Happy Birthday to Léna! Vacation begins in Calvinet

Today Léna is three years old! I spoke with her on the telephone this morning and her first words were "Bonne Anniversaire, Maman!" Well, she almost got it figured out! Last Friday we drove the long drive to Calvinet to kick off the girls 2-week vacation. The weather was pretty rainy the whole time we were there, but we had some clearing moment and sun spots so we made the best of it. A few photos of some jam-packed 2 days. We got to see a lot of people! Missing are photos of Marie-Laure who dined with us on Saturday - I'm still figuring out my new camera (poorly figuring it out, that is!), so bear with me. Thomas and I returned to Nice Monday and have been working a lot but enjoying our freedom thanks to Andrée & Guy.

Joyeuses Paques! (and Bonne Fete to moi!)

Happy Easter everyone! Our first year without Craig & Doug for Easter. But we are enjoying making our own tradition right here. Estelle & I went to mass this morning and she was quite interested. She's also interested in chocolate!The Easter Bunny has to get creative in France. No pastel candies, no jelly beans as we know them, no pastel M&M's or foil wrapped special Darks. No Peeps, no chicks. No white eggs (oh lord that's ANOTHER story I'll save for when I have the energy - I think I am emotionally - and fiscally - scarred).

Usually I buy Easter candy when I'm in America for the winter break, which of course I was unable to do this year. So here's one chocoloate bunny we bought for $15 at the bakery.
So this year the Easter Bunny brought lots of great Easter-themed books.
Every time I see the photo below, for some reason I think "Uncle Sam wants YOU!"




On Good Friday, we had a little visit from Baby Basile, who is nearly 6 months old. Eliott & Estelle were at school. Friday afternoons I stay home with Léna.Léna likes to give him kisses!
Estelle enjoying a gift from one of my students.
Night-time reading:
Peekaboo
The girls have (re) discovered that if you pull off a turtleneck and leave it on, it's like you have long hair!


This is little Estelly Welly when we was knocked down with a stomach bug 2 weeks ago. Poor kid.Notice that by the next afternoon she was eating cake batter.
This was so funny to them. Pile stuffed animals on the couch.
Hope everyone has a nice Easter day. Spring has certainly sprung in Nice. This has been a long, hard winter for me, starting on Halloween when I first got sick. Lots of you have emailed and asked about my lungs - I am back to full steam as far as work, etc, but I can feel that my respiratory system hasn't quite caught up with me yet. Some days I seem to cough a lot with all kinds of gunk coming up and other days I forget all about it. The doctors said it would be long, and it's already been over 5 months - Easter means Spring and spring means warm days and clear lungs, I hope!

"My Sister, Rebecca"

Dad used to often tell people about "My sister, Rebecca, over to Colchester...."
This image below captures many memories we all have of going to Becky's, especially on Christmas Eve:
And I remember spending a lot of time in Dad's last week with Becky on the other end of his armchair, just like this photo:
I don't know where this one came from, but that's me for sure. I like that you can see she's got a good strong grip on my head to give me a kiss, and you can see that great manicure again!
I'm so glad I have a number of photos of both my girls with Becky:

I bet Dad and Becky are catching up someplace right now, with Ellie and Warren and Dick and Walter. What a great lady.