Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Monkeying around at a new playground

The weather here is fantastic all of a sudden. Sun, warmer weather...so nice for a change! Daniel took advantage and took the three littles to the playground while I was at school this afternoon. As you can see they had fun!



Monday, February 27, 2012

Menu plan

Quick plan since this week started out crazy with a sick, constantly nursing or attached to mama baby boy. This morning Daniel had to skip class to go with us to the doctor, which thankfully went well despite the language barrier (althoughttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifh the barrier is getting smaller...we understood and spoke some!). Here's the slammed together menu plan for this week:)

Monday: Spaghetti with meatsauce (over zucchini for me), buttered toast
Tuesday: Taco Soup or another soup?
Wednesday: Crockpot curry over rice
Thursday: Tacos
Friday: Cheeseburgers, homefries
Saturday: clean out the fridge, popcorn, banana cocoa icecream

Our weekend in pictures

We've been learning "Go Fish". Tonight Liv joined in (not in these pictures) and it was the cutest thing.

So happy to be getting some fun daddy time in!

Livvie and Louis (louis looking a little out of sorts...he's been sick a ton)

Marianna and Daddy and the Raclette (a huge chunk o cheese daniel bought...he got an entire Kilo because he was thinking you had to buy it that way....!) Its pretty tasty though.

Daddy snuggling his girls

Daniel and Louis having some guy time trying to catch part of a rugby game (in French of course:)

Okay, so I asked Daniel to take a picture of this because this is seriously how I have to study. This is just to illustrate why I end up each week asking myself when I ever studied?! But going to class is the best way for me to learn anyway.:) And I love those kids of mine.

Saturday, February 25, 2012

Chasing the Carnaval


I was holding Louis so the video is bad, but you can get a little idea that we were walking through the streets of Chambery following the fire-juggling and music. It was good even though it was a challenge to keep everyone safe and happy;)

Friday, February 24, 2012

More school-house rocks (or school in the bathroom?)


They were pretty stinkin' cute playing school together in the bathroom. This is our "bath" room (also a sink) that doubles as a playroom and Louis' naptime room (we move his pack n play in there a lot).

School time in the salle de bain


Not sure who is the teacher here. But either way, Louis is surely going to know his ABC's (in french and english) soon.;)

French pre-carnaval

In class I heard about the "carnaval" coming to town tomorrow. There was also a pre-carnaval happening within 20 minutes (by foot) of our apartment that sounded like fun. The kids are usually bouncing off the walls at night anyway so I thought I would brave it while Daniel did part 1 of our weekly shopping trip(we go to two stores by bike each week). It was fun, a little crazy but good to "do something" with the kids. Getting out to do something just for fun has been very rare since we arrived for various reasons. And it was FREE!

There was lots of fire-juggling and lots of walking through the city (they kept moving the "parade" to draw more attention I think.)




The girls had a lot of fun dancing around at one of the stops. They had plenty of energy so I was glad we went. Louis however did not and was very cranky. I had to hold him and push a double stroller...not awesome. On the way home he screamed for a few minutes but then fell asleep (thank goodness). The girls had a good time though and we had popcorn and read books when we got home. That's about as fun as it gets around here!:)

Monday, February 20, 2012

Menu Plan

We are halfway through our uber-busy both in school full time month. Thank goodness! Next month will be interesting because we may both be in group 2 (there are often only 4 groups for 8 +levels of French at our school) which means we'll have to have someone drop out for the month to do tutoring or split classes half the week (one of us likes that idea...the other not so much;). The good news is that the "problem" will force us to slow down a little!

Here is Louis "attacking" the moving box:) It really is true that a box can be the best toy!

Monday: Chicken, baked potatoes, and whole carrots in the crockpot, whole wheat toast & real butter
Tuesday: Lentil Chicken spinach soup in the crockpot (using homemade broth from yesterday's chicken), fresh bread from bakery.
Wednesday: Taco Salad (make big crockpot of pinto/kidney beans to use for this and for tomorrow)
Thursday: Chili, cornbread, peas
Friday: Cheeseburgers, homefries, fresh veggies, dip
Saturday: Beef Rice Casserole, broccoli
Sunday: Clean out fridge, popcorn

Breakfasts:Breakfast cake, eggs (always...we eat 70+ eggs a week, crazy!), smoothies made with kefir, bananas, pineapple, oatmeal, eggs in a window

Saturday, February 18, 2012

Sister and brother...quite a pair

Marianna LOVES to play with her brother. He's getting a bit more independent these days. He doesn't always want the attention (or to be held) but he is always interested in what the sisters are up to. Marianna doesn't always seem to realize that brother is over half her size now too.

