Miss G

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With english being our first language with french as a distant second, we obviously compose all our blogs in english. HOWEVER now, you can have our blog translated to your language of choice. Pretty sweet, EH? HAHA! Yes, that’s my Canadian in me coming out. HEY, wait a second…I didn’t see “Canadian” in this language lists?!? WHAT THE…?

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Au revoir, mes amis!

After a couple of LOOOOONG flights for a recent trip back to North America to visit family, we decided we needed something a little less scheduled. Plans for a train trip to La Rochelle fell through due to train scheduling so we opted for a trip to Corsica. It sounds like a great set up for a relaxing trip, right? A ferry ride to the island, a rented bungalow/cabin a stone-throw from the beach, my beautiful wife and amazing daughter…perfect!

It was Miss G’s first time on a passenger/car ferry. We put on her psi-bands in the morning prior to getting in the car. You see, Miss G doesn’t do too well in the car driving in France. Can you blame her though? All those twisty-turny roundabouts. Heck, who doesn’t want to puke? As we were unsure of how she would do on the boat, we figured we’d stay on the safe side. I have to say though, so far, when using the psi-bands Miss G has not gotten sick (especially since she got sick on both flights on our trip to North America).

After arriving in Corsica late on a Saturday evening due to a delayed ferry departure, it took us a bit to find our rented bungalow at Cala Bianca Residences. The Cala Bianca property is only a short 11km drive from the port in Bastia and boasts quite large number of bungalows with about 150 or so!

Our bungalow was the perfect home away from home; a two bedroom place with a full kitchen with open living room, and a semi-private patio for late afternoon sun. It had everything we needed.

The next morning was quite wet. The clouds were abundant and dark in hue with brief periods of dryness. The rain stopped long enough for us to take a walk to the main clubhouse and check the grounds out. We went down to the beach despite the wet sand and gloomy weather. We met a very friendly Frenchman at the Cafe where we stopped for “un cafe, une verre de vin rose, et jus d’pomme”. Due to the weather, I think we were his only customers that day.

The next day the sun beamed bright and it was a beach day! Following breakfast, we were beach-bound to soak up some sun. Despite the day being a bit breezy, we managed to enjoy a few hours on the beach. With only a few other people on the beach, we pretty much had the sand all to ourselves. Building sand castles, dipping our toes in the cool water, and collecting sea-washed shells was so much fun with Miss G. She LOVED it! Later, we had an old-fashioned, charcoal bbq of burgers, grilled asparagus with red peppers, potatoes, and for dessert grilled pineapple. Delicious!

A welcomed email informing us of another late departure from Bastia back to Nice meant that we didn’t have to get up at 530am to catch a 7am ferry. A 1.5 hour delay meant that all three of us could get a little bit more sleep prior to heading back home from a short but relaxing getaway in Corsica.

Click the picture here for the slideshow of Corsica in pictures! (…be patient though as the slideshow loads.)

Au revoir, mes amis!

Well…it was supposed to rain this afternoon in the Cote d’Azur despite it being a beautiful morning, luckily the rain held off all day. No rain was perfect for us, since we decided to take a trip down to Cannes to see what was happening at this year’s Film Festival. Miss G wanted to see and hang at the beach today and the weather cooperated by giving us perfection!

Katherine made an awesome breakfast of scrambled eggs with red peppers, garlic, red onions, spinach, and ham. Miss G finished an entire “pain au chocolat” all herself, we got ready and headed for “la gare” enroute to Cannes.

After wandering around on “La Croisette” and checking out all the promotional billboards, beach restaurants, and people, we decided it was time for late afternoon lunch on the beach. There is nothing like an amazing afternoon of hot, sunny weather and having lunch on the beach! A bottle of Rose and two refreshing salads for us and “steak hache avec frites” for Miss G – a perfect day in Cannes I would say, yes?!?

Following lunch, we were off to find the carousel. Miss G LOVES the carousel. It’s a double-decker carousel in Cannes! We rode the Ferrari and spun around in the Tea Cup. As it was getting late in the day, the people attending the premieres were starting to come out. With barricades up, black cars, police, people in tuxedoes and sleek dresses were everywhere around us. We weren’t completely sure but we think we caught a glimpse of Matthew McConaughey. Also scheduled to attend today was Reese Witherspoon and Elijah Wood. There were probably quite a few “French” celebs; however, they are all “foreign” to us!

Click here for the slideshow to see our day in pictures!

Au revoir, mes amis!

It was somewhat of a happy and sad day, all in one. Miss G started school about a week and a half ago. Yep…she’s a big girl now..just ask her! In France, kids are eligible to start school at 2 years of age.

The fact that she knows quite a bit of French already (more than daddy), we wanted to continue her experience to the fullest and learn as much French as possible before we head to whatever the next destination will be. (I hear Asia might be asking for us to visit for a couple years?!?) Granted, that is still a couple years away so by then, G should be completely bilingual. With that being said…daddy will be in trouble! I had better find a French tutor in exchange for their practicing English with me. Thus far, I have been reluctant to pull the trigger on this one unlike Katherine, who has met a fabulous French woman with whom she exchanges linguistic notes/lessons.

