So, Friday and Saturday, we bring to you in place of your regularly scheduled program, "Museum Madness," brought to you by Natalie! On Friday Andy and I bought 2-day museum passes good for over 60 museums in and around Paris. Natalie, since she is under 18, is free pretty much everywhere, as are our children. We started off Friday morning at the Pantheon, since it is right by Andy's school, and he went in really early that morning so he could take the rest of the day off with us. The Pantheon was cool for it's architecture, it's famous dead people: Victor Hugo, Jacques Rousseau, the Curies, and Focault's Pendulum. FP proves that the Earth rotates as the pendulum swing silently over a circular table marked with the hours of the day. It appears the pendulum moves, but really, it is the earth--which the table is attached to--rotating around the pendulum, which stays swinging in a straight line as it is suspended from the ceiling on a wire cable.
Next Andy and I went to St. Chappelle, a real gem of a church housed within old palace walls. One of the King Louis' built it to house the holy relics he purchases: supposedly Christ's actual crown of thorns, a piece of the cross and other things. The relics cost him much more, actually, than it did to build the chapel; amazing, considering the level of detail that is in the chapel. This is Andy on the ground floor, reserved for "commoners." It was neat to see all the paint on the walls and columns, other places we've been have generally lost all of their paint. This place had the walls painted to look like fabric draperies, the columns had raised little castles that were painted, and the ceiling was navy blue with gold stars.
When I got out of the spiral staircase leading up to the King's chapel, this is the sight that greeted me. The windows are so tall and make up most of the walls, as you can see. If you could see them all--and when you are down low, you can't see the top details--you would be able to read the stories of the Bible by book in each pane. It is really the Bible told in pictures. Imagine the dedication of artists, who had to know that most people would never see all the details they put in to each frame, doing their work to glorify God.
Next to St. Chappelle is the Concierge, famous as a revolutionary prison for people who were going to the guillotine. It's most notable prisoner was Marie Antoinette, who spent her final days here. There is now a small, darkly draped chapel where her actual cell was. Painted on the dark blue walls, rather than castles or fleur-de-lis as in St. Chappelle, were silver swirls that looked like teardrops to me. We saw the various types of cells available to a person, based on whether they could pay for a better one or if they were poor, and a re-creation of what Marie Antoinette's cell looked like.
We went to the Pompidou Center next, and I didn't take any pictures, but, let me say, modern art is often too much about making a statement than about beauty or pleasure for me to enjoy it. When I could understand the French labels that told about a piece, that was interesting, but it was hard to enjoy most of the works just from looking at them. The kids art display was cool, though. It featured a photographer who used unique positioning and depth to distort the scale of a picture, like, he would show a parking lot full of play cars in front of a real, life-sized super-store and it looked like they were the right size for the building. There were some interactive displays that let you build your own scenes. It was a fun idea, one I'd like to try at home with the kids and their toys. After the Pompidou Center, we bought a box of ice-cream bars and ate them at a new park we discovered. I loved how this toy accommodated all 3 of my kids.
After ice cream, Andy and I went to Musee Picasso, and left Natalie in the park just outside with the kids. I really didn't get much out of it. I know that makes me sound uncultured, but oh well. Now Andy and I can say we've seen a lot of Picasso's work.
I snapped this of Abigail as she walked by at the park.
Natalie had already had her fill of the Louvre, so Andy and I loaded her and the kids on to the correct Metro to get her straight home and took off. Go Natalie! She played at home with the kids doing the "Tutu Day" package my mom had sent with her--making caramel apples and snails out of paper plates among other things--made dinner and put the kids to bed. Andy and I went to "Les Arts Decoratifs," a museum at the Louvre dedicated to advertising, fashion, and how people live, I guess. We only went to the fashion exhibit, which currently features hundreds of vintage Valentino gowns. It was quite the candy for the eye. Then we went to the main Louvre and walked a few miles off of our lives. Of note to my mom, I saw, "The Oath of the Horatio"--that painting you did in Art Masterpiece. It was huge. There were more, but I remembered that one most. This is Andy with the "Mona Lisa" just over his shoulder. After the Louvre, we hopped on the Metro and went to get our favorite falafel at
L'as du Falafel. I will miss that when I get back to Mesa. We bought gelato and then rode the Metro to the American Church in Paris, where we heard a concert put on by the Durham Cathedral Choir, a choir of young boys--sop/alto--and men--ten/bass. It was really neat to hear live. A highlight for me wa hearing "Ubi caritas," a song I had performed with Westwood High School's Honor Choir under the direction of Mr. Harris, who I later had the privilege of student teaching with. It was so beautiful in the big church. After the concert ended, we headed home, with over 32,000 steps and 11.3 (estimated) miles underneath our feet.
Saturday we started off at the Musee d'Orsay. We spent our time on the top level of this converted train station, which houses it's impressionistic and post-impressionistic art. I had this picture taken with me and all my future pianists. I was thinking that this was the picture on my piano growing up, I have since remembered that it was a different one, but still so moving to see. We saw works by Van Gogh, Renoir, Monet, Degas--all of his ballerina pictures reminded me as my days as accompanying the ballet classes at Jeanne's School of Dance--and Seurat, the pointillism guy. We saw his painting of the Circus, which my mother also taught about in Art Masterpiece.
At the Orsay, Abigail took a picture of, and wanted her picture with, the clock. So here it is.
