Catching up

So I finally have the iPad to myself (thanks Nana for playing with Hannah and giving me a break) and can post an update on our trip.

Today we spent the whole day at the Luxembourg gardens.  What a treat for me to discover areas of the park that I didn’t know existed!  Hannah started out in the playground and luckily met a girl from Michigan who was eager to have a playmate.  Hannah said Erika was a miracle!  The two ran around hand in hand for almost an hour and I peppered her mom with questions along the lines of “what will your daughter eat here?” and “what fun places have you found for kids?”  After Erika left, Nana, grandpa and I had lunch on a picnic bench while Hannah dug in the dirt and did a little eating. Then it was off to the lake where Hannah played a traditional French boat game.  We went to the live guignol puppet show them finally left the park at 5.  

Yesterday’s highlights include: buying Ellie the elephant, Lunch by the Stravinsky fountain, making and popping bubbles,  looking at sculptures and watching dancers in the Pompidou Center, playtime in a little park, delicious dinner just down the street from our apartment, organ concert in Notre Dame by our family friend Angela Kraft Cross, watching rollerblading tricks along the seine and seeing the sparkling light show on the Eiffel Tower at 11 PM

Friday’s lessons learned: We need to carry more snacks and water with us, the musée d’orsay time limit for my kid is about 10 minutes, the museum gift shop is way more interesting than the museum itself, it is really hard to hail a taxi, chocolate crêpes make everything better, and French sounds like “gibberish” to Hannah.