Au revoir, mes amis!

Sitting around last weekend hanging with Miss G, I was able to capture this video of here answering the stereo remote. Unfortunately, I wasn’t quick enough to capture her “speaking” on the remote with her good friend, Olivia, and asking her to come over to play LEGOs. It was precious!

It’s kind of a “long” video (5 mins) BUT…we found it quite funny especially at the end. I mean, really…”is this what I do on the phone all the time?” She has to get it from somewhere and it certainly isn’t the local playground with other kids, right? Hahaha!

Au revoir, mes amis!

Food, food, food…and living in the Cote d’Azur…
Today I am thankful for living in a place where I can walk with my wonderful husband and amazing little girl to the Marche Provencal (provencial market or open air farmer’s market) to get basil-marinated sun-dried tomatoes from a local artisan.
Food here in the South of France…
My little girl has never eaten a chicken nugget (of any kind), macaroni and cheese or a Happy Meal…she’s never eaten from a commercial fast food establishment. She ate her first hamburger patty 2 weeks ago and I didn’t think 3 times about her getting E-Coli from it…probably because it was from a “real” restaurant & not a fast food joint, but mostly because we weren’t in the States.
In France I don’t worry about water flouridation, GMO crops and E-Coli-ridden meats…but G still eats 90% organic food. After all I’ve learned in the last 2 years about our food, its sources and the potential hazzards associated with them, I’m glad that I can worry just a little less about my fledgling being poisoned by the very things that are supposed to nourish her.
I must admit that I was mostly blind to all of this until about 18 months ago, about the time that G was starting solid foods. Since then I have tried to really educate myself on what goes in and on our bodies, especially hers. In doing so I have been truly shocked and appalled at the US Food System…in fact the world’s food system.

Growing up…I never ate this shit…NEVER, NEVER, NEVER…but then, that was 20-30 years ago, before Monsanto and all of the pharma-farming started ruling the food supply. I know now that most people didn’t have that option 30 years ago and even fewer have that option today.
I grew up on a small farm in Minnesota, 20 acres of 5 acre parcels; three 5 acre fields and one 5 acre section that contained the buildings including our house, garages, etc. At the peak of our farming we had 60 head of beef cattle, 100 chickens and a 1 acre garden consisting of everything from corn to watermelon. We rotated our fields between grazing and alfalfa that we baled for hay. We grew or raised everything we ate except for the dairy products including milk, cheese, yogurt and cottage cheese. Those dairy products all came from local family farms from people we knew…because back then it was cheaper to keep it local.

As big of a pain in the ass this place has been to get accustomed to, after one year it really feels like “home” and there are so many things I would miss about it. We live in a beautful, amazing part of the world and are truly blessed to be able to take advantage of so much that this place has to offer…including food that seems a little safer and healthier than it would be if we lived in North America.

Think about what you eat, what goes in and on your body…THINK…THINK CRITICALLY especially about what goes in your kids’ bodies. EDUCATE yourself and don’t fall prey to the voices of the media that are bought and paid for. You live in a country that is free…take advantage of this and don’t just accept what you are fed.

Upon waking and diaper change, Miss G informed Daddy boldly that today she would like to go “train”….

Guilliana really likes riding trains…which is wonderful since we live 3 blocks from a large train station and there are many wonderful towns and cities (and yes even countries) within an hour or so train ride. The fearless and always adventurous Miss G also gets horribly, viciously car sick (just like her mommy), so if it weren’t for our easy access to rail transport we probably wouldn’t be getting out too much while here!

So there we were with an eager little traveler and no idea where we might go. Bob had done a bit of reading about St. Raphael and its suburb Frejus in the Var region earlier in the week when we were looking for things to do during this week off together. So we headed to the train station and got our tickets to Frejus!

Wow, what a fantastic and incredibly scenic ride! I honestly had no idea that there were red rocks similar to those in Sedona Arizona. The homes, ports and beaches along the way were gorgeous and actually a bit different from the areas west of here where we have visited previously.

Upon arriving in Frejus we took a short walk and didn’t see very much. We decided to head back to the train platform to see when the next train would come by to take us the 5 minutes up the road back to St. Rapheal. We discovered that we would have to wait another 3 hours…well, let’s make the best of it! So we followed the signs to the center of town to look for a restaurant to have some lunch and generally check out the little town.

The town generally struck me as more “working class” and definitely medieval, although it didn’t have the same 13th century feel that the incredibly picturesque town of Valbonne does. After strolling down a few streets we discovered the town center all decked out for the holiday season, complete with carousel and food booths. As we didn’t want G to get all worked up before we had a chance to eat, we made a quick detour around the festivities.

We went down another few streets and found what looked like a lovely little place with a decent-looking menu and decided to go in. Well the food at Le P’Tit Encas was really very good, and very reasonably priced! The service was lovely and the entire experience was quite enjoyable.

