was hard to get everything well attached to the baskets without a glue gun. I guess that is the next item on my craft shopping list. Just when I think that I have every possible tool any crafter could ever need or use, up pops something like this and I wonder how I managed for so long without getting one. Yeah, so I may have to confiscate this basket from Georgia the Hun as soon as she finds it on Easter morning so that I can keep it safe til I can do it right.

2. We dyed Easter Eggs. I think that they turned out beautifully despite the fact that I had to improvise with gel food coloring, which wasn't all that easy to do. On Tuesday, I had to walk up Blvd Beaumarchais on my way to the craft store and I passed in front of a Franprix. I remembered that I was completely out of diapers and so I took advantage and popped in to pick some up. While wandering around I stumbled upon a stack of white eggs! Now, you non-Parisians will think that this is no big deal but here in Paris all the eggs for sale in 99% of the shops are brown eggs, which are not fun to try and dye. There are years when I have gone into a dozen different grocery stores and chased up leads from all my girlfriends only to come up empty handed. So really, this was a stroke of luck. I was also excited about doing them since my friend Hestor brought us an egg decorating kit from Holland. If only I had read the directions BEFORE starting the job. To get the plastic bands to shrink to teh egg, you dip them in boiling water. Ella had already dyed the eggs but most of the color came off in the boiling water, as you'd expect. I was all ready to drag out the dyes a second time, but then I had a lightbulb moment. I realized that Ella was happy; no one else cared the least little bit how brightly our eggs were colore; maybe, just maybe, I could let it go? And I did. People, this is huge.

3. I have a basket ready for to be planted with spring flowers to give to my mother-in-law as a sort of centerpiece. I also stumbled across a store in the 11th called Le Fiacre which had a ton of stuff for Easter- baskets, stickers, cards, gift bags, towels, etc. I bought some stickers for Ella to put in her basket as stickers are always always always a winner with her. A also managed to find some really nice little English coffee cups for my MIL. Last time we were at her house, she broke nearly everyone she had in some freak dishwashing accident. I also got some mugs as I hate having espresso in the morning and I HATE drinking cafe au lait from a bowl. I will never be that French. I am hoping that the present of something that she needs will win her over and she will accept the mugs (under normal circumstances, she would just open the box and then hand it back to me, saying, 'Keep them, I don't like them.' She is nothing if not blunt.) We shall see.

4.The girls have matching yellow dresses. Georgia will be wearing the one Ella had when she was 1 and Ella will be wearing a really pretty little sun dress from Chloe that I found at Fifi de Vem. How funny that the last three items of clothing that I bought Ella have all been Chloe. I never thought that it would be my go-to brand for dressing my kids but what can you do? The children's line of clothing is To Die For.

5. I have my closet packed with chocolate treats for the girls but I am a bit miffed at Georgia. The other day I popped into one of my fav chocolate shops, just off the Place des Vosges and bought a few bags of friture for me and B. As we left the shop, it started to rain and so I ran home, not paying very close attention to Georgia in teh stroller. I should learn my lesson. I got in the door and she was missing a shoe (she is the middle of a stage of taking them off and then immediately screaming for them to be put back on. We can do this a hundred times in a row and she does not get bored.) So I had to grab and umbrella and go back out to find her damn shoe. Then I went back into the apartment and unloaded all my bags from the pousette, only to find that the bag from the chocolate shop? It was empty. The sales girl had given Georgia a sample - which she inhaled- and then she kept pointing to the sack and saying 'Num-num? Num-num?' which is her word for 'feed me!'. I didn't think she needed another piece and obviously I should have learned by now that if there is one thing that will motivate Georgia, it is food. By the time I discovered the empty bag it was pouring rain outside and I was done. So I may go and get something else or I may just call it Fate's way of reminding me that I am on a diet.

The littlest fashionista

Georgia has recently discovered a new game- she goes into Ella's room and grabs shirts out of her dresser, then she comes to me and holds them up, saying 'Huh? huh? huh?'until I slip them over her head. Then she sort of swans around the room, posing and checking to see if anyone is watching her. She kills me with the cuteness, sometimes. Today we managed to get on a record 4 shirts before she got bored with the game. Of course, now they are all scattered over the living room floor and all the hardwork that the cleaner did yesterday, refolding and rearranging Ella's dresser, was all for nought. But look at that little grin! It was clearly all worth it.

weekend in review

Well this weekend was all ups and downs. It was nice to have so many plans, but it is really exhausting! And if I had known about the time change, I think I would have been dreading this weekend. But finally, that was a breeze and the real problems were all the blame on the French.

I'll do the bad stuff first. I don't want be spreadin' B's bidness all around, but he has had a rough couple of days, poor guy. For the last few months, his business has been audited and they got the results on Friday. Now, it seems to me like this was pretty much the result that he had predicted but apparently he had harbored secret hopes that it would go differently. The auditor made some pretty far-fetched assumptions to come up with his valuations which means that the 'bill' to be paid is astronomical. So now, they need to hire a lawyer to appeal the 'bill' and all this will probably take a year or two. And since B is a pathological worrier, that means a year or two of worrying constantly about the result. Sigh.

