Vacation, Day 4

This morning, Ethan and the girls ventured out to buy pastries while I was still asleep.  As an added bonus, Madeleine got some licked by a dog, which made her morning.  After I awoke, we all headed to the beach so that the girls could have more fun in the Mediterranean Sea:

In the afternoon, we took the train to the other end of Nice so that we could visit Parc Phoenix.  Part botanical garden, part zoo, and part art museum, there was something for everyone.  Especially for Madeleine.  As she always is when in the presence of live animals, Madeleine was bursting with delight.  Like, so much so that we would occasionally lose sight of her

MADELEINE: Mommy!  I found some secret pathways!  Come see!  I found this one, and this one...(completely disappearing from view) TURTLES!  Mommy!  Come see!
ME: Okay but where are you?

At another point, while I tried to follow the sound of Madeleine's voice, I found her sprawled on the ground, still chattering.

ME: Did you wipe out?
MADELEINE: Uh, yeah.  So Mommy, I found a really cute creature-
ME: Hang on a minute.  Come over here so I can see if you're okay.

After we had explored the Parc, we took the train back to our area and then walked to dinner.

ME: So Madeleine, what's your favorite part of vacation so far?  Still the Aquarium?
MADELEINE: (definitively) Being licked by the doggie.

When we got to dinner, I made the mistake of going to the bathroom a split second before the waitress appeared.  Don't worry, though.  Ethan managed to tell her in English that he doesn't speak French, then assured her in French that his husband does, just as I arrived back at the table.

The husbands and kids are back at our apartment now and ready to hit the hay!

Vacation Day 3

Day 3 of vacation took us to Monaco!  It was a total workout for our legs and feet.  We didn't rent a car for this trip, so we have been getting around Nice on foot. (The past two days I have logged over 20,000 steps on my Fitbit, to give you an idea!) This morning we walked to get breakfast, walked to Starbucks afterwards, and then walked another 30 minutes into Vieux Nice to catch the bus into Monaco.  We did not anticipate there being no available seats for the entirety of our bus ride.  We wound up standing for the 45 minute ride, although we couldn't complain too much, what with these views:

We arrived in Monaco and, after getting a snack, began the long ascent up to the Royal Palace.  Julia was so enchanted by the views, both on the bus ride and upon arriving in Monaco.  "That was the most beautiful view I've ever had in my LIFE!" she announced upon disembarking the bus.  While on the palace grounds, she told me, "This is the BEST vacation we've ever taken!"

We also visited Monaco's Jacques Cousteau Oceanographic Museum, which is part aquarium, part nautical history museum.  Madeleine LOVED every second of it, proclaiming, "This is a very cool aquarium!" only a few minutes after we entered.  The rest of us grew weary of so much standing and walking, so we took breaks to sit and rest, but Madeleine was too excited to slow her pace.  Beyond the aquarium, there was a recreation of a wooden ship with exhibits all above and below, including fossils if prehistoric sea creatures.

Some highlights:

And Madeleine took particular delight in showing Julia this:

There was a playground that Madeleine scampered through delightedly while the rest of us sat and drank water, then we walked through the Jardins Exotiques, finally heading to the bus.  Lo and behold, we had to stand for the entire bus ride back as well!  To give our feet a rest, we took the train back to our area instead of walking from Vieux Nice, but even the train was standing room only.  Lucky for Madeleine, I was at least able to procure her a seat for the second half of the bus ride.  You can tell her nonstop energy had run out by that point:

Soon we will all hobble off to get some dinner, but veforehands, we are all putting our feet up!!

Nice, Day 2

Jet lag is improving for us in our 2nd day of vacation.  We did have to wake the kids up at 10am Nice-time, but we all got a good 12-13 hours of sleep overnight.

We had breakfast this morning at a creperie, and Madeleine decided she does not hate crepes anymore, after eating a crepe with chocolate sauce, whipped cream, and vanilla ice cream.  The waiter gave us menus with English descriptions of the crepes, but Madeleine was still too terrified to order.

WAITER: (in French) Are you ready?
ME: (in English, to Madeleine) Do you want to go first?
MADELEINE: (reaching across the table to clutch my arm for security, a look of panic on her face,)

So I ordered for her.

