Christmas in DC 2011

I hope everyone who reads this has been as blessed with family and friends as we have.  We had a full house for a gathering at the Mansion on O Street on Christmas Eve, followed by a gathering on Christmas Day of EVERYONE!  As this will increasingly be harder to accomplish as the years and families grow, I was especially enjoying this one.  Three active grandchildren ages 18 months, 4 and 3 years keep the day active, exciting, and special.  With gifts exchanged after an eggs benedict breakfast, we managed 14 around the dining room table for a Christmas feast of Filet and Salmon.  I took the time this year to focus my camera on scenes and sights, not people.  Enjoy as I certainly did.....

My last day in Paris

As I begin to pack for the return trip home, I've discovered a sure fire way to control the weather where I'm going.....take rain boots.  Yes, they are heavy and yes, they take up loads of room.  I figured this time of the year in both London and Paris it would be cold, damp, and rainy.  Well.....3 weeks of dry, sunny, cool with sometimes grey days thrown in became our pleasant working/touring weather!  I really wanted to wear the boots, too, because they make a great statement and are comfortable as well.  Take a look:

Mind you, I'm not complaining because I've been able to do 10s of miles of walking very confortably enabling me to see Paris through an "everyday life"lense.  Whether walking over sidewalk art of a student, not doubt, catching a delivery man on the street with bread on wheels, observing the city's "wildlife" (pigeons), finding a most beautiful round window of old, stumbling into an ancient church that sponsors musical concerts for the neighborhood, to name a few:

Strolling along the Seine on a beautiful fall day just can't get any better.  Michael was fascinated, ofcourse, with the barges moving along as well as permanently tied up at dock.  The leaves of the trees shimmer a golden yellow now and fall drifing into the water.  This was our afternoon walk to the Musee d' Orsay.  Once at the museum, we were still excersizing our legs as we drank in the incredible age of the impressionists.  What a collection here.  No photos, ofcourse, but the building itself is a monument to architectural art.  Image Grand Central Station, or Union Station, 10 times larger and far more grand....and built well before ours, at that.  We were able to reach the top of the building and peer out its glass clock (it works) and see all of Paris laid out before us.  To me, this is a more personal look at art than the Louvre.

I will close by sharing our celebration of Michael's birthday yesterday....by the way, he LOVED the sculpture I gave him of Lady Justice (french) discovered in an antiques shop in London earlier in the trip.  I'm glad to say...."I scored big" on this one!  Yea.

Time to say goodbye to the city of Lights.  It's been a lovely sojourn, now back to reality.....phone calls, puppy needs, family catch-up, home repairs waiting, holiday preparation, and ofcourse, the office!  Actually, I'm eager to come home.  Blogging out now..thanks for following me!   Winsome

Long walks and a museum visit

The weather turned cold yesterday, very brisk, but sunny.  I continued my quest to walk the streets and try to feel less like a tourist and more like a long time visitor.  I must say, however, that as hard as I try, I just don't look like the elegant Parisian woman...always turned out so simply and beautifully.  That sense of style must be in their genes.  I particularly notice the beautifully dressed shop windows, and here on the Left Bank, sooooo many wonderful men's shops.

And the department store Bon Marche is eye candy for sure.  Reminds me of Saks in NYC, but with much more beautiful architecture.

And one never knows what is around the next corner.  For me it was street musicians, flower and vegetable markets, cafes, narrow streets, and extraordinary architecture side by side....

Oh, and did I forget to mention the amazing number of chocolate shops?  The parisians love their chocolate...especially the dark chocolate.  One shop I came across was promoting cocoa from Africa with this GIANT chocolate gorilla in its window!  Now that was impressive....

Tomorrow is Michael's birthday..and we will celebrate while packing to return starting our journey back early Saturday morning.  Tomorrow I'll try and write about our celebration and museum day, if I can just get the rest of my photos downloaded.  Seems to be a glitch right now....could be the "rube goldberg" electrical support system Michael wired up to "service" all our tech equipment.  I guess this tells the story of our lives...always wired.

Paris by Citron...

A quiet morning, followed by a long walk continuing my photography quest for Parisian doors, a light crepe for lunch, and a surprised "find" of a small St. Joseph statue for our collection.  I tried to find one from Notre Dame, but was unsuccessful.  Go figure.....

