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Showing posts from 2017

Current Status: Madness

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We're down to 4 hours until the car picks us up and we head to the airport. All the 429 suitcases are packed. And I'm just looking around my house in a daze. It looks like a hurricane hit. Serenity now. But not likely until we have moved the 429 suitcases into our temp apartment and I've taken off my shoes. Then, and only then, peace. For now ... madness.

The Need for Scooters - Paris Friday Update

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With the house packed up and half-gone, my week was spent finalizing paperwork for school, the temporary apartment and the shipping company. So far, so good. I also had a bunch of errands to run to pick up perscription refills and Leah's orthodontist file. She'll need braces in Paris. And cleaning/organizing what's left in the house. We also celebrated Hanukkah and got ready for our Christmas trip to Orlando, which will provide some much needed distance from all this madness for awhile and recharge our batteries for what's to come once we get on that Paris-bound flight. Less than two weeks away! Scooters for Everyone When visiting school options in October, here's what we saw ... ... scooter parking! Apparently, it's the best way to travel the neighborhoods around the 16th. We saw a scooters in a Parisian toy store and they were pricey, so I came home and started a search on Amazon. I looked for scooters that were inexpesive (it's a city and thin

Our Paris Flat - The Details

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I'm excited to share with you some of the details of our Paris apartment. But first, a little story: Back in 2010, we took our first trip to Paris. It was only for a few days while we were based in Berlin for two months but I quickly fell in love with the city. I remember pushing Alice's huge stroller through the 7th on the way to the Eiffel Tower and telling David that I'd like to live here someday. Have a little pied-a-terre ... "any of these buildings would do" ... and pretend to be Parisienne for a little while. He thought it was a great idea but impossible. Heh. (You can read about that day  here. ) Anyway, fast-forward about seven years and viola ... our Paris flat: It's on the corner of a residential neighborhood right across from a cute park, in the 16th district on the outskirts of Paris. Look at those trees! The building is from 1910 or so and near the Bois de Boulogne, the huge park to the west. Its location is perfect because it's clos

My Five Favorite Paris Movies

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I've been a Francophile for quite a long time, long before I visited Paris for the first time in 2010. Mostly, maybe, because of all the Paris-set movies I've loved. Here are my all-time favorites and links to watch clips or trailers. Amelie So obvious, but I really, truly, madly loved Paris after seeing this movie. And the film is legitimately in my top 3 all-time favorites and I still watch it annually. I love the Amelie character, the whimsical story, the beautiful cinematography, and filters. It's art. Sometimes I trick myself into thinking I know French because I can follow along without reading the subtitles. Watch the trailer then go find this movie and enjoy. Creme Brulee Anyone? French Kiss I took my VHS copy of this movie to college and watched it on rainy days in my first apartment. It was required for my sanity. I love this movie so much I don't even know where to start the praise. Meg Ryan in all her most adorableness. Kevin Klien as the good-at-h

This Week Was Busy - Paris Friday Update

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The Highlights From This Week It's been a crazy week over at our house, let's review. On Monday , we got word that the apartment with the dining room murals was ours. Huzzah! Finally, a confirmed address and a place to go. (More details about the apartment later.) And not a moment to spare, because that night I made changes to the items we had earmarked to move. For example, the master bedroom is not large enough for both dressers, so one of them is staying behind. And the kitchen is small, so I edited out some things and added the bar-height table from the basement and the white stools, hoping they'll fit in the small area by the window. That kind of thing. Then on Tuesdays , the movers arrived bright and early with two trucks. One was a smallish container meant for the sea move. And the other was a white truck for all the items going by air. There were four guys and they worked fast and efficiently. They even packed up the desk in Alice's room I hadn't ori

It's Moving Day!!

