Les visiteurs

So I have been meaning to update this for AGES, but somehow laziness always wins out over good intentions (or blog updating intentions, at least, if we can call them good). I can't help but wonder if anyone will actually ever read my blog anymore or think to read it anymore, given that I am SO bad at keeping it updated. But I mean, I have books to read and Smallville, Cardcaptor Sakura, Death Note, Desperate Housewives, Gossip Girl, the Secret Life of the American Teenager, and Privileged to watch. Not to mention Japanese homework to work on and Nintendo DS and Wii to play. Oh and, of course, my job. How can I forget about that? As you can all tell, I am a VERY busy person.

Now, though, I want to write about what a GREAT time I had with Alex here with his girlfriend Janet and then with my mother, grandmother, and sister here.
It was SO good to have them all here, and I am still super sad that they are no longer here.


Alex and Janet arrived on Friday, and I got to hang out with them most of Friday and all of Saturday. It was so good to catch up - and I'm so excited that he's moving away from icky Boston and back to fantabulous New York City where he will be interning in a hospital.



When Mom, Kristen, and Grandma all arrived on Sunday morning, we ate some cupcakes (oishii desu!!!!) and then headed over to Versailles. I thought I had never been, but it all seemed so familiar when I got there, and Kristen informed me that we did, indeed, go to Versailles when we came to France in high school.



On Monday morning, we (= me, Mom, Kristen, and Grandma without Alex and Janet) left super early for Annecy, which is a small fairy-tale-esque city situated right in the heart of the French Alps and at the edge of Provence.




We unfortunately had to walk up a huge hill to get to where we were stay, but it was worth it for the adorable little gite we stayed in and the view of Annecy's castle right next door. We spent Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday there, and it was a GREAT vacation! We cooked delicious vegan food, and Mom, Kristen, and Grandma ate crepes every day. On Tuesday morning there was the Annecy market, so we bought juice and olive oil and cheese (not for me, bien sur!) and soup (vegan, ohhh yeah!) and had a lovely lunch sitting in the sun by the river. There was a very persistent bird that sat by us eating the cheese that Mom, Krist, and Grandma threw at him but that wanted nothing to do with the bread.

(I know that this picture is the wrong way, but I can't get Guillaume's computer to do anything about it, so it will have to be changed later)
After lunch, we spent time by the lake and went shopping and met up with my friend Lauren, who was living there at the time. Kristen was going to be having a fake patio party, so we tried on dresses.

Kristen, Audrey, Grandma, Mom, and Lauren in faux patio party dresses

On Wednesday, we had a lazy morning and then spent some more time shopping (and I discovered that Zara actually does sell fairly cheap clothes that I would actually be interested in wearing - shocking!!) and then got fantastic (but unfortunately expensive) massages. It felt so nice to be pampered. Night times there were also super fun - we played games like MASH and wrote lists of questions that everyone had to answer. We learned lots of fun facts about everyone - for example, I learned that Mom's favorite singer is Phil Collins with Peter Cetera (ohhh yeah!) coming in second. And And that Kristen hates having water in her face. And lots of interesting facts about Grandma (that I'm not sure she would appreciate me posting in my blog) as well.



We got back to Paris late on Wednesday night, and Alex and Janet had cooked us a delicious dinner. They had worked on the impossipuzzle while we were gone. I had started this thing a while ago, and I only managed to get some of the border done and a very little bit of the inside. Almost all of the pieces look and are shaped exactly the same. They made some progress - they completed the border and some of the inside. I have been working on it since.

Then I unfortunately had to go to work super early on Thursday. Krist, Mom, and Grammers went to Pere Lachaise, and then when I got home we all had a pilates lesson together. Grandma does yoga, so she was a little nervous about trying out the pilates, but I think she loved it in the end. Afterwars we spent some time in a little outdoor market, where Mom bought a delicious smelling lavender sachet and Grandma tried on these fantastic bendy necklaces (there seems to be no picture :-( ) and Kristen and I tried on lovely hats. Then we got some delicious starbucks vegan mint hot chocolate. Mieum!


Sadly, Kristen then had to leave on Friday right when I got home from work. :-( So we sent Kristen off and then headed over to les Champs-Elysees. We saw l'arc de triomphe and walked down the street that has all of the haute couture stores on it (Mom has these pictures, and I unfortunately don't have them yet). We saw la place de la concorde and les tuileries and then I left Mom and Grandma to explore the Louvres while I went home and cooked us dinner.

On Saturday, Grandma was unfortunately not feeling so well, so she stayed home and rested while Mom and I explored St-Michel and Notre Dame and l'hotel de Ville and le Marais went tourist shopping. We somehow managed to run out of time before heading over to the Eiffel Tower, as we had to get back quickly to go have dinner with Guillaume's parents. It was, of course, delicious, and Guillaume's dad happened to have just put on Phil Collins, which we now know to be Mom's favorite. On our way back, we had to do a quick drive by of the Eiffel Tower so Mom could get out, as she had never seen it before, and you can't come to Paris and not see the Eiffel Tower:

Anyhow, this is getting ridiculously long, so I guess that's it. Mom and Grandma left Sunday morning, and I was sad. The end.