Count Down

I didn't even get to start packing for our big trip to Paris until Saturday night at 9:30 PM because I was busy finishing up the one million (really 10) place mats that I promised Hans that I'd make for his brother's birthday! But Cinderella finally finished them and then started in on the business of packing.


What to pack?


Well let's see. After checking the forecast for 'Spring in Paris' my winter wardrobe might do very nicely there.


I kid you not!


Highs in the 50's and lows in the 30's, with rain.



I could stay home for that.


So I sorted, and sorted, and resorted, because we do not check baggage at the airport. Carry on only is our motto. I'm now down to approximately one outfit, one red satin cocktail dress that Hans gave to me at Christmas and makes me look just like an old prostitute, and a spare pair of contact lenses.


We then spent Sunday afternoon getting new brakes on my car (for a small fee a friend does the labor if I provide the parts and Thank God he works on Sunday). You see, Baby Girl's car got new brakes last week and well... my car had a jealous fit and needed them this week.


We dropped the car off before going to Baby Girl's college soccer banquet which was very nice, was attended by very nice parents, but was unfortunately marred by many computer errors, resulting in the failure of the video program that Baby Girl had worked on for hours.


Baby Girl's major is in Communications and I'm hoping that this problem, which she handled in such a mature manner and would have left me in tears, only makes her stronger. While we would like to protect our kids from disappointments, how would they ever survive the future without dealing with setbacks now?

So at the bottom of this post is a picture of Cinderella's place mats, and there's even one that's been flipped over so that you can see the back. Hans will pack them in his computer bag and hopefully that space will later be filled with a small amount of fabric that I hope to purchase in Paris. I had Hans look up the addresses of the fabric shops that some of you have emailed to me and they appear to be within a couple of subway stops from our hotel. I told him that I was glad he can speak French because from what I've read, the French don't like non-french speaking people.

His response?

"Don't worry, they don't like each other either."

If I've offended any French people, I apologize.