The second problem that he had this weekend was a lot more exciting (really? you say. More exciting than discussing accounting errors? Oh Internets, I know it is hard to keep up with my thrilling life over here. But seriously, wait for it...) - his bank was robbed! Personally, the last word that I would use to describe the situation is 'shocking' but I'll let you judge. The bank office where we had our checking accounts and safe deposit box has been closed for renovations for the last few months. This branch is near B's office so I hadn't seen it until a few weeks ago when we drove by in the car. B pointed out the window and said 'Look at how safe they keep our money...' The front wall of the bank had been removed and was replaced by... plywood. You know, thin flimsy pressboard. Can be snapped in half by a hefty toddler jumping on it in the middle. Well, apparently, they had moved the front desk part to another location down the street and just weren't terribly worried about the safe deposit boxes so plywood was considered sufficient protection from the bad guys. Geez- I don't even think that plywood is sufficient protection from strong wind, but you know, thats just me. I asked him if had left anything in the safe and he said yes. I said that I hoped it wasn't anything important because personally, that wall of plywood didn't reassure me much. And I guess I was right because Sunday morning, B stopped by his office to pick up something and he saw firemen and police all over the bank- or I should say, former bank. There had been a fire. Set by the bank robbers, who broke into the safe. B called me right away and he was practically in hysterics because the police wouldn't tell him anything. Again, I can't say that I was at all shocked and I pointed out that if the fire was only caught at 8 or 9 on Sunday morning, it was probably only set a bit before (its right on avenue de l'opera and there are lots of people around even early on Sunday morning so it couldn't have burned for very long). That would mean that the robbers had probably been in the bank all night and had had plenty of time to get in all the safe deposit boxes. It was probably a safe bet that whatever he had in there was gone. Well, we spend the rest of the day, on practically on hourly basis, having this same discussion over and over and OVER again. He tried phoning up this morning and the staff at the replacement office didn't even know that there had been a break-in. Oh, French people and their great attitude of 'Whatever. Not my problem.'

At least I can't complain about not getting enough sleep this weekend. I'm not saying that I couldn't have slept for hours more each morning but atleast there were no noisy neighbors to wake me and the time change totally worked in our favor. Tonight will be the real test, but last night Georgia was in bed at 8:30 (a bit later than usual due to the time change and a late nap) and didn't wake until 6:45. I managed to settle her back to sleep til 7:15, when I gave her a bottle and when she was done and had woken us up by banging her bottle against the bars on her crib (honestly, she finally wakes up happy one day and do we get to hear her cooing in bed? No. Its like waking up to an episode of Prison Break.) Despite the noise, this is magical. People, seriously, a Full Nights Sleep. Even if she did wake me up at a very critical point in my dream about hanging out with Brad Pitt and our kids in the park ( we were exchanging very longing looks but I refused to kiss him because Angie would shoot daggers at me each morning before she left for the movie set and I was afraid of the paparazzi taking a photo of it. Don't know where B was during all this. Perhaps at the bank, sifting through safe deposit ashes? Anyways, best dream I've had in AGES. But also kind of random since the scraggy goatee Brad's rocking right now is actually pretty gross. )

I guess I'll just keep working backwards. Saturday night got sort of screwed up since I was supposed to go out with an old uni friend in town for the weekend but we got our wires crossed and I ended up with a babysitter and no place to go. I told B that after my hellish afternoon of hangover + kids birthday party (boy, kids sure like popping balloons, don't they?), I was bound and determined to ditch the kids for a few hours of quiet adult company. He made reservations at the Thai place at the Village St Paul and we had a lovely dinner, discussing a dream vacation inspired by my brother and his sailing adventure. We are going to fly to Panama, get on a sailboat and sail to the Galapagos Islands, where we can spend a week diving and hiking and visiting stuff. Can't wait. The nice thing about B is that once he gets an idea in his head, he won't let it drop (OK, full disclosure; this is also the most irritating thing about him. Funny how that works, isn't it?). I was teasing him this morning when he asked me to cross my fingers and say a pray for him, since he was off to the bank to see about things. I told him that I would be praying hard because if everything turned out fine, he would be so excited that I would be able to book an awesome vacation for May; but if he got bad news, I didn't have a snowball chance in hell of going anywhere til the fall because he would nix all my ideas simply on principal (the principal being that people who are robbed don't have money for vacation. Never mind that the stuff in the safe has nothing to do with our finances...)

Friday night, I had my weekly girls night out which was fab. I am sad all over again about my friend who moved home to the Netherlands. She is so lovely and I realize more and more that she was sort of the corner stone of our group of friends. You know how there is often the person who is the connection between different groups? And without that person, no one is the catalyst to get different people together? Its funny how it works out; I talk to all these people when I bump into them on the street or in the shops or at the school gate, but the only time that we go out is when Hestor is around. Hmm. So dinner was fun although we went to Chez Janou to eat. I don't know. Lots of people love that place but I think it is a pain. First of all, the no seating til your whole group arrives is ridiculous because the bar area is like a cattle pen from 8 til 8:30. The guy that runs the place is obnoxious, even though he sort of acts like its just his schtick. Ugh. The Rude French Waiter act is maybe funny for tourists, but I'm so over it. Just whatever, ignore me or bring my dinner but don't harrass me, please. Thank goodness that I was too drunk at the end of the meal to care about the tip. I think I paid 7 euro too much and I hope that one of my girlfriends too the change. It would kill me to think that I left it as a tip for that meal. The food was fine, don't get me wrong, it just wasn't great. Anyways, I think i like that place better in the summer when you can sit outside on the terrasse.

That reminds me, while talking about restaurants. On Sunday afternoon, while strolling through the Marais with the girls, we decided to stop for a coffee. That whole area around rue Francs Bourgeois was just heaving, per the usual, so I decided that we should head up rue Turenne a bit to find somewhere less busy. We went into Le Cafe de Deux Musees and it was fantastic! I had been there ages ago and sort of forgot how nice it was. We ordered the apple tart (mainly because the waiter said that was all that they had left...) and it must have been just out of the oven as it was still warm. It was honestly just so gorgeous that it immediately went to the number one spot on my list of Best Tarts Ever. So yummy. The wait staff were all really nice and cheeky (take note, Chez Janou, there is a difference between cheeky and rude). The salle is nice and old-fashioned. And the regular menu looked nice and well-priced. We took the card and hopefully we'll remember to go there for one of our mid-week, low-key date nights. I am on a mission to find some new restos in our neighborhood because we have gotten into such a rut and then last week, it started raining as we wandered around looking for a place to eat and we ended up in a very sub-par place just off place St Catherine. Ok, it got is in and out of the rain which was our main goal at that point but the food was abysmal. Oh well. I guess that I've learned my lesson- never go out on a warm evening in March and expect to have all night to stroll around and find a nice place to eat. Unless you left the house with an umbrella.

