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January seemed to fly by for us.  When Makenna’s cafe owner friend, Didier, returned from his Christmas break he had a Christmas gift for Makenna and Reese.  It was a cash register which was the perfect gift to go along with the market stand we got the kids.  It even has a scale for fruits and veggies like the supermarkets have here, and a credit card machine.  Makenna received 2 cookbooks for Christmas so she also put those to use and chose a few recipes to try, starting with almond brownies.

Makenna also had dinner at our Brazilian neighbor’s house a few times.  She just loves them and it is so cute seeing her with her friend Elis.  I love how she gets to try traditional Brazilian dishes too!

I was able to enjoy a dinner out with some friends for my friend Emily’s birthday.  We went to a mexican restaurant which is one of our favorite places to go for ladies nights out, it is so good!  It’s a very small restaurant and the owner has 2 seatings at 7pm and 9pm.  It’s usually busy, so if you have a reservation at 7 and are taking a long time to catch up on the gossip, he may kick you out at 9!

Ryan had to go to Daytona for a week to work at a 24 hour race.  I was thankful that over the weekend my friend Katie, her husband John and son Parker got together with us to go to Royal Kids, an indoor playground.  The kids had a great time and I was so thankful that John was able to help me manage 2 kids in that crazy place.  Reese and Parker, who is only a month older than Reese, had fun playing together in the baby area while Makenna ran around the bigger area.  The next day we went to Katie’s for a delicious brunch.  It was a great way to spend the weekend!

While sometimes the day to day activities don’t seem that interesting or fun, they are often the times we look back at with fond memories and I know these will be some of the times we will remember when thinking about our time in France.

On January 6th, the Epiphany, it is French tradition to eat “La Galette de Rois” or what we would call a King Cake.  But really, you can find these at the local bakery or grocery store throughout the month and it’s not uncommon to feast on just one of these tarts.  You can also find different flavors; while the original is frangipane there are flavors such as chocolate and pear, raspberry and pistachio, pear and caramel etc.

There’s more to this tradition than just eating the cake:

• First, the youngest child (if there is one in the group) has to hide under the table and tell whoever is cutting the cake who should get which piece.
• The person who finds the charm, known as a “fève”, in their slice gets to wear the crown that comes with the tart and then names their king or their queen.
• The tart is normally enjoyed with either cider or champagne.

Some people will hunt down galettes from particular bakeries just to get a certain type of fève (ahem, I have done this after we were highly disappointed with the one we got in a galette we bought from the grocery store), and some people collect them year after year.  You can find them on the French version of Craigslist, and at the flea markets.

Makenna found the fève in our first galette, which was something from Aquaman but since we’ve never seen the movie we had no idea what it was.  So I bought another galette from a chocolate and macaron shop that had a really cute little fox fève.  And ironically I was the one to find the fève that time!

I’m pretty sure we have saved our fèves from previous years, and I think we’ll have to buy several galettes next year since it will be our last!

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December was somewhat uneventful for us as one or more of us was sick the entire month!  After looking back through the kids health books, they both have been back and forth to the doctor since Halloween, mostly with ear infections.  They also had a gastro, twice.  Ryan and I caught it the first time but thankfully were spared the second time, although the kids both had it for a week!

We did a few Christmasy things in between when the kids were feeling ok.  We had their photo taken with Santa, and Makenna mailed a letter to Santa which was followed by receiving a letter from him a couple weeks later.  We also took the kids on the ferris wheel and Makenna and I rode the caterpillar roller coaster that was in town.  Ryan took quite a bit of vacation time throughout the month as he had a lot of days to use up, so one morning after dropping the kids off at school/the nounou we went to the Christmas market and had some mulled wine, then did some Christmas shopping.

Makenna’s dance class had a day where the parents could observe the children dancing and then Santa came to hand out presents.  It was great until Makenna opened her gift and was upset it was a barbie doll and not the piano she asked Santa for!

It was quite a month and Ryan and I were both tired and stressed with all of the sickness going around our house.  Even Bailey was acting really odd and sick and we thought we were going to have to put him down, but whatever it was improved.  I was so glad that Ryan was home to help me with it all!

Thankfully by Christmas day we were almost on the mend and the kids were able to enjoy opening their gifts.  Makenna was happy to receive her piano and Reese went crazy for a toy vacuum that I had originally bought for Makenna because it was on her wish list.

A few days after Christmas, Reese and I headed back to the pediatrician because he was still sick.  It had just started to snow as we left the apartment, and by the time we left the doctor’s office the parking lot and roads were covered in snow!  I was slightly worried because I’m not used to driving in snow and the entire trip back home is downhill.  Once I got about half way home I noticed the car was starting to slide and there were other cars sliding too.  There was quite a bit of traffic and I was scared to slide into another car especially with Reese in the car, so I looked for a place to pull over but there was nothing nearby.  I pulled onto the sidewalk and noticed another person did the same behind me.  After sitting there for about a half our watching other cars pull off the road (even a bus!) I decided I had to get us home somehow since it was time for dinner.  There was still traffic and the cars were going really slow but I decided to pull back on to the road and find the closest parking lot or driveway.  Thankfully not too far away I saw a driveway and pulled into it.  With my broken French, I knocked on the door of the house and asked the old woman who lived there if I could leave my car in her driveway until the next morning.  She was so kind and even offered for me to stay there for a little while until the weather was better.  I wanted to get home, so I put Reese in his stroller and walked the roughly 20 minutes it took to get back to the apartment.  Reese and I weren’t prepared to be out in the cold, snow and wind and he was wailing the entire time and I had a hard time pushing the stroller on slippery sidewalks against the wind but we made it!  That will probably be one of the days I don’t forget about our experience here.

By New Year’s Eve we were all healthy and were very much looking to start a new year!