Weekend at the Grandidiers

Before I tell you about our weekend with the Grandidiers there are a few things I forgot to tell you.


At our apartment you have to walk up 88 steps before you can get to us...because we are on the 4th floor.
So yeah...that is a part of our everyday life now...going up and down at least once - 176 step a day at the least. Then you get to our door and will see our doorbell. :o)

I will show you the view from our windows later. Now, I'll tell you about the Grandidiers.

Here is a picture of us with them from the summer - I know, David's beard will shock you at first if you have seem him without it recently.

Ok, so this is really a picture of us with Stephen and the Grandidier parents. Lucas and Thibaut aren't in this one. Therefore, left to right, Stephen, Denis, Patricia, David, and Me. You say "den-knee" for Denis, and Patricia is the same. For Lucas, you say "luca", and for Thibaut...the easiest..."T-bo" Ok...now we can continue.

They live in Remilly. That is like going from Conyers to McDonough (maybe a little further...25 minutes), but here you have the option of taking a train (13 minutes). Denis owns a cabinet business...well it's not just for cabinets, he orders everything else that would go well with the cabinets that he makes, so really it is for the entire kitchen, but he specializes in the cabinets. He does very good work. Here are pictures of the store (le magasin)

"Cuisines" means kitchens.

And this is what their house looks like. It is to the left of the store/shop......it's huge.

Most French homes are not this large, they are more like the size of decent apartments. This house is more like the typical home you'd find in the US. They also have a very large backyard with a big garden, a pool (above ground), and lots of room for the boys to play.

Thibaut's birthday party was this weekend. They played videogames (play station)...

The TV is often set up like a movie theater, with a huge screen and projector, and of course...surround sound :o) Nice.

...and ate LOTS of pizza. One kid ate about 10 pieces. He's 10...a piece for each year.

(Thibaut is the one in the orange, and Lucas is at the far side of the table in light blue putting something in his mouth...he's a little older...maybe by a year)

It was amazing to watch Patricia make pizzas for this many boys. They were frozen pizzas...but still, in a French oven that could take a while. She could fit four at one time.

I think the next most exciting thing was that we played Scrabble. Not just any Scrabble, but French Scrabble. This was our gameboard...The only letter that wasn't used was that "w" It's like the hardest letter to use with French words. But we did that so that I could learn more French words. And it did help. I think when I teach english I will use Scrabble too. We played again, in English, to help Lucas (because he started taking English in school this year) but we were too slow sometimes, talking about what words mean etc, so he didn't stay for the whole game. Oh well.

We talked a lot. Well, David talked with them a lot. I listened a lot, and tried to understand the conversation and pick out words that I know. I also sat down with Denis, because Patricia's english is better than his, and we went through some basic conjugations. He would say them in english (well, read them from this cool book he has) and I would read them in French. Although, I think he knows more english than I know French...so while I was just reading it, I think he actually knew what he was saying without looking at the words. He has already learned a lot just from when I saw them over the summer. I hope I can make decent progress like that.

Other than that I saw birds and cats this weekend. And I could have owned any or all of them. Denis parents have lots of birds that they have won prizes for, and somehow Denis ended up with some "extras" I guess. He doesn't want them, so they tried to give them to me...David said no. But at least they aren't annoying birds. They have a nice sounding, delicate chirp. And the cats have been living/mating in Denis piles of wood for his cabinets. There were two grey kittens (one with cute little white paws) and the mother, a solid black cat that was extremely friendly. Oh to have a cat...oh well. David said no to that too. :o( I still have Duncan...thousands of miles away though.

oook, that is all for now.