I'm also going to try Au Petit Marche on rue Bearn. One of my girlfriends recommended it and its also close by so I'll post a review as soon as I get around to eating at all of these places. It shouldn't be too long. The warm weather, and Georgia's improved sleeping habits, have made me antsy to get out of the house more often. I think I might even need to go have a look through Craigslist to see if I can't find a nice American student looking to pick up a few hours of babysitting.

A have a few minutes before I need to go and get Georgia from garderie so I am going to make a real To Do list and try and be a bit productive this week. I am embarrassed at my lack of motivation lately. In fact, I am so embarrassed about it that I won't even go into the details. Lets just say that its amazing that I manage to leave the house fully dressed.

Indestructible

Oh, today is just getting better and better. Georgia and I were playing at the coffee table with some paper and crayons, when she sort of stepped back and got that very funny look of concentration on her face that babies get when they are, you know, doing their business. If I had any doubts about what was going on, they were erased a moment later when a smell wafted over towards me... B and Ella got home just then and B took Georgia for a change while I chatted with Ella. Suddenly, B called out to me, with a frantic note in his voice, 'Nicole! Nicole, I think you better come in here and see this.' I thought that she maybe had a bit of diaper rash. Not even close.

She was sitting up and clearly there had been a bit of a poo-nami since the baby was stripped naked. Bruno pointed at her back, and I looked. At first I didn't notice anything odd, so B finally pointed his finger right at it, and said , 'Look at that!' Ladies and gentlemen, it was an orange crayon, probably 5 cm long.

I laughed, thinking Ella must have stuffed it down Georgia's pants, and we finished cleaning her up. I was carrying her into the bathroom for a bath when it suddenly dawned on me that Georgia had been wearing a onesie and that Ella couldn't have put the crayon in her diaper. I grabbed Ella and interrogated her but she denied all knowledge of the rogue crayon. (My suspicians increased when she started giggling, but I suppose, to a 5-year-old, there is nothing funnier than the scatological humor of your parents finding weird things in the baby's diaper. Man, this is going to be all over the cour de recré on Monday...)

I turned to B, and said, 'You don't think that she...' and he answered, 'I think she did.'

Now, Georgia is not big on putting weird things into her mouth but lately she has liked carrying around a crayon whenever Ella starts drawing. I've even seen her kind of gumming the big fat ones, but she's teething and I guess I figured, since they were non-toxic and so enormous, there was no worry about her swallowing them. But this was one of the skinnier crayons. And she does generally eat really well so I guess that I could imagine her trying to eat a crayon. Only, she hasn't been eating well the last few days which may have been due to a sore stomach- like maybe due to crayon indigestion. Oh geez, I can't tell if the pieces are falling into place or if I'm just taking myself into it. But this crayon seemed huge! How on Earth would she have managed to actually swallow it? But then, how on Earth would you explain this crayon in her diaper, otherwise?

I've just done the worst thing possible and googled 'baby swallow crayon diaper' and it confirms my fears that a baby could totally eat an entire crayon. I guess that I'll give the pediatrician a call tomorrow and see if I need to do anything else about this. I'm suddenly worried about what else she may have been ingesting on the sly.

Things that I am liking today

Despite the nice suuny sky, doesn't look like I am going out this afternoon as Georgia is acting a bit under the weather. Don't
quite know what she's got, but I have had a few good nights sleep in a row so I suppose that means I am due for an all-nighter. In order to get a post up, I will do a quick list of things that I am liking today:

*Soup
On Sunday afternoon, I cooked up a pot of Jamie Olivers' Tomato and Chickpea Soup (found in his cookbook Jamie's Dinners, which I picked up at The Little Red Wheelbarrow a few weeks ago; its turning out to be a great purchase), so yummy. I just ate two bowls of it for lunch and finished off the last of it. I LOVE this recipe- here is my version:

Saute 100 g finely chopped chorizo in a tbsp of oil. When the oils come out of the chorizo, add two sticks of chopped celery and a chopped onion; saute til cooked through. Stir in one clove of crushed garlic. Add 4 cups of chicken broth, 2 cups of crushed tomatoes (or chopped fresh tomatoes), a lg bag of spinach leaves and a can of drained chickpeas. Leave to simmer for 40 minutes. Puree about half the soup (I use those liquidizer wands). When ready to serve, top with sliced prosciutto, chopped boiled eggs and a drizzle of really good olive oil. Die and go to heaven. Voila.

I suspect that I could eat it this everyday for a good long while before I every got sick of it.
PS: notice the dish? So far, I'm happy with the change- food looks so good in these dishes!


*Fleur de Geisha Tea from Palais des Thes
I am also burning through my box of tea that I got as a present from our friends who stayed in our flat while we were away skiing.
I had smelled it while I was in the shop and thought that it smelled nice, but I like it even more than I thought I would. As I am still trying to watch what I eat, I have been drinking gallons of green tea every afternoon. It gets boring. But this tea has such a nice flowery smell that I would be drinking it even if it wasn't green tea.






*Tetines
And since Georgia is under the weather, she is allowed to hang on to her tetine all day long, even though it is normally limited to bed time. She is just cranky cranky cranky. I got her up from her nap because I heard her making noise and brought her in the kitchen for lunch. She refused everything that I offered her, even though I broke my own rule (normally, in this house, you eat what is offered or you go hungry to til the next meal. Doesn't matter how short you are...) and opened a second jar of baby food to try and tempt her to eat something. No luck. She kept squeaking until I just put her back in bed. She slept another 45 minutes and then I took her temp (nothing), gave her a Doliprane in case it was sore teeth, and now she is wandering around the house alternately playing with her toys and breaking into inconsolable sobs.