The girls and Ethan took a swim in the Mediterranean while I went on a run along the Promenade Des Anglais later in the day, and then we spent the afternoon in Vieux Nice.  We strolled through many alleyways full of shops:

And we visited an old palace, now the site of s museum of historical musical instruments and art:

Afterwards, we had dinner and gelato in the center of Old Nice.  Julia ordered her own gelato in French all by herself!  Madeleine was still too scared.

We hit a playground on our walk back to our appartement.  Madeleine was out of her mind with delight and climbed all over everything like a monkey:

Julia tried climbing around on the big wooden whale and, much like on our vacation to Utah, she became scared and needed my guidance in getting down.  Because a structure for children ages 8-12 should definitely still pose a challenge for kids at the latter end of the age range, right?

It's nearing bedtime here so that's all for now.  Bonne nuit from Nice!

Arrival in Nice

We Rowes have arrived in Nice, on the French Riviera!  We had an overnight flight what with the time change.

Some of us tried to sleep on the plane:

A valiant effort for Jules.  She drifted off once briefly but startled awake when she dreamed she was swimming and did a flip turn and bumped her head.

One of us actually slept pretty much the whole flight:

That didn't totally ward off the jet lag, however; this is how I found Madeleine mid-cartoon watching on the couch of out appartement this afternoon:

However, despite our jet lag, we managed to do two hugely important French things today. 

1: eat Pain au chocolat

And 2: Swim in the Mediterranean Sea

Now, if we can all just get a full night's sleep we'll be eating to go tomorrow!

Packing, Packing

We Rowes are leaving on an eight-day vacation this afternoon, so most of our preferred clothing and underwear are packed.  This proved to be a struggle for Madeleine as she searched through her overly stuffed drawers for something to wear this morning.

MADELEINE: (making a loud sound of frustration from her room)
ME: Honey, what's wrong?
MADELEINE: I don't have anything to WEAR!

I went into her bedroom to see piles and piles of clothing from her drawer strewn around the room.  Clearly, she really had NOTHING to wear.

ME: Is there something specific you're looking for?
MADELEINE: Yes.
ME: What?
MADELEINE: Well, Mommy...have you seen my tank top that's...well, if it was a FONDANT, it would be, like, MARBLE?

That is one way to describe a shirt.  Funnily enough, I knew exactly what shirt she meant.  I had packed it, so she was not too happy with me.  Fortunately, she was able to wade through the massive piles of clothing on the ground and find something to her satisfaction.  It's obviously not quite as great as her marble fondant tank top, but it is a nice striped tank top, so I suppose Madeleine could describe it as: "my tank top that's...well, if it was a candy, it would be a CANDY CANE."

Self-Portraits

The girls drew self-portraits with their aunties this past weekend.  Apparently the paper used for the drawings was the backside of yet another book Madeleine started at some point in time.  This book cover states:

Madeleine Rowe's BAKEBOOK

Delicous, Delicous!

I wonder what delicous is.  Is it like deli meat and couscous combined?  I bet delicous tastes delicious.

AAAANYWAAAY...

Here is Julia's self-portrait:

I don't know why her arms are limply flopping off her shoulders like that.  Did she dislocate her shoulders in this picture from too much swimming?

Here is Madeleine's self-portrait:

If she's trying to draw a picture of an alien space creature or something then this is spot on.  Like, this could be a Muppet, or a cartoon character, or maybe even a Dr. Seuss creature.  But I'm not sure this portrait really evokes "Madeleine," do you?  Unless you think of Madeleine as having blue hair that stands straight out on either side of her head, a face that consists of nothing but bulging, bulbous eyes, two inflated footballs with spidery spindles for arms and hands, and feet so close together she'd only be able to waddle at best.  I mean, I guess if you think of Madeleine as having body parts like I just described, then, sure, it's a solid impression.

I will tell you: I bet the Madeleine pictured above is darn good at making delicous.

Play

Madeleine is writing a play for the whole family to perform, and , um, one of the characters has a pretty unfortunate name.