Katherine
Hi everyone, it’s been a while since I’ve written anything, and not because I didn’t want to and definitely not because I didn’t have anything to say!
I have found WordPress a bit tedious and to be honest, I didn’t even know my username and password. I had no idea how to upload photos and really…with all of this moving around the world and having a very active kiddo, I let my microposts to Facebook do most of the talking.
So, now I have committed to writing a whole lot more and you, my adoring public, will have to let me know if you like it or not!
So, my thought of the day, “food”. Well, it’s kind of a thought every day, but you know what I am getting at…
“”Knowing how to cook might not keep you from being overweight,” he says, “but it will keep you from being obese.””
My friend Tina posted a link to a challenge to not eat any processed food for the month of October. I jokingly told her that I couldn’t “play” because it wouldn’t be fair to the North Americans, considering that I live in the South of France. All joking aside, I think that this is a really interesting and critical conversation that we Americans should start having. Here’s a link to the site and the challenge: http://www.eatingrules.com/2011/09/october-unprocessed-2011/
Questions to ask yourself and ponder…
What are we eating…and why? Who controls our food sources? Does someone other than your neighborhood small farmer stand to gain from our gluttony?
Did YOU eat some of the stuff that your kids are consistently putting into their little bodies?
I grew up on a small (20 acre) farm in Minnesota where we raised our own Hereford beef cattle, chickens and had about a 1 acre garden. The first time I had McDonald’s I must have been about 12 or 13…and I thought it was disgusting!
Is it really more convenient or cheaper to eat the processed foods on the shelves?
Interesting article and apropos considering where I live, “The French are getting fatter too”: http://www.npr.org/2011/08/06/139042221/the-french-are-getting-fatter-too
“Nearly 14 percent of the French adult population is now obese, compared with 8 percent just 10 years ago.”
I must say…I live in a place that is full of tourists from all over the world during the summer months and you can still tell who is French and who is not, based on the girth of their backside…
Well, there have been a LOT of hiccups along the way (and more seem to come up daily) but it looks like we are finally pulling the trigger on a major life change: we are relocating to the French Riviera the first week of March 2011! We have secured a place to live as well as a nanny for Guilliana and are incredibly excited to start this 2-year journey of living and working abroad.
The main software development department for Amadeus, the company I have been working with for the past 19 months, is located between Nice and Cannes in the South of France. I will be taking a newly created and very unique position as the liaison between the divisions in Nice and the division in Tucson.
The “apartment” we are renting was built in the early 1900’s and is a converted mansion in the center of Antibes, within a few blocks of the ocean. We have the entire 1st floor (in Europe the floors start at 0…so most of us would consider this the 2nd floor) and it is simply amazing! It is 155m2 which roughly translates to 1480sqft…simply MASSIVE for Europe, especially for the price!
It is simply beautiful and historic, with 3 bedrooms and 2.5 bathrooms along with a giant formal living room and dining room. One of the best things is that it is a single floor, so no stairs inside for our new little walker to get in trouble with! I have quite a few pictures that we’re including here.There is so much to say and to tell everyone and quite honestly I can’t remember more than half of it because we have been “living” with this for quite a while now and haven’t been able to share it with everyone!
Bob will be working for Amadeus as well, most likely as a contractor…unfortunately we couldn’t get them to just double my salary so that he could enjoy being a stay at home dad.
This is an amazing and exciting new chapter in our lives. I am so thankful for my amazing husband who is effectively uprooting his whole life to move to a place that he has never even visited where they speak a language he’s not exactly fluent in to live in a home he has never seen and taking a job he knows very little about!
Other than all that, this should be a cinch…right?
Here are some more pics of our new home…
Holly just got some really old pictures from an old friend of my Dad’s that he used to go hunting with in Northern Minnesota. The first time I ever went deer hunting was up in Outing, MN with my Dad and all his guy friends and their sons. I was 12 and it was freezing! The other pics I’m not sure when they were taken, but I have a feeling it was when we were pretty young.
Wow…this is all very interesting. More work than I thought it would be.