*the new brochure from the Opera de Paris
Yesterday in the mail, I got the calendar for the 2010/2011 season of operas and ballets and the paperwork to pre-order tickets. Since I've been taking Ella to see shows this year, I've realized that even though tickets are expensive, they are a worthwhile expense. I really really enjoy going and I just don't know why I always put off buying tickets when it was just for B and I. Ella adores going to see the ballet and, as I've said before, I think that it is just as worthwhile as sending her to ballet class. She probably gets more out of it; as well. I have been pouring over the book and trying to decide which ballets I want to get tickets. Then I mentioned to B that they also had some great operas scheduled for next year (Madame Butterfly, Tosca, Les Noces de Figaro) and maybe we should think about getting tickets for that as well. I was really surprised when he told me to go right ahead and book them, if I wanted. I think I will!
The only downside is that when you buy all these tickets at one time, the total bill is pretty impressive. I don't think B quiet realizes just how much this is all going to cost. On the positive side, I think that I can probably go down a category and still have good seats since the pre-order tickets get the best places.

That reminds me- I did manage to get tickets last week for the Nureyev ballet Le Bayadere. Because I was in such a tizzy Monday morning from the unexpected arrival of the painters, I totally forgot to go online for the tickets until I was sitting down for lunch. I logged on and the website was completely blocked due to high traffic and I ended up getting pretty much the last tickets available. I have 2 seats in category 3, which is good. But they are not any where near each other, so taht is kind of bad. Well, its really bad since I had planned on taking Ella. Hmm. I don't quiet know what I'm going to do abou this, but I figure no point worrying til it gets a bit closer. At worst, I have B or a girlfriend go with me, and take Ella to see something else. Or I could just show up with Ella and hope that someone switches places, or that they just let us sit together anyways.

*My brother's blog
My little brother has taken a sabbatical from work to go an A Big Adventure. He has a buddy who bought a boat and they sailed it through the Panama Canal. Now they are getting the boat ready and will be sailing out of Panama City today or tomorrow for the Galapagos Islands. From there, they will go on to the French Marquesas (I'm trying to talk B into flying out there to meet them). Wow. Maybe this is something that has to go on my Life List. It sounds like an amazing thing to do- a bit scary, but the most worthwhile things tend to be the ones that push you to your limits, right?

Just a normal weekend full of fun...

We had a nice weekend- but it just seemed like it flew by! Its getting to the point that I long for Monday mornings, which is a sad state of affairs.

Saturday, especially, was a complete whirlwind. I made an appointment for Ella to get her hair cut at that kids place up in the the 11th, Mum & Babe. I think I've mentioned it here before. Well, we got off to a bad start when we left late and I couldn't find a plan de Paris to throw in my purse. Then I thought, 'Well, I've been there before two or three times. I'm sure that I can find it without a map.' Yeah, famous last words. As soon as we got on the bus, I knew that I was in trouble. I couldn't remember which stop. I was watching out the window for something familiar but no luck so finally we just jumped off when I knew that it couldn't be any further along. We wandered around, asking people if they knew where the street was but no one did. On the other hand, it might have been because of my bad pronunciation- Keller, is one of those stupid names that looks English to me and so I don't know how to pronounce it in French. Arg. I couldn't find a kiosk to buy a map so I ended up having to go into a Monoprix and search for one. When I finally looked up the street, I realized that I hadn't a clue of where I was headed so atleast it was money well spent. Despite all that, we ended up only being a few minutes late. You would have thought it was an hour, by the reception we got. They were HORRIBLE to us, even though there was only one other person in the whole salon, and she was downstairs getting a facial. They barely acknowledged us when we walked in. They didn't offer to take our coats or the pousette. They didn't ask the kids names. There was no chatting while we were in the chairs. I was going to party so I wanted a brushing that was a little more 'going out' and she said 'no, your hair is far too short. I'll just blow it straight.' And the one who cut Ella's hair didn't even look at me when I was trying to explain to her what I wanted done. When they were done, no one came with us to the coat closet or the front desk so I had to stand around with two antsy kids while all the staff stood around in the back chatting. They acted a bit nicer to the people who came in after us, since clearly they knew them better. I used to always tell people to take their kids there for a haircut but I don't know if I would do that anymore. It is nice that Ella's cut only cost 12 euro (and I'll admit, that it turned out very nice, which is better than the Camille Albane downstairs does for 25 euro) and that the baby can go in the playroom, but still. This was French customer service at its nadir. And this time when I didn't tip, I did not feel the least little bit guilty.

After all that, we still had to get lunch in a restaurant (MacDo, which was a first for Georgia and after she spied the Chicken McNuggets and fries, there was no question in her mind about eating pureed baby food.), go to a first birthday party, go shopping for a PACS present for B's friends, and buy/order a big bed for Miss Ella. I was running so behind schedule that the babysitter was at the house before us. Thank goodness, actually. She ended up feeding our over-excited monkeys while we threw our party clothes on and hustled back out the door. Good thing there was a big glass of chilled champagne waiting for us on the other end of that car ride or I don't think that we would have made it!

Once we got to the party, I discovered that I was not the only person there who had no idea what the deal was with the Pacs. We did bring a present and weren't the only ones but they ran the gamut from a bouquet of freesia to an engraved silver picture frame from Christofle (I'll let you guess which one we gave...) I'd say that the bigger mistake was dressing up in high heels. There were far too many people in a very small living room, so I spent all but 15 minutes standing. I still have sore feet! To think, I used to be able to spend an entire day dashing around Paris in a pair of heels twice as high. Now, I am so used to my ballet flats and Geox that I can't even make it through an evening without needing to pull out my crutches and heating pad the next day.

I am an old old woman.

On Sunday, we were shattered despite the fact that we were home and in bed at 12:30. The people downstairs went away for the weekend so, per the usual, their son had his friends over. At 3:30 in the morning. I got woken up when they came in but drifted off again. By 4:30 I had had enough, as they were only getting louder and I banged on the floor. They quieted down, but then a girl in heels starting walking around their living room and the tap!tap!tap! of her heels on the floor woke up Georgia. Who woke up the upstairs neighbors and Ella. So then at 5 am I had to go down and ring the door bell to ask if the noisy girl could possibly remove her shoes since she had inadvertently woken up another 4 people. This kid was clearly horrified (by the fact that he woke us or the looks of me? Hard to say. I didn't dare glance in a mirror before going downstairs and I can only guess how scary I looked...) and apologized profusely. But I HATE having to ask them to be quiet since Georgia is a such a noisemaker.

