Starting in the middle of February, Abe had to go on a month long "trip" down to a French Military base in Avord to enhance his French skills. Adeline had a week off from school during this time frame and I contemplated if I should drive the girls down so we could visit Abe and do something fun together one weekend. Abe has never had a deployment (yet) and he rarely has to go on work trips, so the girls were a little out of sorts. Adeline in particular was super dramatic about it and would randomly cry that she missed daddy quite often. She had to speak with him every night and she wouldn't go to bed without a framed picture of her and Abe lying by her side. Like I said, a little dramatic!
When Abe was able to go find wifi somewhere, we were able to facetime him, which was nice!
Abe was able to meet up with his good friend Rob one weekend to see Mont St. Michel. He sent me this picture of him in front of it that he took from his iPad. Let's just say that that new little ipad that we got him (to imessage, facetime, etc) got stolen at the end of his trip :(
After I mustered up the courage to make the trip, it went quite well. I left right when the girls woke up in the morning and started driving. I had tons of snacks and had make them each a lunch I could pass to them in the car when the time came. They were happy and quiet the entire car ride. I was able to drive for 5.5 hours before stopping to fill up on gas again, get the girls a treat and take a bathroom break.
The French military guys that Abe was working with knew that we were going to come hang out with him for the weekend, so they let him have Friday off too. We decided to meet in a little town called Saint-Aignan where we rented a little apartment/house. While we waited for Abe to show up, we walked across a bridge and found a fun little park for the kids to play at with a neat view of the town with the Cathedral and a Castle up above it. After playing, we walked through the little town and finally found a little grocery store where we bought some fruit, a frozen pizza to cook and a couple little essentials.
After eating our "luxurious" pizza, the girls sat and looked out the window because they were so excited to see Abe. It was fun to see him after almost 3 weeks.
Our first day we spent at Chateau of Chenonceau. On the way, we were passing lots of random castles, so we stopped to take a picture in front of this one. So neat!
Anyway, Chenoceau was amazing! The grounds were ginormous and so pretty. The girls had fun running around through the little farms, seeing some donkeys, playing on a playground and of course seeing inside the castle. The girls love walking from room to room in the castles and seeing fancy furniture and guessing which princess lived there.
That night we walked around the little town we were staying at and explored a little bit before getting Crepes for dinner.
Our second day we went to Chateau d'Usse, which is the Castle that inspired the original Sleeping Beauty fairy tale. It appeared on a couple different websites that it was a must see, so we decided to go. I was a little disappointed. The grounds were tiny and the there wasn't that much to see of the castle. They did have a little part of the castle that was all set up like Sleeping Beauty's castles for the kids to see. This castle was twice as much as the one we had gone to the day before, so it was quite a disappointment. We were not there for very long and then left because there was nothing else to do. The girls thought it was fun though, so a little bit of a win.
Adeline was a little bit scared...
After that, we decided to drive over to another Castle, Chaumont Sur Loire. By the time we got there, Meika was sleeping and the kids were beat. We would have had to walk a lot with the kids and then we were not willing to pay another ginormous fee for a short visit to see the castle. We tried to see it from the road instead, but it was completely hidden.
On another note, I loved this cute little old boat in the river in front of where the castle was.
Then we headed back to the house to visit our local park and make dinner for the kids.
Our last day, we visited Chateau Chambord. Another ginormous, amazing castle!!
After we were done with the Castle, we played out on the lawn for about an hour before we had to say goodbye to Abe.
Remember how I was bragging how EASY the drive was there? Well, the way back was NOT the same. It took me eight hours to get home and Norah had to go to the bathroom a total of 5 times in the first 4.5 hours. One time was when we were stuck in the middle of traffic in Paris. Nowhere to pull off and Norah had to put a diaper on. She had to go so badly while Adeline was helping her put it on, that she peed on Adeline, on the floor and a little bit in her diaper. She ran up to the front of the car so I could help her finish putting it on and she also peed on me. She spend the next 10 minutes changing clothes, and cleaning up the car. Let's just say that when dinner time came along and we had to eat in a very overpriced restaurant (because there is no such thing as convenience in Europe), and not one person spoke English... and my kids were swinging on the food tray bars.... and people were staring at me wondering who this pregnant crazy lady was traveling with THREE kids... I may have shed a few tears while trying to order our food. I was very, very happy to get home!
I have been so anxious to find out where we will be headed next. I finally came to the conclusion that I was ok not knowing until end of May/June to find out since that would be the timeframe. A week or two ago Abe called AFPC (Air Force office that makes assignments) to see what they projected. They had told us last year that most likely we were going to Los Angeles. Well, when Abe called, they confirmed that we would be headed to LA UNLESS Abe got a green door assignment... which is pretty much a special request from a specific person at a specific base asking you to fill a specific position. These are harder to come by, especially in the places we wanted to go. We had some connections to get to the Pentagon, but I really can't be East coast again after living away from family for so long! So, since all the green door assignments were pretty much filled anyway for the fall, we thought it was a done deal that we were headed to LA. Abe was so sure, he even told Adeline and she was super excited to be by her cousin Jojo!