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Well, not moving day for us, just all our STUFF! After weeks and weeks of planning and strategizing and the last-minute apartment find and everything ... it's time. The movers are here packing up all our stuff for their journey across the ocean. Some will go via plane and the larger things will go via sea. Just One of the Piles of Stuff! We wanted to get this pack-up started as early as we could manage it, so it all got a head start to our final destination in France. Sea can take up to two months to arrive. While air is pretty fast, at about 2 weeks. But that's all pending the holiday schedules, delays, paperwork and customs. And because we're not taking everything we can still live pretty comfortably in our house with what will be left. Though, the kiddos will be missing some of their favorite toys and stuffed animals. So, I'm trying to be useful as the four guys load out most of my favorite things ... including toys, beds, stuffed animals, books, shoes, dis

Holiday Shopping List - 2017

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I love all the round-ups bloggers and websites do about the things they are shopping for this holiday season, so I thought I'd make my own. Picture Gifts - For Fans of Your Instagram Feed The Young House Love folks just mentioned this amazing daily photo calendar from the nice folks at Social Print Studio  on their podcast and I had to share it. I've been using this small business studio for years to print out my Instagram masterpieces and this year I had a poster printed for David's birthday to decorate our apartment in Paris. Instagram prints are great to print out because you've already edited them, picked them as favorites (because you shared them) and are a pretty little square. Gilmore Girls Again - For Late Fans For whatever reason, this was the year two of my sisters decided to get on the Gilmore Girls bandwagon and binge all the shows. Years late to the party, girls, but I'm cheering you on. I watched it religiously (except for that last season, let

Success - The New Apartment

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It only took four trips around to look at apartments but Dave and I settled on a "new favorite" that we hope we can snag before anyone else does. Gah! Here's a teaser photo, I'll share more details and photos once we can safely confirm it's ours. Yup! That Dining Room Has Roman Murals on Two Walls!  Fingers are crossed! Related posts: All the Paris Move posts

Lost Apartment and Deep Thoughts on Packing - Paris Friday Update

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Lost the Apartment In a dramatic turn of events the apartment we loved and thought was ours went to another party. They got their file in hours before us and the owners felt they needed to play fair ... even though our case looked way better. So all the imagining I did with placing furniture and neighborhood research went out the window. Very frustrating. Dave is making a valiant effort to do his FOURTH apartment hunt today. Please keep your fingers crossed we find something we like. If we don't, and we go to our backup-backup plan of apartment shopping in early January, shipping of our household goods become complicated. Plus, my sanity is a stake here, people! Temp Housing Search Meanwhile, we're hunting down a temporary apartment for the transition between arriving in Paris at the end of the month and the arrival of our beds, and other necessities, into our permanent residence (assuming we are successful today). Why not a hotel? Because we could be there awhile and it

Apartment Hunt DRAMA!

There was another interested renter for OUR apartment, and they got their application in hours before us. So we lost that amazing apartment. CRAP CRUD SHOT DAMN SON OF A .... (trying to keep this PG) :( Back to the listings!

Apartment Hunt Success!

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Dave looked at eight flats on Friday, all the while texting and sending me photos. We found one we both LOVED and is in our IDEAL neighborhood. We got a chance to look at it again today and fell deeper in love. So we're hoping to get the paperwork started ASAP and lock it down. Here's a quick preview: The building's 1880s front door... Front Door and Also Garage Door! Once Upon a Time: The Way Horses Entered the Courtyard And the dining room with balcony doors. That Floor Your Drooling Over is Called Herringbone Parquet More details to come once we get word it's ours. Related posts: Catch up with all the Paris Updates

Apartment Hunting, Packing and School Newsletters - Paris Friday Update

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The Apartment - It's Happening!  Have you ever seen House Hunters on HGTV? (Of course you have!) So picture the couple separated by a few thousand miles. The one  actually  looking at the apartments sending updates via text while the other one is in PJs on her laptop is taking notes and looking at apartment listings online. That's basically how we're apartment shopping today. So, not ideal. But I do feel like the person in the spy movies who is furiously typing and watching surveillance feeds in the city while yelling into the earpiece of the spy "get out of there!" or "what do you see?" and "how big is the bathroom! We need two toilets, at least!" Fingers crossed we find the place today. The Business of Packing Now that we don't have any parties or social events planned for the house, it's time to get down to the process of pulling rooms apart and deciding what goes and what stays. How? By making piles. The game is to make