That kid, honestly. If she is not screaming at 5 am because she was woken by a bad dream or a sudden noise, she is screaming for her bottle. Or screaming to get out of bed. Or screaming for Ella to come and play. Or screaming at some food that she spied on the counter and would very much like to eat, if you don't mind. There is no volume control on her. Yesterday afternoon, we all laid down for a nap after our turbulent night and I ended up getting up first when I heard Georgia waking. But she wasn't actually ready to get up yet, it seemed. EVERYTHING was making her mad. And so, her natural response was to scream at me. No! I don't want water! NO! Nothing to eat!! NO!!!! I do not want to look at a book! or my toys! or a movie! or your stupid face! Finally, because I wanted to let Ella have a bit of nap, I ended up clamping my hand over Georgia's mouth and hauling her out on the balcony. She calmed down almost immediately. I'm hoping that I have found a magic cure for this problem but I worry that it is only temporary. I put her out there 2 more times before Ella was good and woken up. So you can see why I feel like the last person in the world with any right no complain about noisy neighbors. I just pray that she outgrows this. Some kids are just noisy though. Am starting to wonder if we are going to be forced out of apartment dwelling and into the suburbs because we never manage to shut her up. And she was such a calm baby.

I also managed to clear out our old dishes from our cupboards yesterday and put the new ones in their place. We decided our old orange Fiestaware had to go. I've been looking around for plain white round dishes but all I could find was stuff basically the equivalent of orange Fiestaware. Most importantly, I needed to be one hundred percent certain that it was dishwasher and microwave safe, since I've had a horrible experience with some mugs that I bought at IKEA.* Finally it dawned on me that I should just use my wedding china which was Louvre, by Bernardaud. We've had it for 11 year and use it fairly often, for nice dinners and parties, and not a single piece has chipped. Its not too fancy looking for every day, I figured, so we are going to give it a trial run of one month and see how things go. Then, if we decide to go for it, I'll think about getting another set of dishes for parties, something a bit fancier (maybe this , or this, or this, or this!) Anyways, I hesitated as put the dishes in the kitchen, thinking that it would be a shame to see them all getting chipped over time when I like them so much. But then I stopped myself. If you're lucky enough to own beautiful things, you shouldn't waste your good fortune by hiding it away in a cupboard. You should use them and enjoy them everyday. How it can it be anything but good to enjoy beautiful things, right? Right. So the dishes stay.

Which still leaves me with the conundrum of what to do with the Fiestaware which is in perfect condition, after I don't know how many years of use. Amazing. I suppose that I should try and Ebay it or sell it on Craigslist, but I suspect that B and I will be making a trip up to Emmaus this week to drop it off as a donation. We still have the dishes from our first apartment sitting down in our cave and we've never needed them so they will go as well. Thats one thing about apartment living - it teaches you not to get too sentimental about your stuff. If it isn't being used on a regular basis, its got to go. I'm sure someone else out there will enjoy having and using all this stuff, as well, so that it makes it even more stupid to box it up and store away for some imaginary future life of mine when I finally need it again. I've been thoroughly heartless lately and that Emmaus has been the lucky recipient of a mountain of stuff. Anyone out there looking to stock up a new apartment should definitely head over to Emmaus on boulevard Beaumarchais :-)

* I needed some coffee mugs and I just picked up some nice simple ones at Habitat one day, without checking that they could go in the dishwasher or microwave. After a few months, I started noticing that the handle on the mug was hot when it came out of the microwave- even when the contents were still barely warm. Then, one morning, I reached in to grab my mug of warm milk while Ella was running around underfoot, and the handle was scorching hot, so hot that I ended up with a blister over the entire surface of my thumb. I was just grateful that I didn't drop the mug of hot liquid on Ella when it happened and thats when I decided that I couldn't possibly use those mugs anymore, because they were too dangerous. Someone finally explained to me that when the pottery is not dishwasher safe, it can 'absorb' water. Then, when you put it in the microwave, this water heats up and if it gets too hot, can actually make the pottery explode!

Friday favorites

I tried to get a nice photo of Georgia when we were playing with bubbles the other day (she goes CRAZY if she spies a bottle of bubbles, all other activities must come to a screeching halt until I am woozy from lack of oxygen and she is covered with a fine layer of soap suds). Every shot, she had her tongue sticking out like this, or her eyes were shut like a little drunken geisha. She clearly takes after her father and therefore will never ever be elected Miss Photogenic. I've always thought that she was her father's daughter- from the chubby cheeks to the bottomless pit of an appetite, no worries about babies being switched in the nursery at the maternity clinic.

So after my lovely little nap yesterday, I was in a great mood. I ended up calling up a girlfriend to meet me at one of the galeries last night. Except I called the wrong girlfriend. The one who ALWAYS changes her plans at the last minute. So there I was, hair done, make-up on, undressed in front of my closet, trying to decide what to wear when I get an SMS. She had decided to go to different vernissage in the 8th off avenue Montaigne and wanted me to meet her there, after I saw my friends. I did really feel like a girls' night out and I should have just sucked it up, because we probably would have gone out afterwards and had a great time. BUT but but. I didn't have enough enthusiasm for the change of plans to get myself out the door on my own, on such a miserable night. I told B, when I came out of my room wearing my pyjamas, that if it had been a nice spring night, it would have been totally different. On a cold March night, I much preferred cuddling up with him on the sofa and watching TV. So that is what I did.

Which in the end was good, because Georgia had a bad night, after a fairly great week of sleep, and did her patented sleep torture move (I like to call it 'Going Guantanamo'). She woke at 5:30. We went in 3 times to give her her pacifier, start her music box, settle her down, til finally giving her a bottle just before 6. 10 minutes later she yelled hard, so I went in and saw that she had lost her pacifier. Again. Then she yelled again, every 10 minutes for another 40 minutes, til it was time for us to get up, more or less. That, my friends, is a hard night. She collapsed into bed at 10 a.m. for a morning nap and I imagine will sleep for 2 hours. Atleast I am getting good naps out of her on a regular basis. Thank god for small favors.

