Halloween--Not a Paris Post

We interrupt our Paris posts to bring you tonight's Halloween festivities...you're welcome!

This Halloween officially marks the end of any sort of cute kid-type costumes for our family since both Landon and Whitney went for gory face paint driven costumes this year.

{2002}

Gone are the days of a very excited Spiderman and the world's cutest Teletubbie, I didn't know the time would fly so quickly.

Say it isn't so!

The cousin count has increased since then too, there were only 5 then.

Now there are 8.

I'm not comfortable with the passage of time.

Can you believe I didn't take my camera trick or treating with us? I have finally decided to rely on Amy's brilliant photos since mine never turn out in the dark (she has a super nice camera with high ISO capabilities). It was liberating, except for the fact that I don't have access to those photos at the moment.

Upon returning, Adam put Ghostbusters on in the background while the kids surveyed their loot. Can you believe I've never seen this movie the whole way through? How did I make it through the 80's? I honestly don't know, but I've only ever seen tiny bits of it.


Whitney was actually distracted enough by the movie not to be blinded by the bounty of candy in front of her...I should have taken her temperature, something must be off!


Randy took Landon and Austin out for an extra half hour of trick or treating (Landon's idea of course), which resulted in tons more candy because many of the houses they visited were closing up for the night and dumped hand fulls of candy into their bags.


Of course there was sorting to be done. Landon proclaimed it "the year of the Kit Kat!"


It was a good night and the 7th year of our traditional family gathering at Adam and Amy's house. I like having this tradition, but am a little bummed out by how old the kids are getting. We have to rely on Ashley for the cuteness quotient, so she better stay little for a long time.

**Did you go trick or treating?
Do you still have cute costumes happening?
Are you comfortable with the passage of time?
Were you a candy sorter?
What's your favorite candy?

Comment Window Tidbit: I feel like I woke up this morning and realized my kids are big. I thought that wouldn't happen until they hit their teens, but apparently ages 9 and 11 are it. Dang it.

Best Creative Friday Ever--Part II

Michelle and I walked down the stairs after crossing the bridge and saw this one man band taking a break. I loved the look of his set up and the view of the Musée d'Orsay across the river.

Park signage.

Immediately upon entering the garden we were treated to gorgeous views. Apparently everything in Paris is picturesque (except for a few things I saw which I'd rather not mention for fear of tainting my posts).

This is the view up those stairs, even having strangers in the background is okay with me because they're part of the art.

Of course we had to take a self-portrait there, notice it was still warm enough that we hadn't put on our coats yet even though people all around us were wearing coats, hats and scarves...what the?

I adore that there are chairs all over the place and love the groupings they end up in. Sometimes there are just one or two chairs together and sometimes there's a bunch of them. No matter how they end up lots of people love and use them.


We had an errand to run for Michelle's niece at the Musée de l'Orangerie gift shop (best errand ever) and I'm so glad we had to go there (the actual museum wasn't on our route because I went there last time I was in Paris).


The beauty of having to run that errand was that when we were done with it we walked over to some nearby chairs and had the best, most relaxing and visually beautiful hour-long rest/chat of my whole trip!


We had a view of the Eiffel Tower, Place de la Concorde, fountains, and a bunch of other beautiful buildings and trees. It was the perfect resting place. (The view slightly to the left.)

This was the view directly in front of us.

The view slightly to the right.

We sat there long enough to see the clouds move and the sky change multiple times, and long enough for us to actually get cold and have to put on our coats and scarves!

It was the debut of my Paris scarf!
{Photo by Michelle}

Earlier in the trip I had tried to get a great Eiffel Tower reflection photo like Jane's daughter did this summer, but couldn't seem to do it, so this reflection in my sunglasses will have to do.


It was a little sad to leave our perfect spot, but we were sufficiently rested and hadn't even explored the Tuileries yet so we had to go. Adieu awesome chairs!


There were tons of people in the park enjoying themselves, but it still felt like it was ours.


The fountains weren't on but the water and cymbals were still beautiful. It would have been nice to see and hear the water bouncing off the cymbals though.

Another self-portrait.

