Walking up the Champs Elysees

The plan for today was to ride the Metro to Concorde, get off, eat chocolate waffles, then walk Champs Elysees--a big boulevard here--to the Arc de Triomphe. From there, we would head down another street a big scenic view of the Eiffel Tower. We did that, with a lot of little side-trips to enjoy living, not just sightseeing in Paris.
First, Molly, you were right about the waffles with chocolate on them. Gauffres chocolat, are fabulous. Lindy discovered them Saturday and liked them so much we planned our starting point at the waffle stand and she bought them for me and the kids. The only disappointment was that a very aggressive pigeon--dirty rat with wings--flew right to Lindy and took about 1/3 of one that she was holding in her hand. I guess they like them too. After the waffles, we started walking Champs Elysees via a nice park with walking paths. Warren brought his "soccer" ball along today. He is so proud of this ball; he wanted a ball to play with, and Saturday he bought this with his allowance money. He loves playing with it wherever he gets the chance.

We took a detour to visit the Petit Palais and Grand Palais. They are across the street from each other. On the way there, we passed this fountain. My kids, like all kids, are enchanted by water. I also included the picture so you can see the double-decker tour bus Warren and Abigail are in love with. Every time they see one, they ask if we can ride it. I hope they have reduced fares for children, because if they don't, we won't be riding it!

This is Warren blending in with the statue in front of the Petit Palais.

These are the entry doors at the top of the stairs to the Petit Palais. All three kids had a great time singing and dancing on the "stage" they created. Abigail, sang her with her loudest voice, of course and pranced around with her arms spread out. That kid's life is like a musical.

At the Grand Palais, there was an exhibit about Marie Antoinette the Lindy was interested in seeing so I took the kids on a walk in the area around it. Avery was asleep, and I was focusing on getting smoothly over an especially big pot hole in the sidewalk when I looked over and this is what I saw:
After getting out of the fence, we walked up the path and saw the tree-trimmers at work. I wondered how they keep the trees so fabulously squared-off and now I know: a cherry-picker and pruning scythe. It was fun to watch, and they waved at Warren, which made me especially happy.
So, as long as Warren is getting Egyptian bongs, (see Saturday's post) he thought he'd pick up a 6-pack of booze along with it. Warren found this box on the way to the Arc de Triomphe, and loved "playing" it like it was a set of bagpipes. When I asked him to throw it in the recycling bin, he said, "Mom, I need it to play like a horn as I cross the crocodile river." His reason was better than mine, so it stayed with us until he conveniently forgot about it at the children's park right by the Arc. It seems I left my wonderful map of Paris along with it. I hope I can buy another one just like it here. It's gotten me everywhere.
Abigail saw the crane and thought it was taller than the Eiffel Tower. Lindy said, when you can see both, tell me which one is taller. Abigail took this picture when she could see both and corrected herself, deciding the tower was taller. I was glad she could use new information offered her to come up with a conclusion different than her first one.

This is maybe my favorite picture I've taken yet. I asked Warren to stand there for a picture with the tower and he decided to be the tower. Of course, Abigail joined him. Avery did, about four pictures later. Then they all became dancing towers; see the second video below. Both times we've been here, these guys are out doing a dance routine and my kids just used their music. Once, when I was off tracking down Warren, who wanders just a bit, Lindy told me Avery walked right into the dancers area and the man danced right up to her and did a little dance exchange with her. Too bad I was off being cranky and didn't get to see it.It was a bit off a trick getting home, with my map gone, it took longer to decide on the Metro line to take home, but we figured it out. Lindy waited with the kids while I walked through the Metro station looking for a wall-map and planning our route home. Thankfully, nice men helped me lift the stroller down the steps at our transfer station and that made it a lot easier. I'm grateful for helpful strangers. (I'm even grateful for the stranger who told me my Avery's face is dirty while we were waiting for the elevator. She was interesting to the kids and interacted with them which kept the pretty quiet, which is good in France, especially when there are a lot of people. And now I'll always remember to wipe my kids faces and comb their hair before we go on the Metro.)
Total steps today: 20,261 (It was warmer today, so it felt like more, to me)
French word of the day: livraison: delivery
Other good things I ate today: croissant with chocolate and cream filling; yogurt (the French do anything with milk exquisitely; their yogurt takes up a full aisle in the supermarket, and their ice cream is good too)