And now i wanted to post a photo of another beautiful bouquet from my favorite florist on rue St Antoine, Christian Collin, but I think my camera has died! It got knocked on the floor the other day and landed with an ominous 'thump'. It did turn on right afterwards, but now it's dead dead dead. Maybe I just need to charge the battery but I fear my little Canon has moved on to that big camera shop in the sky. I'll miss you.

Hmmm. Wonder if this means that B will let me get the Nikon D-3000 now?

total chaos

Our house is a complete disaster zone yet again today. The dining room was all finished yesterday and Ella's room should be finished today, but the living room will remain a work in progress through tomorrow. Ugh. I had to have the sitter stay an extra hour last night because there was no way I could manage keeping both girls out of trouble and occupied while also throwing together a quick dinner. The guy doing the work is actually fantastically neat and very polite so he won't so much as move a curtain without asking my permission or instructions. The walls that he has finished painting look amazing- which is really saying something, since B is a great painter and I thought the job he did two years ago was impressive. The new built-in unit should look great when he is done. If only I didn't have to try and keep Georgia occupied in the house while all this is going on.

Good lord, is it cold out! Normally, I would just pop her in the stroller and spend two or three hours walking around Paris- good for my ass and good for entertaining Georgia. I took her with me yesterday while I ran a quick errand and the poor kid was mute with misery. Her nose was streaming, her face was bright red, she even left her hands under the fleece muff (which she NEVER does) while she pushed her head into the seat to try and stay out of the wind. Clearly, a longer walk was out of the question. I let her run around in the halls of our building for a bit yesterday and she screamed her head off, she was so thrilled, so I won't abuse the kindness of my neighbors by doing that again today. Basically, we are forced to sit in her room all day. I don't mind, and certainly she has enough toys that we don't get too bored, but she has suddenly started to obsess over her favorite books. I think I read 'Petite Singe' (Little Monkey), oh about, 800 times yesterday. And tied for second place (that is, I only had to read each of these books around 400 times over the course of the afternoon...) were 'Les Petites des Animaux', 'Animaux Sauvages', and 'Ou est Mon Chaton?'. I am trying to be zen about it and consider it as a chance to perfect some of the problems I had with gender pronouns and les accords. I wonder why my old French teacher, Catherine, never suggested that we read aloud from Ella's library? So many opportunities for instruction. And, unfortunately, so much more in line with my abilities. My French library is rather sparse (and B's is quite frankly, non-existant) so we did readings from Beigbeder's 'L'egoiste romantique' which is a bit too (porno)graphic for a french lesson and then switched to 'L'elegance du herrison' by Murial Barbary which has too many long words susceptible to mispronounciation, which made our lessons a real bore. I actually should give ole Catherine a ring so I can show off my perfect pronunciation of 'la lapine and ses lapereux!' (I'll probably save the 'boinga boinga boinga sound effect for Georgia)

Its funny that I just noticed that all her favorite books are in French. Hmm. I suppose the actual text is not that significant and since she likes the baby books with things to touch and feel, I don't have many English language ones which take up too much space in the suitcase so I end up leaving them in the States. All the same, I should probably start paying more attention to my English. Ella is so bilingual (she switches between French and English during a conversation depending on whether she is speaking to me or B.) so I don't worry too much about being strictly English-speaking. As usual, Georgia is keeping me on my toes. She is clearly understanding English, since I can give her an instruction like 'Pick it up and put it on the table, please' and, with no gestures to help explain, and she will do it. She also understands 'Yucky! Spit it out!' and 'Come here and let me wipe your nose.' Although that last one either sends her running in the opposite direction or has her doing one of her full body wags to indicate a No, with a capital N. Speaking of which, I'm sure she'll be saying her first 'no' any day now. They grow up so fast.

I know that she is probably right in line with the average development for a baby her age, but God! I just find her so genius! I don't even want to look at my 'What to Expect' book because it is so much more fun being completely amazed by her. Its really one of the joys of being a parent, seeing a child actually develope each skill. You see them struggle and struggle and then finally the lightbulb goes off and they succeed at whatever they are doing and then- the best part- they look at you with this look of proud amazement. If I had a dozen kids, I think I would still find it mesmerizing to watch them learn things like how to put small toys in a jar, how to pick up a cheerio, how to use a crayon. The other day, I watched Georgia trying to put her shoe on. It was hilarious. She knew that you had to aim the toes towards the hole but after that it was all a bit vague. So she would turn turn turn the shoe in her hand til the hole was pointing down. Then she would need two or three tries to actually get her toes in the hole. Then she would try to balance the shoe on her foot as she slowly let go and eased away. And then it would fall off and she would let out a little grunt of frustration, before trying it all again. You also realize, when watching a baby learning, just how tenacious they are. I often think about how frustrated I get with a task after two or three failures. I mean, I get really really fed up with my computer when things are disappearing or not following commands like I expect. These little tasks, which are NOTHING compared with the struggle of learning to walk, for example. It is the ultimate lesson in patience.

Its a good lesson for me, right now. I've been spending time online, doing research into going back to work. I think that I need to go back to study, atleast for a bit, before trying to get back to the career that I would like to be doing. BUT finding the right program and applying and getting financing and then sorting out babysitting for the girls while I am doing a course. Its all so complicated. And its so easy to just to just sigh, and go all Scarlett O'Hara about things. ('I'll just think about it tomorrow...') Obviously, I need to commit myself to this and not let up until I've sorted things out. Its so easy to let things slide when you know that the problem is still rather far off in the future, just a vague cloud on the horizon. The best birthday present I could give myself is not a day at the spa but a list of '40 by 40'. I think I need to get serious about getting stuff done. Starting today.