After we finished our nice, long lunch we headed back into the town center to see what we could find for G to see and do before the next train arrived. Once we got in we saw the cutest thing…PONIES!! There were 4 of the cutest little Shetland ponies giving rides to the little ones. So I quickly got in line and had Bob take G around to the various displays and whatnot while I waited for her turn. Guilliana was quite amped up at this point due to her chocolate Sunday and half of my raspberry & pistachio ice cream with raspberry coulis. SUGAR HIGH!

Once it was her turn, Miss G got on that little guy and grabbed the reins like a pro, completely ready to start her ride. To be fair, Guilliana has a rocking horse in her room nearly as big as the Shetland…so this wasn’t exactly her first rodeo, so to speak! Although the ride wasn’t very long, and G didn’t really want to get off, we had to only a short time to make our train for the trip back home. With the 15 minutes we had left, we took a quick tour of the Medieval church in the town center, amazing! We also sampled our first vin chaud (hot wine…we enjoy this in the States as well, it’s usually called mulled wine), not too bad.

We headed to the train platform and boarded within a few minutes, found some excellent seats and settled in. The bright and sunny day quickly faded to a gorgeous sunset over the Mediterranean and then slipped into inky night as we arrived in Antibes. Our little ball of energy was nearly zapped out at this point and ready for dinner and an early bed time.
We live in an amazing place, in an incredibly beautiful part of the world. We are blessed to be able to experience all of this together as a family. Although our road has been anything but easy since arriving here, the struggles make us stronger and reinforce to me that there is nothing I can’t handle while my amazing husband and beautiful little girl are by my side.

Here is the day in pictures…

Slideshow – Miss G takes Frejus!


Au revoir, mes amis!

So…it’s the end of December 2011 and the weather this past week has been unbelievably awesome! This week has basically been about 16C (60F)! Wow, can’t complain for the last week of December.

We decided that we needed to go somewhere we have not been since moving to France. So…the decision was made to take the train to Cannes today and spend the day down at “La Croissette”.

We got Miss G all dressed up in one of her “new” outfits she received for Christmas. She looked soooo cute with her little Benetton boots and long sweater dress. We found few open restaurants right “on the beach” that we decided to enjoy lunch with a view of the sea. It was rough…NOT!

After lunch, we walked sea-side and enjoyed the sun and water-view. OH…and we even found a pay-to-use WC (water closet) that was self-washing once you finished your business! It was definitely better than some of the public restrooms we have encountered in the locale. Miss G rode the go-kart train a couple turns to finish off our incredible family day! It was back to the train station to head home!

Here is the day in pictures…

Slideshow – In Cannes with G


Au revoir, mes amis!

Pere Noel is has been a little bit of an elusive fellow to track down here in the French Riviera. Two Sunday’s ago we saw Santa while shopping at the “big” Carrefour Market and decided that we could wait one more week before getting Miss G a picture with Pere Noel! Also…influencing our decision was the fact that G wasn’t really dressed for the occasion. So, one week later on Dec. 19, we figured it was time to get pictures of Miss G with Santa.

After a 2 hrs struggle to get out the door in order to “beat the crowd”, we arrived at the Carrefour during the downtime of lunch hour (or “hours” here in France).

Much to our surprise (and still being 6 full days before Christmas) one Pere Noel decided he wasn’t going to work on Sunday. We aren’t the only ones in the store that day. There were lots of people especially ones with kids! The entire following week was tough to get out to a place to “find” Santa. We went all around Antibes to find a Santa 3 out of 5 evenings but had no luck. Really? Is Pere Noel that hard to find especially in the last week before Christmas?

On Friday, Dec. 23, we decided to try the local (and only) mall we know of near St. Laurent du Var called CAP3000. We scanned their website and discovered that Pere Noel would be in the mall and available for photos from 1000h-1900h. Perfect! We REALLY didn’t want to miss G’s opportunity with Santa.

We braced ourselves for what we thought was going to be a “zoo” of people but we were pleasantly surprised that not very many people were out despite most of the shops being open! And, after a bit of asking around, we were able to find Pere Noel for G’s photo opp. So…

Merry Christmas! Bon Fetes!

From all of us to ALL of you! Best wishes for 2012!

Au revoir, mes amis!

Two weeks ago on “holidays” (vacation for you North Americans), we were on our pre-flight departure to Rome where Miss G and I were having a discussion. She is at that age now where she is repeating everything mommy, daddy, and her Nounou say. (Well…looks like daddy better start paying CLOSE attention to what comes out of his mouth!)

G’s vocabulary is quite extensive now in both English & French. I will go so far as to say that Miss G understands way more French than daddy & I was taught French in school. (Good for G, sad for daddy!) In the video, it started out where I was trying to teach her how to say “OK” and after a couple of attempts to get the pronunciation right, I just decided to go with the flow…here is the end result and Miss G’s interpretation of “OK”.

Stay tuned for our Rome blog with amazing pics!

Au revoir, mes amis!