Paris is always a good idea- Audrey Heburn

Oh, and how right she is.

Young, broke and...

Carmen's birthday was Thursday, and we've been planning to go to Paris for a while to celebrate. I have been counting down the weeks sine the beginning of January, not only to see Paris, but to see my good friend AK who always lets me crash at his place, and to have a weekend of fabulousness with Carmen!

Before we even left, cherries were being piled on top of our Paris ice cream sundae; it was going to snow (beautiful!) and we had an extra friend with us- WBW, an American guy who works for humanitarian organizations for the most part of the year, and has taken 3 months off to travel Europe. A girlfriend of mine told him I live here in the south of France, and he got to be so lucky as to stay with me the week before Paris. It was so great to show Montpellier off to a tourist (when it wasn't raining), as well as have somebody to share my day to day life with.And great to meet somebody new!- good thing he was funny, kind and easy going or that would've been a long weeekk! (Or, as he put it, he would've just left it we didn't get along lol).

So Paris was set up to be a great trip. 

Little did we know it would be..

FANTASTIQUE!

WBW played paparazzi all weekend, and we got some funny pics on the metro and just walking around.

I thank the Lord for photos, every time I look at them I smile because it's so clear how much fun we're having. Sigh, what a great weekend.

Saturday: 
Biggest Crepes you've ever seen in your life- mine filled with Nutella, coconut and bananas. OMG Heaven.
Thank God it wasn't snowing yet, because there was no place to sit with these huge things. So we just walked around enjoying our 3000 calorie treats. Worth every bit.

The rest of that day was spent buying/fudging costumes for a Superhero party that AK was invited to, and subsequently we were invited to, that night.

I went as "Wonderwoman" (hardly), WBW was.. Sexyman (or whoever anybody guessed he was), Carmen was Catwoman and AK went as Zorro!

French parties are a little.. different. They serve vegetables, for one thing- there was an entire bowl of RADISHES as party treats. I mean, not complaining on my current health food kick (I think I ate the entire bowl of sliced bell peppers).. but radishes? Really?

And they play GOD AWFUL MUSIC. Like nothing to dance to. But they thought it was dance music. They were wrong. so, hate to say it, but we took over the show. Praise the Lord for iPhones- plugged mine in and we were good to go. Were we the only 3 (WBW, Carmen and I- as the Americans.. and then occasionally AK as an American-loving French man) dancing, and I'd like to think we gave the party entertainment. Knowing we'd never see these people again, we just did whatever we wanted. I felt like it was a private party :p Then we did our own little photo shoots (I can't imagine what the French were thinking just watching us take pictures of ourselves for like an hour) for the rest of the night when our music selection was taken over, and made the best of it til we begged AK to leave (it became clear this was a couple's only party, and dancing by yourself can only last so long!)

Sunday:
Sunday morning we let ourselves sleep in a bit, and then to pay for it, we RAN to the American Breakfast place Carmen had heard of before to eat a little bit of home. Of course, once we got there just five minutes before the place closed for breakfast, we found out that they actually serve breakfast all day. Well, that's alright, before the bagels and pancakes (white chocolate, apple and almond pancake?! Best thing EVVERRR!!!) and breakfast burritoes and whatever else we ate, Im sure a little cardio wasn't bad :)

My favorite part of Sunday was Buttes Chaumont. AK told me about it when I came to Paris with MIF in December, and I'm so glad I took hsi advice to go check it out. This place is a huge park with gardens and waterfalls and a huge man mad mountain in the middle. It's the third highest peak in Paris (or something impressive like that). In the snow it was AWESOME. The moat around the island/mountain was frozen, so of course we tested fate and walked/skated on it (in Uggs or whatever shoes we were wearing). I got a little out of hand and tried to do some lovely spins , and I fell on my butt (pic below, mid-fall). Some man swore he heard a crack, WBW dragged me off the ice like a five year old, and AK scolded me for being wreckless. Ah, to be a five foot tall adult.. :p

Random:

Speaking of being a semi-adult, I STILL have lice. Found two huge gross bugs in my hair today.

I just want to crawl home to my mom so she can sit me down and do a RID treatment on my hair like I'm in the first grade again.

Also WBW if you're reading this, sorry I didn't tell you about the lice, I didn't want to freak you out. And I definitely thought I had gotten rid of it.. 

Also, I'm trying to cardio 75k in the next 6 days. Power walking, biking, and elliptical count. Wish me luck!

<3

Lice Strikes

First let me start by saying that eating healthy does wonderful things for your body.
Like make your nails grow so long and beautiful you scratch your eyes out every time you try to take your contacts out. Or make you have to pee every ten minutes because you're so freaking hydrated. Or make your hair so long and thick that getting lice out of it takes three treatments of lice killing spray and two treatments of mayonnaise and hours of combing with a fine tooth comb.
Take the bad with the good.