Happily waving February good-bye

I don't think that I am the only person to be saying 'good riddance' to the month of February. It was rough, and I even managed to squeeze in a vacation. Well, two, if you count flying to the States for a funeral (although I think we can all agree that it doesn't really count, even if I did get to eat pizza from Drag's.) The weather was tough. I had to frantically dash from one major project to another. I gave myself whiplash (I don't think that I mentioned this. I fell down badly on the last day of skiing and the next day? I had to actually use my hands to turn my head from side to side. A week later and I am mostly better although I still creak when I get out of bed in the morning. Way to celebrate another birthday is coming up, body!) We were all sick- and some of us, more than once. Its Lent and I gave up alcohol so I couldn't even reward myself at the end of a hard day of cupcake baking and baby wrangling with a nice glass of wine. Oh, and my appointment to my lovely new hair salon was marred by the MOST EXPENSIVE BLOWOUT and/or MANICURE ever. When I told B how much it had cost, he was actually going to call them up and yell at them because he thought that they had taken advantage of me or cheated me or something. I had to admit that it was just a ridiculously expensive salon and now he may explode when I mention that I still need to go back this week to get my hair cut. Life was hard in February.

Forgive me for taking off an entire week from blogging but I am EXHAUSTED. The minute that we got back from vacation, I was ready to start burning through my prep list for the big birthday party for Georgia, but Monday morning I got a text from the sitter/cleaner to tell me that she was ill and she didn't know if she would make it to work all week. I couldn't have gotten any worse news. First of all, since we had all had The Gastro that Never Ended, I suspected that she wouldn't be back to work any time soon. And Secondly, Ella was on school holidays and was quite frankly, being a PITA. After spending a week alone with B and I, it seemed like she was determined to make it her full time job to have my full attention at all times. OMG, the endless questions! The constant harrassment to play games. The insistence that she was incapable of doing the smallest task without constant supervision. Plus the fact that I also had to entertain Georgia- who was being extra clingy due to our little vacation. I was at my wits end. By noon on Monday.

Luckily, Ella's school has a great centre de loisirs during the holidays and it turned out that there were a few kids from her class who would be there. She didn't want to go, we literally dragged her out of the house on Tuesday morning. Then, on Tuesday afternoon, I came to pick her up and she sent me home! She wanted to keep playing so I made dinner and then went to fetch her at 6 pm. Its funny but I would swear that the people who organise this put in more time and effort than her regular teacher. The schedule for the week is just a list of amazingly fun stuff for kids. Granted, there are only 30 kids and something like 6 animateurs/-trices, but still. I am more and more happy with my decision to pull Ella out of this school and send her to a private school next year. Not only does her teacher this year seem to have been slacking off in the extreme but she only worked about 9 days since January. She'll work a day or two and then be on sick leave for two weeks. And this is despite the fact that she only works part-time the way it is. Since I go to school to do the english class with teh kids, I am always shocked to hear that she has been put on arret maladie, when the day before, when I was in class, she was perfectly well and chatting to me about her plans for the evening. Hmm, a cynical person might think that she was abusing the system. Of course, she might very well be dying of cancer, but I highly doubt it.

So Ella was happy to dance out the door every day at 8:30 but that still left me with the Littlest Dictator. Good lord, this kid is a handful. She started walking really well while staying with her grandparents so she's become quiet brave, only the smallest things can send her crashing to the floor. Things like the edge of a rug. A piece of paper on the floor. A bit of light flashing in her eye. Its getting to where she is so covered in bruises that I am horrified to send her to daycare. They must think that I am either the most incompetent parent alive or that I am using her in cage fighting. I honestly don't remember Ella being such a klutz. I also don't remember Ella being so difficult and disagreeable. Ella used to be happy to sit by herself and play. Georgia is almost never happy to sit and play by herself and even when you play with her, she'll suddenly get a bug up her ass about something and starting crying and throwing things. I really really hope that its all due to her teeth but I'm beginning to fear that she is just a Difficult Child.

Georgia has started sleeping well, some nights, but then like last night, will give a good yell every 10 minutes for 2 hours. She isn't entirely awake but she isn't entirely asleep either. That means that you have to listen closely for the tipping point from Sleeptalking to Hysterics. Especially since she learned to scream. Oh that adds a whole new level of fun to the 4 am sleep-training that we are trying to do. And since she learned to shake her head 'no', she won't eat anything either. The first three bites go down just fine. Then its a big, full-body waggle indicating 'No!' So I try to alternate with bites of a dessert compote. That will work for a few bites. Then, another big 'no'. Generally at this point, she starts pointing at stuff around the room that she wants to eat instead. My tea. Ella's sandwich. A candle. Mainly stuff that she can't eat, but try to convince her of this. Meals have gone from being the easiest part of the day to a slow torturous death slog.

Oh, I know, I know. She's just a baby and she is just doing what babies do. But, gosh, sometimes parenting is a thankless job. I think that part of it is that I am sort of ready to move on to the next thing. When B came home from work the night before Georgia's birthday party, I asked him what he though of all the decorating and baking and projects I had done with Ella. He answered, 'i think you need a job'. Yeah, maybe I do.

I am sitting here watching Georgia busy playing. She pushed herself in her walker over to the entry where she found my purse on a low shelf. She is pulling items out, one by one, and examining each thing like it is the most extraordinary thing that she has ever seen. Its moments like this when you realize how life is just one big discovery for a baby. Everything is new.

She has just found a chapstick. She twisted it around and was a bit surprised when the top half, the cover, came off in her hand. She peered inside the top and then stuck her finger in there. Then she looked in the bottom and saw that there was something inside. She has taken her finger and poked it in, pulled her finger out to examine it, and now has stuck her finger in her mouth, to taste whatever she found. She smacks her lips, turns the tube around one more time to see all the writing. Bangs it on the tray a few times and then checks back inside the tube to see if anything falls out. She puts the whole tube in her mouth once, pulls it out, and looks at it very closely again. Finally, she tosses it on the floor and reaches in my bag for another item.