One Month to Go! - Paris Friday Update

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Happy Thanksgiving, folks! We're ONE MONTH and a few days away from the big move! Holy Turkeys! Today, I'm out walking off the vast quanitities of food I ate on Thursday (and hopefully avoiding malls and shops, but who knows, it's New Jersey!) but I'll be thinking about the list of what I need to do to get my ducks in a row for the next month.  Here are some upcoming milestones:  Dec. 1 - Dave goes on an apartment search. And it will be very much like House Hunters, as we only have a finite amount of places to look at available now, in our target neighorhood that meet our criteria.  Dec. 12 - Packing Day! With any luck, we'll be successful with the apartment hunt and we'll know what the heck we need to take with us (furniture-wise, mostly). We'll have about two weeks to strategize and pile up those items so the movers can take them away on this day.  Hanukkah and Christmas are thrown in here. Very inconvient. Think we can get these hol

School News and Packing Date - Paris Friday Update

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Alice's School Building - Pink!  Super School News We found out this week that we GOT ACCEPTED into the school of our choice. Yippee!! It feels a lot like getting into college all over again. I'm so excited for the girls. Of the three schools we visited, this one really felt the most supportive and the place where they would shine. More paperwork is needed, of course, but we now have a January 9 start date. Such a load off my mind. This also confirms our ideal apartment location is the 16th. It's what we assumed, but now we know. We want to be walking distance from the school (hoping to skip using the Metro) and close to the highway entrance for Dave -- so that really cuts down our ideal location to a small neighborhood. The next step here is to go on a second apartment hunt, which is planned for the start of December. Fingers crossed. A Packing Date Set A few weeks ago, as mentioned, we did the home survey. They estimated one day (one!) to load up all the thi

My Paris Purse Predicament

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Here I go overthinking a purchase ... again. This time, it's about my every-day purse situation for Paris. Why is this such a big deal? Because it's been a decade since I've had an urban lifestyle and I'm completely unsure what bag I'll need with me (or items in that bag) for a daily city existence. So there. Currently, I'm a suburban stay-at-home/work-from-home lady. And even that transition took me a few months to figure out the proper daily bag. I went from a commuting office worker purse (medium sized Orla Kiely handbag with lunch, snacks, and a water bottle that I carried the 100 yards from car to desk) to a bag fit for running errands and holding my to-do lists (an open top  LL Bean "Mom" tote ). Starting in January, I'll be commuting two kids to school on foot in a city. Possibly on a scooter. And running errands in between. So my needs have changed substantially. I'll need to have reusable shopping bags, phone, keys, maybe an ex

The Marvel Avenger-A-Thon

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Our family is in the middle of a Marvel Movie Marathon. It started when we saw the new Thor movie. Which we loved. And the girls had all these questions about Thor. Of course, we've seen all the Marvel Avengers movies, but the girls haven't or don't remember them. So, we started watching the back library: The two Thor movies, the Captain Americas and we just started the Iron Man movies. In other words, we're using our new basement for one of the big reasons we finished it: Movie watching. Lando Just Enjoys Snuggling On the Sofa But, maybe most importantly, we're all watching them TOGETHER. We talk about the characters and try to make connections with the other movies. And provide funny commentary. Related posts: More Pop Culture posts Relive the whole basement saga!

Podcasts and Doctors - Paris Friday Update

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Paris-Themed Podcasts To get in the spirit, I've been listening to Paris-centric podcasts while doing work or sorting our crap. It's been fun listening to other expats talk about their experience in Paris, hear topics of interest and some news, too. Here they are: The Earful Tower  --  The host, Oliver G, is a bit strange and charming. He's clearly entertained and also puzzled by the Parisians, so it's an interesting approach. Each episode tackles some aspect of Parisian life and most include interviews. He just interviewed a Brit who has been an expat for over 50 years and his perspective was fascinating. And at the end of each episode, there's a little story about Paris's colorful history.  The New Paris  --  This one is sort of based on the book the host, Lindsey Tramuta, wrote a few months ago. It's about the newer trends and businesses that are growing in Paris. Such as quality coffee, small businesses (which are challenging because of French t

What I'm Diggin' in November 2017

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There's frost on the ground and I just pulled out my puffy Northface coat ... so it must be November. Here's my latest list of what I'm loving right now. I've got the most fantastic print/shipping place just around the corner and I'm so grateful. With all the documents I need for the move, and all the stuff I'm shipping away, they're making my life just a little easier. And the guys there are so helpful and sweet! I used them in September to color print Alice's birthday invitations from this lovely Etsy shop , and it was super easy and not expensive. Don't you just love a small business with great customer service! Outlander: Jamie and Fergus (from EW.com) Guys, Outlander is back and I'm totally in love with it again. I have to say the Paris storyline last season was not my favorite, but this season is completely on fire. I've got a major crush on grown-up Fergus, though Jamie is still my main man. There are not many shows I consid

