Shopping

Petit Pan

Lillibulle

Today I spent the day doing what one should do while in Paris - wondering and shopping!

I had such a brilliant day. The 87 is now my favourite bus route! From the Champ de Mars into the 6eme for Rue de Sevres, Cherche Midi and Bac. On to 12eme where there is actually lots of good alternative shopping and cafés, but specifically I went to Petit Pan on Rue de Prague. I then popped across to the 11eme to Rue de la Forge Royale for Lillibulle, after which I decided it would be good to take a long walk through part of Paris to soak up La vie Parisienne. This involved walking up to Bastille then into the 4eme along Rue Saint Antoine, verring off onto Rue François Miron (a couple of little gems on here). Note: stopping at Rue Vieille du Temple for a reviving hot chocolate! Finally crossing the Il de la Cité through Place St Michel, re-entering the 6eme along Rue St André des Arts, Rue du Four onto Rue de Babylone, then succumb to exhaustion and take the next bus home! There is absolutely something for everyone along that route for shopping. While I did take the Amex, and use it (though not going to reveal to the breadwinner just how much so), I forgot my camera and did not catch for you the wonderful sights of Paris along the way.

The Palais up close

O on the little train around the grounds

H on the train

O feeding the swans

Ducks standing on frozen pond

Looking back towards Versailles

Bella in the parc

Today we visited Versailles. We go there relatively frequently as the grounds are lovely and we can take the dog. If visiting Paris and you can make the time to go there, it is really worthwhile. But make enough time to wander the park grounds, along the canal, and over to the Domaine de Marie Antoinette. Take a picnic and take your time. 

Doing what I do

H breastfeeding

O breastfeeding handsfree

H slinging his baby doll who is asleep which is why the sling goes over dolls head

O slinging the baby

Not long ago we were at a friends place and the boys found some dolls. They instantly began to care for them, giving me a sneak peak into what they see me do with E. They pulled up their shirts and did some breast feeding, and then sat the dolls upright on their knee and patted the dolls back gently to burb. I caught them on my phone camera, so the photos are not so clear. This prompted me to buy a doll for our house. Occaisionally now we have a doll session of feeding, burbing, changing nappy, putting to bed and more recently they had me sling the doll for them. I have mainly been using the sling when I go out with E, so they were keen to do the same for their doll. Actually, we were on our way out to an exercise class I do with the boys, and H kept the baby in the sling on for the whole class, to the other mothers amusement.

Interest - Looking for something to read?

I found quite an interesting list of books that are now available to read or download online, headlined as Walden, and 99 other free online books that every humanities student should read.

I have read 11, so looks like I have some reading still to do, what about you?

Here is the list.

Children's Theatre

Today we took the kids to La Cachette, which holds theatre productions for children. The story today was Boubam et le tam-tam. It was really wonderful. A one man show, he captured all our imaginations with Boubam and his little monkey, one evening by a baobab tree in the savanna, visited by a lion , a jackal and a snake. 

Kids - crafts II

Crocodile with our favourite helicopter

Mosaic in action

At the table working away

OK, I am a burgeoning craft legend (yeah, yeah, I know, in my head).

While on a craft roll, we made some mosaic crocodiles. Crocs are a major preoccupation of the boys. I am not sure why, but there is often a conversation during the day about 'Crocodile not eat Hugo', actually there are conversations all day about all sorts of things that are not going to eat Hugo. He has a preoccupation with things eating him. I think this began not long after Sean starting showing them documentaries on nature and animals in the wild, in substitution of them watching too much trivial commercial rubbish. Yes, so there is now a fear of being eaten by wild animals... 

Message

Yesterday I was at a playdate, which is organised through a group called Message on a weekly basis. Message is a group for expats in Paris. Mostly made up of mothers it provides great resources for understanding all aspects (drs, schools, things to do with kids, socialising groups in your areas etc..) of family life in Paris. If you are thinking of moving to Paris it is a great resource and well worth becoming a member, particularly helpful for making friends and providing support when you are new and lonely in a big city.

Yesterday the kids ran wild at someone else's house, as it is crazy good fun discovering all these other toys that exist in the world and that we don't own, as well as enjoying a craft session making valentines day cards (heart stickers and glitter glue hysteria!), and not to forget the chocolate biscuits and muffins to devour (and which probably accounts for the running wild).

Kids - crafts

Recently I have felt baby preoccupied and when I spend time with the boys, very uninteresting and no fun. So, in a bid to be more 'fun' we had a craft session together and made some toilet roll puppets. Here is the evidence:

They are gone now, actually they were gone some 8 hours after their creation (or perhaps less but it was about 8 hours later that I picked up the scraps strewn through the apartment), between the boys and the dog it was pure carnage. 

Paris Kids - Palais de la Découverte

Excitement on the train ride
Crossing the Pont Alexandre II

The Grand Palais
Running home

Yesterday we took the boys to the Palais de la découverte, which is just behind the Grand Palais. We were mostly taking them to see the 'Né pour sentir' exhibition, which was great, and saw the boys running to each new exhibit to smell something new. An exhibition of smells, with a brilliant kids section of herbs, different noses to try on with different smells inside each one, funny mirrors, doors to open, bottles with lift off stoppers that released different smells, little telephone booths with different smells coming from the receivers, and on the smells and innovative ways to present them go. On arriving there though, we also found that there is a wealth of things to discover in the Palais de la découverte, particularly for children a little older (mathematics, physics, etc..)but definitely enough for little kids with lots of bugs, frogs, fish, rats to excite and an astronomy section to discover the stars. Well worth another visit, particularly good entertainment for a rainy day sometime.