You try to put yourself in the place of a baby. Imagine finding a bag full of fascinating objects, things that you had never seen in your entire life. You had no idea what purpose they serve. I try to imagine how exciting it would be to touch these things and wonder about them.

After having a baby around for awhile, you stop noticing how every day is something new. But moments like this are magic, when it is quiet enough and calm enough that I can appreciate and even participate a bit in her giant Discovery of Life. Its really fuzzy and just barely flitting around the edges of my memory, but if I try hard enough, I can almost remember that feeling. Being little and being mesmerized by something New.

I remember being about 8 months old and being left alone on the floor near the cupboards at my Grandfather's house, the cupboards without the old-fashioned latches, the ones that had a button you had to press to pop the latch. They were shiny metal and worn smooth from years of use. They made a nice 'thunk' sound when the latch popped. I remember sitting there and being totally absorbed, touching the latch and trying to open it myself.

It makes me think about other memories from when I was really really young, and how they seem so disconnected. But maybe that is what a baby's mind is like- totally absorbed in one object or task and then an adult comes and scoops you up, and suddenly you find yourself somewhere else entirely, being handed some other object, and suddenly you are completely absorbed in this new item that has appeared. Sometimes when I see items that my mom had when I was a baby, I have strangly strong reactions. I glimpse a blanket in a stack on the shelf and I remember laying on the blanket and examining it, the way the yarn ties curl up and fuzz at the corner of each of the patchworks. I see a picture hanging at the end of the hall and I feel the ridges of its frame, bumping under my nails. I put Georgia in her pyjamas and, as I stand in my childhood bedroom with the pale green carpetting, I can feel my feet sweating against the rubbery bottoms of my footy pyjamas, the blue ones with the white plastic feet that matched my sister's red ones. I wander through the toy section trying to find Christmas presents for the girls, and the chemical smell of all the plastic reminds me of the gritty feel of the yellow plastic on the play shopping cart that I received for Christmas when I was two.

Its funny how these memories flash into my head, surprising me and at the same time feeling worn smooth, as if they had been touched every day for years. It makes my stomach tense up with excitement, thinking of all the other memories that must be lingering around the corner, just waiting for the right signal to jump out and say, 'Here I am.'

It makes me look at the girls every day and think, 'Will they remember this? How about this?' Which events from today are the ones that they will turn over and over again in their head as they fall to sleep, the ones that will come back to them when they are grown up and remembering. As I paste the pictures in their photo albums, I wonder if the photos will jog memories and they will remember how that day smelled. Or how the cake batter felt sticky on their faces. Or how the cold air pinched the insides of their noses.

And what I often ask myself is, why do I spend so much time printing out photos and carefully pasting them in the albums? Why is it so important to me to try and pin down all these moments, especially when I am constantly being impressed by how intense my childhood memories come back to me? Maybe its just the randomness of memory that worries me. It feels like I have no control over what disappears and what sticks. Maybe that is what the albums are for. Like this, I remember the girls' childhood exactly as I want to. I choose the pictures. I write the captions. The universe doesn't get to decide which day gets lost and which moment will haunt me.

Will it work?

The anti-organiser

While she did that, I did this:

which made me so happy that I didn't even mind having to spend 15 minutes sorting out her mess.

A very productive weekend

Despite having spent the weekend fighting off a cold, I actually got lots done. I suppose that it what happens when you are stuck in the house for hours on end and can't go out and waste time on pointless errands. Exactly what I needed.

Now, the number one task on the to-do list was the ski holiday. Booked! B extended an olive branch (after laughing heartily at my suggestion that I fly with the two girls to Phoenix , "15 hours on a plane? For fun? Sounds like a great vacation. Feel free to book the tickets." Ok, maybe that was such a brilliant idea after all...) and called his stepmom to see if she would babysit Georgia while we were skiing. She said that she would be glad to and that immediately made planning so much easier. Then B told me that he had spoken to his SIL who suggested La Clusaz as a really family friendly ski station. I actually trust her advice, so I looked on line, we found some really nice hotels that do demi-pension and had pools/spas, and B immediately phoned up to check for vacancies. In a half hour, it was sorted. Ahhh. Now all that remains is the small question of packing our bags- of course, I realized that Ella has no snow gear so this afternoon I am off to try and buy a ski suit. I don't have a jacket this year so I also have to do some hunting. I was thinking of one of these from Alex Mabille for Pyrenex, but I need to try one on before I can really decide. Despite being from a cold climate (or maybe because of it, I suppose) its hard for me to work up enthusiasm for snow sports and the clothing it involves. Now, bikini/sunhat/beach bag shopping, that is stuff I can get behind.

Only one hiccup- I realized, once we had it all sorted out that we would be gone on Georgia's first birthday. Does that make me a HORRIBLE mother or just a horrible mother? We are going to try and fix this somehow but as B pointed out, Georgia won't know the difference if we celebrate a day late. Good point. Why doesn't that make me feel better?

The next big job that I promised to do was the photo albums. Well, I made good progress, but there are ALOT of photos. Even more than I thought there were. I finished up album #4 and am well into album #5, but I still have a stack of photos 2 inches high that need to be stuck in the book. That can't be more than 75 photos, right? 100, tops. Slim possibility that it is actually 150 and I don't dare count or I may have to kill myself. And this is only for Ella. Then I have to do my album, which is much smaller project, and finally, get started on Georgia's. Dios Mio.

I did continue with my cupboard clean-up/out. I attacked my make-up bag. Small in size, big in irritation factor since everyday involves digging around and getting my hands covered in purple powder from that one time an eyeshadow lid came off. I swiped an organizer out of B's nightstand- it was supposed to be for electronics but he never used it and it looked just the right size for me. I wiped everything down and fit it in to the little compartments. Success! And can I just tell me what secret joy I get every morning when I pull it out of the cupboard, all the little pots arranged neatly in rows, the lipsticks ready to grab with my spotlessly clean hands. Ahhh. Its the small pleasures that make life worth living.

Meanwhile, Georgia makes sure that is one step forward, two steps back... Photos to follow.