Afternoon was spent with Monsieur Jerry of the ParisAuthentic tour company which specializes in driving around Paris in a custom tour of out of the way streets and sights. I especially like seeing the last remaining wall of the city which was built in 200 BC and the last remaining colliseum for gladiators tucked away in a quiet neighborhood of the Marais district. It was still easy to imagine men fighting for their lives against tigers for sport. Gladiators had a hard life, to be sure. This "stadium" held 10,000 spectators!

Cages for the animals

From the narrow streets of the Latin Quarter, to the broader, grander streets of the Marais, a sneak peak at a hidden canal which houses hundreds of boats and finally to the highest point in Montmarte for a bird's eye view of the city spread below  the fun was in the traffic maneuvering done so expertly by Jerry in our little car.  Our friends Guy and Irene have/had a citron they have cherished for years.  I now know why!    As we drove around, Parisians as well as tourists would smile at the sight of us, and take photos when they could!

Sacre Coeur

To end, I will show you a few beautiful doors whose photos I am collecting for a future project:

Views from the Seine

Another beautiful day in Paris.  Sky is blue, temperature around 60, sun is bright.  It's is looking less like I will be using the rainboots I hauled over from home.

After a long walk this morning, Michael and I took a boat tour on the Seine.  It is a lovely way to see the buildings, both public and private among the monuments and museums.  My walk continued to affirm the respect and love of art in this city:

touring the Seine

An elegant billboard

The Metro station at the Louvre

Now I have to make a call to California and attend a board meeting for Mo-DV, a software company on the brink of hitting it big!

A Sunday stroll

I know we are now relaxing from our busy lives when Michael starts sleeping 8 to 10 hours a night!  Unheard of for a guy who exists on about 5.....

We strolled the side streets off St Germaine boulevard, took coffee and lemon tarts at a Bistro and people watched  and I then decided to concentrate on recording photos of the marvelous entry doors of Parisian buildings, large and small.  I plan to construct a montage of these beautiful doors and transfer to canvas as a wonderful reminder of our time here.  We scouted for a new dinner spot tonight and found several off the beaten paths to explore tonight as well as future birthday dinner for Michael, who turns 78 on the 18th.

I very cleverly found the "perfect" gift for him in London at an antique shop in SoHo.  By happenstance, it is a beautiful small sculpture of lady justice....which should be meaningful to him representing all the legal work he has done these past 40 years.  No, Michael is not a lawyer (nor am I), but I'm now convinced we both should have taken that extra step at University because we are both well suited to the profession.  Instead, I'm fond of answering when asked if an attorney....."no, but we prefer to practice law without a license, and instead with money.....through our philanthropy".  Clever, huh?  And by happenstance, this sculpture is very old French!  I think I got a "twofer" out of it!!!

Paris....the weekend.

A hidden courtyard

It's Saturday and the weather is lovely again.  In the 60s with bright sunlight.  We've strolled the boulevards, had crepes on the move, and walked in and out of shops discovering the French way of life.  The  restaurants and cafe's are full with most out on the street where they can still smoke with their coffee.

One of my joyful experiences has been walking the streets and enjoying the art of the city.  By that I mean the ironwork, sculpture, architecture, landscaping, and textures of the city.  I want to take photos of all this to show how a city can be beautiful and functional.  I wish we had more like this in our country:

A bridge ornament

A beautiful street lantern

the Flower Market

All of this is such eye candy!  More later.  I haven't even downloaded the photos from my camera.  These are from my phone......

Paris in the sunlight

We're situated on the Left Bank, Latin Quarter on a small street, rue Dauphine, a block in from the Seine.
Our small boutique hotel is lovely, quiet and right in the middle of tons of restaurants and small shops.

After spending one full day on our computers, we are now beginning to discipline ourselves to get out onto the streets, look around, enjoy the busyness of the Parisians, drool over the chocolate and bakery shops, eat a lot and later and later each day, enjoy good wine and coffee, and walk a lot for good interesting exercise!  Here are some sights to see:

The elegant Metro signs

Lovely barge on the Seine

Surprisingly, under the plaza in front of Notre Dame is an underground archaeological Crypt, ruins discovered during the excavations that began in 1965.  The crypt presents elements from the successive buildings constructed on the site from Ancient times to the 19th century.  My impression?  Engineering skills were well in evidence in the 300 bc times.  Amazing the huge stones designed and lifted into place to build walls!

Second day in and the weather has turned colder.  More like entering winter and great for strolling.  Take in the sights and the wine:

Cheese and wine for lunch.  Too lazy to go out!

Flower Market near the Metro