Days 9, 10 & 11-The End

Day 9-Saturday, April 16th

Saturday we drove into Paris with Mom & Dad and received the royal treatment as we were dropped off right in front of the Opera Garnier. We were late, per our usual, and barely made it in time for the English tour. Phew. The hour and a half tour doesn't accommodate strollers and so we had the 'privilege' of carrying our squirmy 8 1/2 month old for the duration. We started off a little rocky until we realized about 20 minutes in that Bridger was in desperate need of a diaper change. Not wanting to miss any of the tour, I set up base on the floor of the beautiful auditorium. I'm pretty sure that Bridger may be the only baby to have ever had his poopy diaper changed in that room. Oh well, I didn't miss a word. No wonder the French hate us. ;)

After the diaper change we were all in much better spirits and enjoyed the rest of the tour. That building is seriously amazing. Pictures just don't give a good sense of the building's grandeur.

And, for those of you who are dying to know, we didn't get to see the Phantom while we were there. Darn.

{The ceiling inside the auditorium of the Opera Garnier}

After the Opera Garnier tour we met back up with Mom & Dad at the Visitor's Center and then went over to the special impressionist exhibit they were having at the Hotel de Ville. The exhibit turned out to be kind of a bust and much smaller than I anticipated. Oh well.

The remainder of the afternoon was spent shopping. Mom & I left the boys at a park and we hit up some of the stores in search of some clothes for me. We ended up finding a few things which I absolutely love! It was a good day for me. ;)

When we were done shopping it was time to eat dinner and so off we went to a cafe that Mom & Dad knew of. We enjoyed our dinner there while sitting on top of our neighbors and topped off the night by getting me some macaron for dessert. Like I said, it was a good day for me. :)

Day 10-Sunday, April 17th

Once again we attended 3 hours of what I can only assume was church. :) It was an amazing experience to have so many people tell us how wonderful Mom & Dad are and how greatly they have blessed the lives of the people in their ward. We walked away feeling very proud of them and extremely blessed to have them as members of our family.

When church was over we returned to the apartment and had one of Mom's fantastic meals before laying down for an afternoon nap. We got up around 4 and decided we still wanted to go downtown to see if we could make it to the Pere Lechaise Cemetery and Notre Dame. {Originally we had planned to attend an organ concert at Notre Dame but decided we wouldn't make it in time.} Because the cemetery closes at 6, we started there. We followed our trusty Rick Steves walk and found the graves of Oscar Wilde, Chopin, Jim Morrison and a few others. I'll admit, I'm not one for graveyards. But, this one was pretty cool.

{Nana & Bridger in front of Oscar Wilde's lipstick covered grave}

{Old man waiting in a cemetery...classic.}

{Jim Morrison's gravesite}

{Scott standing amidst the graves}

We were kicked out of the cemetery by bell ringers at ten to six and were met outside of the gates by Dad, Mom & Bridger who pulled around the car to meet us. We made our way over to Notre Dame only to realize that there were chimes, bells, chants and all sorts of things going on at the cathedral. It was then that we remembered that it was Palm Sunday. We had made it just in time to see the priest wave the palms and for the bells of the cathedral to sound for about 10 minutes straight. It was pretty neat.

{Notre Dame on Palm Sunday}

The rest of the evening was spent preparing for our departure. We had A LOT of stuff that we were trying to fit into our bags and, by some miracle, we were able to get it all in. After a very late night of packing, we finally hit the hay.

Day 11-Monday, April 18th

Our flight was scheduled to leave CDG airport at 8:30 a.m. and so we planned to be at the airport by 6:30. When we arrived, we saw that our flight had been delayed about a half an hour which we weren't too concerned about. {At that point we were just praying that our luggage wasn't over the weight limit.} Everything ended up working out okay and, thanks to Bridger's sweet smile and friendly nature we even managed to score an extra checked bag for free. Sweet! We made it through the intense security checks and arrived at our gate with just enough time to relax and realize how tired we all were. :)

{Bridger waiting to board the plane at Charles de Gaulle}

When we boarded the plane I remembered that Scott had called ahead and reserved the row with extra leg room and the bassinet for our flight from Paris to Houston. It was amazing. The plane took off, Bridger went to sleep and into the bassinet he went! He slept for about 4 of the 11 hours we were on the flight and, though he was worn out by the time we got off of the plane, he did remarkably well.

It turned out that because we had an 8 hour layover in Houston we were able to meet up with Scott's sister Ashley and her family. We were so excited to see them since we hadn't yet met their newest addition, Hailey. {And they hadn't met Bridger!} By the time we met up with Ash and the girls, Bridger was falling apart. He was hungry, he was exhausted and once again, we were confining him to a seat. After many tears were shed, he finally got a few minutes of shut eye before we made it to Ashley's house in Sugar Land.

Once in Sugar Land, our brother-in-law Cinco joined us and we all hung out for a couple of hours before leaving Cinco with the girls so Ashley could take us to dinner at one of their favorite Mexican food joints. It was good authentic Mexican which was confirmed later by the stomach ache I had from eating a little too much of it.

{Miss Ava Leigh showing off the hat and scarf we brought her from Paris...this girl's got style! Oh, and some seriously gorgeous blue eyes!}

{Our favorite...'Shhh....don't speak!' picture}

{'So, who are you again?'}

{Smiling Hailey Rae-6 months old}

{Scott and his sister, Ashley}

We made it back to the airport with plenty of time to go back through security and make it to our gate--once again realizing how exhausted we were. {Keep in mind that at this point we had been up for almost 24 hours...} Bridger had fallen asleep at the restaurant and was pretty much down for the count.

Once we got on the plane I realized again how darn small those 'regular' seats are. Bridger, who had woken up very grumpy from my having removed him from his stroller to board, let the whole plane know how terrible a mother I was for not letting him stay asleep. After a few minutes, I finally had him back into a peaceful slumber and was trying myself to get a little rest. Unfortunately for me, my 20+ lb. son was in my arms and, thanks to the woman next to me using our joint arm rest, I was stuck in the middle of sleeping woman and sleeping Scott feeling like my arm was going to fall off. {Now, some of you are probably thinking that I should have just moved Bridger to the other arm. Yeah, that would have been great if I hadn't been so worried that he would explode into a fit of rage.} Anywho-I was glad when they announced we were beginning our descent. And, I was especially glad that Bridger had slept the entire flight--even if that now requires me to be on a list for a donor arm. ;)

My parents picked us up at the airport at 11:30 p.m. when our plane landed. We had no problems finding our luggage but struggled to get it all to the car since the airport randomly decided to close their passenger pick up about 5 minutes before we got there. After walking much farther than was necessary we finally made it to my dad's truck where we loaded up and started for home. {Thanks again to Mom & Dad for coming so late to pick us up--especially since you both had to work at 7 the next morning!}

By the time Scott and I put Bridger in bed and crawled into bed ourselves it was 1:30 a.m. At 2:00 a.m., Bridger woke up for the day. I held him in his rocking chair 'til 4 and realized that there was no way he was going back to sleep. Scott got up at 6 to leave for work. And so--life goes on...