After the Orsay, it was on to the Musee Rodin--the famous sculptor. We saw "The Thinker," "John the Baptist," "Walking Man," "The 3 Shades," "The Burgers of Calais,'' "The Kiss" and "The Gates of Hell," all notable and memorable amongst the many works. For a great--true--story that inspired the "Burgers of Calais," paste this into your browser: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Burghers_of_Calais
I caught this cute moment as each of my kids, seeing the other run to get into Natalie's picture, joined in. This was the final result.
After the Rodin, we went to the Eglise du Dome, where Napoleon is entombed. He is in a huge reddish tomb, lying inside coffins of mahogany, tin, lead, ebony and oak. Were they worried he was going somewhere? While there, Avery ran underneath one of the ropes that separated another tomb from the public; I panicked and she must have heard that in my voice because she actually stopped running, turned around and came back to me when I called her name. The elderly tour group that saw the whole thing, laughed, thankfully. Afterwards Andy and I went to see the Order of the Liberation Musuem and Natalie took the kids to play on the cannons. Warren told us later that the guards did not really like that, funny, because about 6 weeks ago we did the same thing, and no one cared. It must be because it's tourist season.
We found a park and ate ice cream in it, but Andy and Warren only got theirs after searching in vain for a bathroom for 25 minutes+ for Warren. For much of the way, Andy carried W, and in honor of it being the first day of summer, it was actually hot--for Paris--and humid. So Andy should get Father of the Year, because Warren is not small anymore. We loaded the kids and Natalie on the Metro again and Andy and I set off for an evening of music, since it is "Fete de la Musique" here in Paris and Europe.
Andy and I hopped on the Metro and went for Vietnamese food at the same place as last week--they remembered him and greeted us in Vietnamese. I love Vietnamese food. We decided to go out for Viet food once a month in Mesa. After stuffing ourselves we stopped off at a park to rest and listened to a blues band play just outside the gate. We walked back to the Metro passing several rock bands, a dance troupe and one amateur choral group. We got off near Notre Dame and while waking there passed a Native American group, a jazz band, a lady singing in the Metro...you get the point. At Notre Dame, we heard a choral group singing a cappella and with the organ; hearing a choir in a space like that where the sound carries forever was amazing. Then we heard an organ recital. Wow. It reminded me of Organ Stop Pizza, when it plays the train song, or listening to the organ at General Conference. It was cool. We left and walked to the Ile St. Louis, the island in the Seine just next to the Ile de la Cite, which ND is on, to try Berthillion ice cream. The island is famous for it, with the long lines to prove it at every place that sold it. But we walked almost the length of the island and found a relatively short line. I had blood orange and green apple. Andy had rhubarb and raspberry. We had some nice guy take our picture as we walked back across the Seine to head for the Metro. We passed all sorts of groups on the way there, and we got off a stop early on the way home to see what else was going on. When we got off the Metro at Abbesses, it was WILD--really, really crazy. After passing 3 crowds like that, we decided to pass on waking up to Sacre-Coeur and took a more direct route home. It was a calmer scene--junior high aged kids playing the one song they could play "La Bamba" in their band, a guy with a guitar who was having a sing-along with wordsheets (yeah for the Blake family Christmas party), a brass band, a jazz combo with swing dancers...The only comparison I can come up with for Fete de Musique in the States is Halloween: it's a major holiday, but you don't get school off, it can fall on any day of the week, it takes place mainly at night, and it gets pretty wild. But of course, here, no one is selling Fete de Musique merchandise 2 months before the event, which would happen in the US :) We made it home and crashed after 26,455 steps, about 8 miles or so, I think. THE END
Avery always sits in her stroller when we ride on the Metro. Usually, she is pushed so far up against the door that she can't reach the pole, but Tuesday there was some extra space, and she could reach the pole. I love how happy she is to "hold on" like the people who are standing up. Other people love seeing her do it, too.
On Tuesday we went to the Bois de Boulogne--the woods on the west of Paris. At one playground, there was this slanted, chasm-ed, rock climbing wall. Abigail kept trying to get over it, but with no success, until Warren went and helped her. So cute.
Tuesday was a hot day, so this water fountain was heaven-sent. Avery enjoyed it a lot.
On Wednesday night we went to the Arts and Metiers Museum, then to eat falafel, played at a park and then to the Shirtliff's house to say goodbye. They have been such good friends to us and the kids. When I told Warren we were going to say goodbye, he seemed to take it pretty well, until I heard him crying outside about 10 minutes later. I asked what was wrong--no response. I asked if there was anything I could do--he said, "I don't think so. I'm just so sad to leave Paris and the Shirtliff's. I wish we'd never met them so we didn't have to say goodbye." Well, that of course, got Abigail crying, too. Needless to say, we will be in touch, and are forever grateful for out dear friends.
I told Elaine that it was my first field trip with the kids to her house that made me brave enough to go out and explore Paris with them. I really think it would've taken much longer for me to get out with them if I hadn't had her house to go to, to "test the waters." It seems a small thing, but on small and simple things hinge great happenings, right?
Yesterday--Thursday--Warren wanted to trade in his training rollerblades and some other toys for real rollerblades at the kids resale store. I had to take a picture, they looked so cute.
Yesterday and today I've been cleaning and packing while the kids run circles around me. But even I could not miss how cute the girls both looked today in their hats. So we took some pictures.
For this last shot, Avery was motioning for Warren to get in with them--it was sweet that she wanted to include him. To get their attention for the picture, I said, "Say, 'Goodbye Paris!'" It didn't really make them smile, it mainly made them confused, but I got a pretty good one anyway.