How adorable is this old couple?

We loved the attitude of this full-figured statue woman. Most of the women in early art were ample-bodied you know, none of this modern-day, praying-mantis body type stuff going on. Apparently I was born in the wrong century!

We were snapping photos of the trees and chairs and surrounding beauty like crazy, but were both panicking because our memory cards were almost full. I had taken 2000 photos at this point in my trip and still had 2 days to go!


We were giddy to be there enjoying such a gorgeous fall day. It couldn't have been better!


We sat down to eat at an outdoor cafe (why don't we have those?) and I just had to rig up a self-timer shot to document where we were.

This was the view from where we sat!

We ordered hot chocolate and crêpes (chocolate for Michelle, butter & sugar for me). It was the best crêpe ever! I don't usually like them because they're so eggy tasting, but this wasn't eggy at all. More like a really thin, awesome pancake. Oh my goodness!


We were so pleased to be sipping in such a beautiful place, and were glad not to have tiny cups this time because we were cold and hungry.

I sip, I'm a sipper.


Pricey little snack eh? But oh so worth it.

I can't even tell you how delightful it was to document this artistic scene and have them be our own dishes.


The sun was going down (we couldn't have timed this better if we'd tried) and made everything all golden and wonderful.


We came across a little pond with boats to play with. Only 2 euros for a half hour with a boat and a long stick to push it with, French kids have all the fun!

One last self-portrait for the day.

We headed over to the other raised garden (identical to the one we sat at the week before) to sit on a bench and take it all in. There were no pigeons to be seen this time, so they must have been settling in for the night.


The sun went down behind us and brought out all the nighttime splendor. We were trying to find a bus to take us to see the Champs-Elysées at night. (We had noticed that there were lights hung in the trees, so we wanted to see them at night.)

We walked a few blocks and did some souvenir shopping along the way. We were happily picking out multiple scarves at one shop, when they turned off the lights and started pushing the racks into the store. We asked them if we could buy the scarves and they said, "Come back tomorrow." Can you imagine?! It was a total FRANCE! moment. (If we weren't nice Mormon girls we could have easily walked off with those scarves and I don't think they would have cared at all.)

{Photo by Michelle}

We finally made it to the Champs-Elysées (after meeting a Brazilian woman who was looking for it also) and found a bus, but like 10 seconds after getting on the bus it turned and went down another street! It was too funny. We had noticed that the trees weren't lit up though, so it was a bust either way.


The bus dropped us off several blocks from the apartment (oh good, more walking) but we were able to see more beautiful places. The city at night is really just as beautiful as during the day, it's just harder to photograph.


The Eiffel Tower had black and purple lights that night and looked oh so cool. We made it back to the apartment around 8:30 (10 hours after we'd left) just in time to see Max and Lucas heading out to see an Eiffel Tower light show. (Apparently they're practicing for some big New Year's display.)


Michelle and I got Grecs again (my mouth is watering just looking at this picture...oh torture) and collapsed. We did really well and probably could have stayed out longer if our bladders could have made it, but 10 hours is a long time!

**Thoughts??**

Comment Window Tidbit: I am seriously trying not to slump on the bed sobbing as I recall that this post is what I was doing last Friday, and this Friday I am home in my pajamas looking for Halloween bingo cards for Whitney's class party. Oh the humanity!

Best Creative Friday Ever--Part I

After Thursday's day of Smotherhood, Michelle and I were very excited to have Friday Flanarizing to look forward to kid-free! We didn't want to waste any of our day so we made sure we were up and ready and out the door by 10:15am. As we walked down the stairs of the apartment building we did a little victory cheer.


We got our morning almond croissant and then took the Metro to the Musée d'Orsay. We were only able to squeeze in a really fast couple hours there on my last trip, so I really wanted to spend more time there this go around.


We passed a realtor's office with postings in the window and were surprised to see you can get a little place along The Seine for almost 3 million euros, oh is that all?!


I was amused to learn that the Musée d'Orsay actually costs a bit more than entrance to The Louvre, though it's still a bargain.


