Five Highlights

In the 17 days since I blogged last a lot has happened so I will try and briefly highlight here to catch up:

1. We started our French classes! So far I feel pretty comfortable in the language and have *gasp!* enjoyed it.

2. I went to Paris all by myself! This summer I tried my hand at sewing. I wanted to see if I enjoyed it enough to invest in the materials and make it a hobby of mine. I made a great tote bag that I use everyday this summer and decided that when I got to France I would purchase a sewing machine. I chose a particular brand of machine (Elna) and found a dealer in Paris. I also found the (apparently) world-famous fabric store Marche St. Pierre (I don't know how to do the accents over the e's yet but there should be one over the 'Marche' e). I took the train to the fabric store first and bought some fabric from there and from another store called Reine. Then I hopped back on the Metro to find the sewing machine shop. I did all this with a map and a little amount of French and I made it! I am so excited to know the way to the fabric stores (turned out the whole block was stores not just the world-famous one) and have the confidence to travel into the city. It's actually the only place to get proper materials in the area. It's about a 20-25 minute train ride. It's not bad, eh? I think my first project will be easy-kitchen towels!

3. We went to church in French. It's a little church (little=30 people maybe?) and a kind group of people. The hard parts are Henry (not really a nursery with the size of this church) and it's in French! Hopefully both of these will get better with time. We want to listen to audio sermons in English to continue to be fed. We started Tim Keller's The Prodigal God series a couple of weeks ago and we'll probably follow that while mixing it up once in awhile. Feel free to suggest some good ones.

4. In this part of France (I don't know about the rest) they hold "festivals" at the beginning of the school year that serve to introduce the community to the variety of clubs and associations available in town for people to join. Children can join art classes, athletic classes, parents can join family associations, there are also ethnic clubs like Berbers, Sub-Saharan African, pottery classes, choir clubs, you name it! I went with the express purpose of finding someone in my particular city who could tell me if there were places nearer by than Paris to buy fabric/sewing materials. I had to do this in French. Well, actually I didn't have to too much. My friend SP helped as well as another French lady who spoke a little English. At the end I learned that Paris is in fact the place to get stuff. I'm real torn up about it. Really.

It's really interesting how the community came together on this day and how many options were there. I mean the ladies rugby lady talked our ear off for 10 minutes! In French! Children here (and our school too) do not have school on Wednesdays. Some students (older I think) have half days on Wednesday but most don't. This leaves Wednesdays open for children to have extracurricular activities. This is when these clubs schedule their classes, games, meetings, etc. Isn't that a great idea?

I found an association that is for playing! It has toys your child can come and play as well as games. They even have ADULT BOARD GAMES you can play and even RENT!!! It's a cost of 30 Euros a year for a whole family. I think we'll join especially since our space is very limited. Once it gets cold being outside will be out of the question. Having a place to take Henry so he can play will be great. It will also get us meeting French folks and speaking it (which we need to do more).

5. Vine et Fromage: Aaaahhhh.....The French are so good at their wine and cheese. The next town over had a Wine and Cheese festival where hundreds of wine/cheese/sausage/chocolate vendors set up! They all had free tastings. It was amazing. We didn't even know where to start how to know what each cheese or wine was, but we loved it anyway. By the way, you can buy wine in the grocery stores here for like 2 Euros or less and of course more, but the 2 Euros wine is actually good. Welcome to France!

So there are some highlights. And I'm not sad, I'm actually happy! Thank God that I have some French already even though I didn't know I did. My friends here who had no French before are having a much harder time.

A bientot!