Anatomy of My Smoothie

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I've been drinking a berry smoothie almost daily for years. It started when I did ten weeks of Beachbody in 2014 (and hey, I lost some weight) and got hooked on their Shakeology powder. It just seemed like a much better breakfast than cereal or toast -- nutrition-wise. And I could drink it while making lunches and running kids out to bus stops. I pretty much follow the same recipe every morning and just change around the fruit. So here's my very unprofessional, yet delicious, smoothie concoction. Start with: Frozen Spinach - about 3/4 cup Frozen Fruit - almost 2 cups * Note: I don't actually measure anything, so this is just a guess. I've tried several different frozen veggies, including spinach, kale, boiled-then-frozen cauliflower, and found I just prefer the spinach. I used to puree and freeze the spinach in an ice cube try for easy-to-use servings, but lately, I'm just freezing our leftover salad spinach and using that. (In the picture it looks li

Slow and Steady - Paris Friday Update

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It's been a quiet week in Paris news. The BIG HEADLINE is we picked up our visas on Wednesday from the French consulate, so we're officially official now. Paperwork is a go. Our Bus Stop Buddy On the apartment front , I'm basically pulling out my hair looking at the same four favorite apartments each week. Our next opportunity for apartment hunting (in person) isn't until after Thanksgiving, so we've got a looong month to go. I'm not so much a fan of waiting. On the school front, our application is complete for our school of choice, so now we're just sitting tight as it goes to the Admissions Group for review. Not getting into this school might change things... big things like where we'd live. So ... this is just another waiting game. Hopefully, it will only be a week review. Lastly, the hunt has started to find Lando, our two-year-old dog, a new home . We're all going to be bummed to see him go because he's such a big part of the fami

Moving Survey and Skipping Town - Paris Friday Update

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Little Nightstand - Going to Paris! Moving Survey Guessing Game  This week we did the "moving survey," meaning I walked around the house with a guy from the relocation company pointing at items that are getting moved and what's staying. With the notes he took, a survey will be created including an estimate on size/weight of the moving container we'll need. And from there, we can start talking about timing. Given we don't know the size of the apartment or if it will be furnished, this was all a big guessing game. The good news is, we can change the survey at any time. I went with the "take everything" approach, so it will be easy to slash items off the list once the big details are settled. It was exciting to imagine our stuff in a different space ... in a different country. And I do love imagining what our lives will be like there and what we'll need. What is essential? Also, I had several questions about the logistics that I got answered.

The Kids Are Alright -- About Paris

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I get a lot of questions about how the kids are taking this Paris news. Because, yes, it's a life-long dream of mine to live in Paris. And this is an amazing career opportunity for Dave. But the kids? What are they getting out of this? First, you should know that we've been talking about this potential move for years. There are Eiffel Towers and posters of Paris all over the house. Our family trip to Paris two years ago was full of sly "what if we lived here" comments and conversations. So, yeah, this wasn't out of the blue by any means. Sure, when we broke the news one morning when we were all in bed they may have freaked out a little. Alice was sad to leave her friends. Leah worried about dealing with a new school. But they were both excited about living in an apartment in a city where they can "eat croissants and gelato every day." Leah was won over by all the European travel. She's keen to see Venice ("there are rivers where streets

Trashing the Chandelier

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I have loathed the dining room chandelier -- if that's really what it can be called -- since we first looked at this house. I remember pointing at it and saying "that's got to go." (See an early dining room post here .) But, on the List of Things That Had to Go (and it was pretty long) this chandelier kept getting prioritized lower because it was functional. And I did a pretty good job camouflaging it with those pretty silver stars ! Ooh! My Dining Room With Stars! But, because we couldn't find replacement parts, we're down to one, flimsy lightbulb. So not only was it ugly, it wasn't working. That's a one-way ticket to replacement-ville! I know what you're thinking ... why bother replacing it, we're leaving for Paris in a few short months? But, guys! It was so annoying not to have a bright light in a room I like to use. Also, we're not entirely sure what we're doing with the house while we're away but having functional ligh