So for the last THREE weeks I have had a terrible rash over my neck and head. It started the same day I severely burnt my head in the shower by accidentally knocking the faucet into BLAZING HOT and singed my scalp, so I thought it was just healing. Then it started being little bites everywhere. Thought it was lice, then quickly rejected that idea after no one could see anything in my hair. Bed bugs maybe. Spider bites. Allergies to my shampoo all of the sudden? So I rearranged my room, took all the furniture out and swept, mopped, vacuumed.. washed all my sheets (no small feat with no dryer, by the way), etc.
FINALLY I itched my head and came down with one little bastard bug on my finger.
I ran to my fourteen year old, who had lice when I first got here, and she was like "Oui, poux."
Here, apparently, you just stock lice shampoo like normal first aid because it happens so frequently. But HOLY MOLY that treatment burns. And to my despair, I found out that the stinging is the little buggers biting in anger, because the second and third time I did it, the less it stung because I didn't have any bugs left to bite me.
Dad said mayonnaise suffocates them. So I performed a genocide on my head with a weapon of  mayonnaise and kept it in ALL DAY. I mean all day. Through a three hour photo shoot, lunch, a trip to the movies to watch Le Chat Potte ( Puss in Boots ) with the kids, and through dinner. Plus side, my hair was extra soft and luscious after I rinsed out all the mayonnaise and dead lice. (When I told my fourteen year old that I had it in my hair, she said "Oh that's why your hair doesn't look nice today." Thankksss)

Fun fact: Lice can't live outside your head. There is about a 1:1000 chance they will survive even on your pillow. There were studies done where the researches swept 100 classroom floors and found not one louse. Then checked the heads of those kids, and found SEVEN THOUSAND LICE.

Hallelujah because I really didn't want to call my schools and inform them I had probably infected 270 students.

When I tell the kids' dad when he gets back (I had the kids this weekend to myself), he's going to say "Welcome in France" ;)

Blogging was NOT one of my New Year's Resolutions.

Because I knew that would FAIL.
But I will try anyway!
My New Years Resolutions were, in fact, the following:
1. Do 10 miles of cardio a week
2. Cut out bread for the most part, and eat about a zillion times better. (This is actually more specific but that's too long to type out)
3. Actually DO the photo shoots I want to do.

So far, I am doing great with #1, mostly great with #2, and alright with #3. But hey, it's been changing my life and it's only been a month.

I can't believe January's practically over.

Here is all the nitty gritty of the past few months..

Since I posted last time I've been to the following countries:

Monaco
Italy
Slovakia
Slovenia
Hungary
Poland
Germany
Switzerland
Czech Republic
England
Spain
Austria (we just drove through on accident, but I am still going to count it)

I am missing one. But I cannot for the life of me think of what it is.

So, you see, catching up on all those travels would be treacherous.  But I still may do something about it if I feel inspired.
Especially because I don't want to forget all those amazing times- I mean I already have!

I am at a place in my life right now where I am proud of my past, pleased with my present and excited for my future.
What better place is in there in life?

So here's what the future holds for the next few months:
Paris
Mont St. Michel, France
Verbiers, Switzerland
Milan, Italy
Edinburgh, Scotland
Ibiza, Spain

And then several more places in Italy and France when my aunt and uncle come down at the end of May.

So that's a wrap up of travels. Photos shall come soon. I have to be general because it's been so many months giving specifics would take ages and ages.
Which is why people who blog like every week are so cool. Ahem, AW.

But if I have time to build habits anywhere, it's here. I have all the time in the world to do things the right way. Drink my green tea, eat my oatmeal, go to the gym, read my Bible, get 8 hours of sleep, etc, etc. Right now I feel like when I go back to the states I'm REALLY going to miss this year long vacation I'm on right now. But who knows, maybe I will be craving the go go go again by June!

I also commute about 6 hours a week, and on Thursdays and Fridays it's 2 hours each day. So needless to say, my Kindle has been more than life saving and I have read the following books in the past few weeks:
Hunger Games series (Hunger Games, Catching Fire, Mockingjay)
Tim Tebow's Through My Eyes
Ender's Game
Jay-Z's Decoded
Eragon series (Eragon, Eldest, Brisingr, Inheritance)


Grandma would be proud :)

I still love living with the family, the kids are speaking some English, bt only a few phrases I've made the  m say because they repeat them so often. Like "What's for dinner?" or "Can you help me please?" or "Can I borrow a t-shirt?".. but that's about it. It's hard to teach a different language to somebody when you're trying to COMMUNICATE with them, not just teach them.  But I have been gaining more trust with the family, I think, not that I didn't have the lives of the two children on my hands the first weekend I lived here, but I have been called to find out what to buy at the grocery store, been given money to go grocery shopping for the family, and been allowed to make decisions on what the kids are doing after school even when it's the dad's night and they're his responsibility. So I am really loving it.

Teaching is.. bleh. Not even worth mentioning, to be honest. I only work like 6.5 hours a week, and therefore am spending a week at a sleep away camp for the primary schools in March to make up for it (I should be working 12 hrs/week, at least that's how much they're paying me to work). I think in about a year I will forget that I came here to teach English. Psh, I've already forgotten.

Alright, so there's the catch up post, and hopefully I can start posting more often so you can have details!!

This is the possibly the best thing I have ever done. Thank you so much for your support <3