Right before this I missed capturing a sweet (rare) moment where Louis was letting Marianna rock him on her lap.

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Our morning in pictures

We have been terrible about taking pictures since we started school full time, but this morning things seemed to be going relatively smoothly so I thought I would try to capture a bit of our morning:)

Beans in the crockpot (for taco soup and the rest for chili)

Snow outside our window!


My busy little school girls working on workbooks, puzzles and having their "fruit and veggie" snack we have every morning. The rule is: one veggie per fruit:) Marianna is off school this week and next.

Black bean dark chocolate brownies from valentines. We love these!

Louis is napping well this morning thankfully, and Daniel is at school!

We also do "morning chore" time every morning which includes one load of laundry off the rack, a new one back up, dishes and cleaning up the kitchen from breakfast. Since Marianna is home, I help and supervise rather than doing the bulk of it! Thankful for that!

Sunday, February 12, 2012

Menu Plan

The menus are getting pretty boring (almost the same every week!) but that's the way it'll have to be until our schedule changes.

Sunday: Crockpot Beef Stroganoff (on zucchini noodles for me:) over rice
Monday: Chicken in the crockpot, carrots, baked potatoes
Tuesday: Taco Soup (crockpot of course)
Wednesday: Mac n cheese in the crockpot (didn't get to this last or the week before?)
Thursday: Lentil something or other ....
Friday: Burgers and homefries, fresh veg or green beans
Saturday: Soup of some sort, fresh bread


Breakfasts:
French toast
Scrambled eggs
Eggs in a window
Zucchini Bread
Oatmeal

Saturday, February 11, 2012

New French friends

We had a great time tonight with new French friends. Daniel met the husband at Marianna's school when he realized Daniel spoke English. Then we realized our daughters were buddies at school. So we've been talking about having them over for a few weeks and we finally did and were so grateful we did. It was a fantastic time. It probably won't improve our French since they both knew a good deal of English, but we are excited to share friendship with them. I was especially thankful everything went so well because I had terrible insomnia last night and today my cold/fever got considerably worse. So so thankful...and ready for some rest tonight!

Olivia became fast friends with their younger child. They were in hysterics despite the lack of a common language:)


Louis and their younger child.

Marianna and her buddy Z, having a great time.

Around the dinner table with new friends. What a blessing!

We served Taco Salad and they brought wine and really good chocolate:).

Friday, February 10, 2012

My "house help"

Not a great "capture" of this but Marianna was helping daddy assemble her bed here:

Olivia is getting better at helping with dishes. The crockpot is still a bit big though.

And my BIGGEST helper of all, the little rascal who regularly breaks honey jars, dumps baby cereal, pulls out copious amounts of tupperware and pans. Good thing he's cute.

We've all been sick and have started school full-time so this blog has been neglected...so sorry! I need to set myself a posting schedule so I can make sure I take a few minutes every other day to do so.

Sunday, February 5, 2012

Menu Plan

And just for fun, another video of the boy:

He is truly "all boy" and thinks everything in the house needs to be conquered or destroyed. I routinely find things chewed up, pulled apart, or he's pulled himself and is trying to knock it over. So different from the girls!

Sunday: Chili in the crockpot and buttermilk cornbread. Dinner is something french: Pave de porc Savoyard with a cheesy potato casserole. Taking a one-day break from no-grains and also having some bread from the bakery:)
Monday: Leftovers: I made way too much food for my bday!
Tuesday: Chicken in the crockpot, carrots, foil wrapped baked potatoes
Wednesday: Making Chicken noodle soup w/bread for a new mommy, but we'll be having dinner at a friends house, so this will be Thursday's dinner
Thursday: See above
Friday: Burgers and homefries
Saturday: Stroganoff in the crockpot
Sunday: Lentils in the crockpot or clean out fridge

Breakfasts:
French toast
Scrambled eggs
Eggs in a window
Morning Glory Muffins

Saturday, February 4, 2012

Louis learns to wave


Big day for Louis: he learned to wave and moved into 18 month clothes. They are a little roomy and long, but I was having trouble zipping up the 12 month jammies.

I love that Louis gouges my eyes out in the last shot of this video. No mommies were harmed in the making of this video:)

Thursday, February 2, 2012

Sick Kids and reading with daddy

A picture of a rare quiet moment in our home:

The week wasn't exceptionally busy until...all three kids got sick. Oye...last night was a doozy with Louis crying for most of the night and Marianna complaining of an earache. Livvie kept with her normal night terror routine so I got about 3 hours of sleep. I felt like my brain was still at home while at class today! Oh well...c'est la vie!