On a trip to France, most people might expect to go visit interesting sites- perhaps the great Cathedral of Notre Dame or the Eiffel Tower.

We are not doing any of that sort of thing with my mom. In fact, today she got to help me clean my house.(Thanks, Mom! Love you!!!!)

But we don't only clean house.
Mais non!
We also....go pick up Mallory when she gets out of school early:

(FYI: My car is the one with the blue "Nebraskans for Peace" bumper sticker.)

Here's Mallory getting her papers inspected as she leaves school:

Back home, Finally!

This is Bob. My mom thinks Bob is kind of cute and sweet.

Bob is actually strange and kind of deformed.
She was like this when we found her and even the vet can't explain how a stray cat could be so hugely obese. She's like a watermelon with four toothpicks for legs. But she's so pathetic that you have to love her....

My mom has been enjoying the lovely fruits and vegetables here in France...

(She took this photo at the supermarket. Kind of pretty!)

She has also sat through two of Alexa's dance classes. She went to ballet on Monday and today was modern dance. As she watched, she had to hold the teacher's dog, Coppelia. Coppelia is quite spoiled and barks at you if not petted and endlessly cosseted.

If my dad shows these photos to their dog back home, my mom could be in big trouble. Bridget seems like the jealous type....

A few posts back, I mentioned that my twins (along with their whole class, of course) were going to be on French television.
Well, the show was finally aired today on the national one o'clock news on TF1 (the most popular channel, if you recall)

JP and I were at home and saw it on our big screen TV. When it finally got to the classroom scene, it was all I could do not to get all Mrs. Bennet and shriek "I was sure she could not be so beautiful for nothing!".
I only just restrained myself, but when you watch the video for yourself, you will notice that the camera person seemed to like Alexa's looks, as did the editor of the piece. She gets a close-up early on in the school scene and then again at the very end of the program.

Besides seeing both of my adorable younger daughters, you'll also get a look at the region where I live. It's even prettier than it looks in the show.

The segment (which you can see here. After the advertisement is over , click the "chapitres" button if you don't want to watch the whole 30 minute program. Go to chapters 11-19. Then click on the third picture from the end. it's a little photo of the girls' class. Can't miss it. ) is part of a series that TF1 is doing this week about the 150th anniversary of the annexation of the Savoy into France.

Today's installment was about the regional dialect of the area. And as my girls are in a Savoyard class in school, they got to be on the news.

Yesterday I woke up to a blizzard.
It snowed all morning, quit for a bit and then snowed again all night. It was nasty, windy and snowy.
I thought it was supposed to be spring now! I'm SO ready for daffodils and green grass.

I was pretty cross and confused until I remembered this little saying that they have here in the Haute Savoie about the month of March:
"In like a lion, out like an enraged polar bear."

Ok, I just made that up.
But they NEED a saying like that so that people don't get crazy, unrealistic ideas about lambs...