Cote d'Azur= French Riviera

We felt right at home on the coast- palm trees, sand, water, sun. Etienne got to ride his scooter in Cannes at la Croisette, in Nice on the Promenade des Anglais, and in Juan-les-Pins along the beach. On the way down we stopped in Montelimar and ate lots of nougat- yum. We got to see preparations for the Grand Prix in Monte Carlo, Monaco, and Cannes getting ready for the annual film festival. Maybe one day we'll actually make it for the big events. We ate outside along the sea, drank cocktails, tried Socca and petits farcis in Nice chez Rene for the first time, navigated with the boys through Vieux Nice and up to the old chateau where a castle used to be and even into the Palais de Lascaris. Denis had been along the riviera with 2 friends 15 years ago! They were camping and didn't see all of the cultural stuff I crammed in. But he had good memories from that trip and his bachelor days;)

All of this we did in 2 1/2 days- a l'americaine. But, je suis americaine! Xavier ate French fries and ketchup for almost every meal. Etienne finally got a chocolate milkshake after spilling one that we had brought home just as he was taking it out of the carton to enjoy it. It was devastating. In Monaco we went to the Oceanographic Museum and saw the aquarium there. Then we took the tourist train to see the Prince's palace, Monte Carlo, and other sites. We finished that afternoon with a walk in the Exotic Gardens of Monaco which were full of cacti and beautiful views of the sea and the principality.

Nothing beats escaping for a few days, eating good food along the sea, and watching your kids play all day long in the sun!

Easter/ Mom's Visit/ LHC success

Wow-already April 13th. Mom came in on the 2nd and flew back out on the 10th. During that time we went to Alsace and celebrated Easter with Denis's parents. Xavier made it through 3/4 of the mass at St. Maurice in Guewenheim and Etienne actually stayed with me and my mom for the whole mass. Mom was singing her Baptist hymns under her breath- up from the grave he arose! But we at least found her a church. We also went into Geneva to show mom the city, shopped at Manor the Swiss department store, had lunch there, went to dinner at the Beau Rivage hotel along the lake. She got to see Etienne's school and Xavier's garderie (he goes now about 2 times a week for 1 hr 1/2), CERN, the ATLAS control room, the Alps, the Jura, and she came with me to the CERN toddler group. Speaking of CERN, Denis was psyched about March 30th and the LHC success. It's amazing to me how such a huge, complicated machine (the biggest man-made machine ever) can work so accurately. Amazing.

Mom's visit went by too fast. We ate a lot. I made bouchees a la reine with seafood for Good Friday. Denis's mom served lamb for Easter. Denis made us fleishschnakas (sp?). We had pierrade- (we have a machine now with a granite slab to cook thin slices of meat), lots of good bread, good Thai food, and last but not least good wine.

(trying to get the pictures to post horizontally across instead of vertically, hmmm)