Michelle and I loved the first couple of rooms we visited and were particularly taken with this woman there painting. Painting is so beyond my skill set that the whole vision and process baffle me. I am definitely one who appreciates this art, but doesn't really understand how it's possible at all.


After walking through a disappointing and at times disturbing Art Nouveau exhibit (surely there were drugs involved with that movement) we wandered around enjoying some sculptures by Rodin and took this self-portrait with the museum's awesomeness behind us. I love that building!!


We wandered around oohing, ahhing and discussing various paintings and came across these. The woman in the painting on the right appeared to be looking into my soul while tapping her fingers together and asking me what I planned to do with this experience. She's diabolical and didn't look like a painting, but like a real person (a thin, pasty one, but still). I decided she's more Mona Lisa-esque than the Mona Lisa.


The rooms full of Impressionist paintings are the big draw for everyone, and really who can blame us hordes for wanting to see them?


It was a bit mind bending to be surrounded by so many amazing and famous works of art. I couldn't help feeling a little guilty for spending so little time admiring each one. I thought it was cool that this Degas was painted at Opéra, especially since we'd just seen that building the day before.


Oh how I love the detail of this painting with the writing supplies and books.


We took one short break to rest our feet, admire some paintings and take a scary self-portrait. It turns out that the lighting that works best for paintings, does NOT work well for pasty, white people!


This was one of the gorgeous views out one of the windows in the gallery, not too shabby eh?


We saw this adorable mother and daughter (and later grandmother as well) walking around and they literally brought tears to my eyes. Can you imagine being able to take your child out for an afternoon at such a place? (Admission to museums is free from kids under 18.)


We were struck by similar thoughts upon seeing multiple school field trips going on. There were all these little kids hopping around with no idea that they were in such a marvelous place seeing so many miracles--it must be nice not to feel any pressure to soak it all up while wandering there.


I commented to Michelle that this painting looks like a man in a dress, I'm sure of it, then we saw these two women bent over with laughter while looking at it and decided they must have come to the same conclusion.


We were so starving by this point and decided to try one of the restaurants in the museum. We were seated right next to one of the huge clocks that can be seen from the outside of the building.


I ordered the lasagna and Michelle ordered the Tartine and we both ended up not really liking the food. I was having some serious texture issues with the lasagna because the 5 layers of noodles and the cheese were so soft and plentiful. I could only make myself eat half of it for body fueling and headache prevention purposes.


We decided to get dessert to help fill us up and give us something tasty to eat, and were happy with that choice, thought the waffle could have been softer.

Our bill was a bit steep though! The servers in Paris get 15% plus whatever else you give them and they basically only take your order, bring your food and then bring your check (there's no, "How is everything tasting? or Can I get you anything else?" going on in Paris) and make a ton of money. It's no wonder you see mature men as professional waiters there, they must be living in an apartment on The Seine with all the money they're making!

We returned to our art appreciation wanderings and found lots more goodness to see. I loved the vignette in this painting.


It was fun to see this Toulouse-Lautrec in real life because we have a print of it on our bedroom wall. The real painting is much smaller than I thought it would be and appears to be done in chalk on a brown grocery bag type paper. A lot of his sketches appear to have been done on whatever paper was lying around.

We finally decided we'd had enough after 4.5 hours.

Upon heading outside there were groups of people everywhere smoking; being in the museum for a long time must have given them quite a hankering.

Here's the clock we ate lunch inside of!

We started walking over to Jardin des Tuileries, which was conveniently located right across the river, and provided a gorgeous walk along the way.


Isn't this sign kind of funny? How can so many amazing places be located so close together?


We stopped to rest on a bench on the bridge and took another self-portrait.


We took a self-portrait of our weary feet (which really should have some sort of pain radiation coming from them) on the bridge as well. Notice Michelle's very soft, cute polka-dotted socks which Jenn sent with me to give her.

**Can you believe this is only half our day?
Do you have any painting skills?
Do you like Impressionist art?
Can you imagine being able to take your kids
to a place like this for an afternoon?**

Comment Window Tidbit: Where is everyone? It's not even the weekend, yet hardly anyone is commenting. I'm going to get a complex about it.