"tu peux fermer la porte!"

I was laying in my bed last night and I thought to myself, what the heck am I doing here? Not necessarily that I am unhappy but just literally like, is this really something I'm doing? I am laying in a bed in France. I had dinner with 4 French children and their parents. I brushed a french 4 year olds teeth, is this really real? So here is the story of my first 24 hours in Paris. I get onto the plane and I am sitting in between these 2 high school students who are on a class trip with 15 of their other classmates. The boy on my right immediately gets out a pack of gum and starts offering it to everyone because of the pressure change of takeoff. We start talking and he asks why I'm going to Paris so I tell him, pretty soon I have 3 or 4 high schoolers listening to this "amaaazing" story and they tell me how jealous they are and how lucky I am. They were cute. We land, we all get off the plane and I tell the kids that I hope they enjoy their trip. The gum kid looks at me and says "do a good job!" cutesy. So I wait in a giant line at customs with people who are about as amuuuurican as it gets and then I go get my bags. Now let's review: there is one of me and 3 giant heavy bags, one carry on and one longchamp so I get a luggage cart and wheel myself to the gate. JC is standing at the gate with a sign with my name on it so I greet him and we stumble through a few words in French then he asks if I may like to speak English to have a "soft landing" for which I am sooo thankful- he speaks so fast it's amazing. We get into their car, and begin driving and we are just having a lovely discussion about what it's like to live in France and he starts telling me about politics and healthcare and so many interesting things that I had no idea about! We finally get to our part of Paris and JC tells me that parking is a game here and it usually takes him 10-15 minutes to find a spot. Eventually we find one, carry my bags in to the tiniest elevator I've ever seen but I'm told it's one of the largest in Paris. We go up to my room on the 6th floor (we take te elevator to the 5th and stairs to mine, and we open the door and my room is smallllll. About the size of an AOII single but add a little kitchenette and a shower and a way lower ceiling. He then shows me their apartment which is fabulous. Gorgeous 3 bedroom apartment (did i mention that their 13 year old has a room next to mine) a cute little balcony and a wonderful view. We then go for a little stroll around the neighborhood, grab a coffee at a little cafe and then he has to run to a lunch meeting and that Nathalie would come at 4 to take me to pick up the children from school. So I go back to my apartment to unpack. I walk to my room and realize I have to use the bathroom so I go to the toilet that is in the hallway, I open the door and immediately realize that the bathro is one of the ones without an actual toilet. It's a hole in the ground with two foot rests and a string that you pull that flushes. I now remember JC saying I can use the bathroom at their house any time I want and that this one can be just for emergencies haha. I unpack my room, make my bed and it's about a bajillion degrees so I open a window change into a dress and decide to lay down because it's only 2. I took the best nap in the world and then woke up around 3:45, got ready and then Nathalie and I walked to school. It's only about 5 minutes away and a nice little walk. We get there to pick up A and he is so cute I can't stand it. We then go get B and H and begin our walk home. The boys are wiiiild. They were showing off in front of the new au pair :) running, kicking each other and saying all around funny things. H is calmer and walked calmly with her friend. We get to the apartment and it's time for the older kids to do their homework which Nathalie helps with. Meanwhile I ask a to show me a game. He shows me mousetrap which idont even know how to play in English and all the instructions were in French. Luckily, a doesn't know how to play either do we just end up building the mouse trap which turns into him wanting to fill the little yellow bucket that the diver goes into with water because as he said "il est plongeur" "he is a diver" almost like I was dumb for not putting water in it in the first place. We put water in it and I lay a towel down an we spend the next .5 seconds trying to catapult the diver into the water. Well then A realizes that I did NOT put enough water in the cup so he asks for more, then more, then more. Finally he tells me he has a great idea and pulls put a huge bowl from the cabinet. He asks Nath if he can fill it with water and she says yes an he looks at me with a giant smile and tells me that we are making a giant pool. He digs through his toy boxes and finds all the Lego people he can and several boats and we begin to play pirates. It was so adorable. It's time to clean up so A helps me and then goes to take a bath. The boys keep playing pirates in their bath and I help the girls set the table. We eat dinner, salad and quiche, then I tried FOUR French cheeses. Which is a lot coming from someone who doesn't really like cheese anyway. After dinner we find A eating honey out of the jar and everyone starts singing the winnie the pooh theme song which kills me. After dinner the kids pick up the table and it's time for the boys to go to bed. A wants me to read him a story and has a fit that I won't read a French one but finally let's me read an English one as long as its Disney princesses. (this kid may be my soul mate) JC puts them to bed and I hear my name being yelled from their room. I walk back in and A scolds me for not giving him bisous. (kisses) After that I excuse myself because I'm exhausted and I go to my room, shower and sleep for everrrr. I woke up this morning, got ready, went down at 7:45 to help the kids get ready for school, they had already eaten and were dressed, H was getting her shoes on, B was playing with his Lego people and A was on the potty with the door ope and kept yelling for papa. I asked him of I could do anything to help him and he said NON! I told hi Papa was busy and asked again if I could help instead and he said to me "tu peut fermé la porte!" you can shut the door! I laughed, eventually JC helped A, we walked to school, I wished the kids a good day, we stopped and got a cafe and croissant on the way home and now here I am. Sitting on a gorgeous balcony facing the Eiffel tower and getting ready to try to meet Augusta for lunch. Bisous :)