We were in Paris for three months when my oldest was two, and we bought a Maclaren Quest for when we were there. I'm a die hard baby wearer, and I never even had a stroller before, so it killed me to spend that much money on one, but I love it. It folds super easy with one hand, has a carrying strap attached, and is light weight. I bought the one year old model off of a baby deals type site for about $100 less than regular retail. I found the flight to Europe much worse than the flight home. It depends in how well your little one sleeps. My guy was not at all happy about sleeping on the plane all night, and the flight attendants kept waking him up when they came through asking if people wanted tea or whatever. It was terrible.

I agree about Crockpot 365! There are a lot of good recipes there!

I love woven wraps, but there's a decent learning curve before you get consistently comfortable back wrapping jobs. Plus, for a bigger child, I would usually want multiple wrap passes for support, and that could be warm depending on the weather. I think in your circumstances I would go with a soft structure carrier. Tula and Kinderpack make toddler size carriers, which would almost certainly be much more comfortable for a little one that age than something like an Ergo that is designed for a smaller baby. Kinderpack actually even makes a preschool size carrier that might work depending on his size at that point.

Star Trek. Original series. No contest. My youngest son's middle name was almost Tiberius. So close, but I just couldn't pull the trigger. ;-)

The only time I've crossed picket lines was in college. The teaching assistants went on strike over a couple of very reasonable cost cutting measures. I went to a very liberal/pro union university, but they did not have much sympathy from the professors or student body. My classes that I paid thousands of dollars for weren't cancelled, and I wasn't going to miss them! I would say at least 2/3 of students in my classes showed up. There was the occasional professor that cancelled out of solidarity, but they were the exception. The strikers made sure going crossing the lines was an unpleasant experience, but you got used to it. Some of my TAs didn't strike (I was in the business school which was more politically moderate), and they had a terrible time coming into the buildings. If I saw a random strike, I would likely try to learn more, but I wouldn't necessarily refuse to cross the line.

When I was in France, I couldn't find nutmeg. It could have to do with my really poor French language skills though. If we end up going back next year, I think I'll pack nutmeg, baking powder, and barbeque sauce.

We lived there for a bit two years ago, and there's a fair chance we'll be there all of 2015. I've researched homeschooling there a bit since my DH's industry doing better there than it is here, and you never know what what's going to happen going forward. I don't speak/read French, but from what I can piece together, it seems like homeschooling there can be quite difficult. It seems to depend on the attitude of the local officials, and you never know when those attitudes or officials might change. ;-) Technically, I think you're supposed to be providing your children the same sort of education they would be receiving in a French school. So, they're supposed to be taking French language, history, and literature and be on track to pass the French graduation exams. I'm not sure what type of progress the person coming to check in on you would expect from a 12 year old with no exposure to French, but I suppose nobody knows except for that one particular examiner, and that's part of the problem. If you go through with it, I think I would definitely try to find a bilingual local to help you navigate the system and be present for inspections. My understanding is that there's a two year window to, "turn your homeschool around" before they try to make you send your kid to school, but like I said, this is all information that I've pieced together from around the Internet. I've heard that in many cases (but not always) they are much more lenient with foreigners who are not expecting to live there long term, but if you're going to be there until your child graduates, you're going to have to figure something out. Thankfully, my husband's employer handled all of our tax issues, but my understanding is that it isn't much fun. I'm actually staring at a nice little packet from the, "Ministere de L'Economie et des Finances" that's sitting on my desk. They continue to send us blank tax forms to fill out every year just in case we had happened to go back and forgotten to pay. ;-) I would say that eating organic is slightly more difficult there than it is in a good size US city. We lived in a very nice neighborhood, like the kind we could never afford if we were the ones that had to pay for it nice, and the local grocery stores had a fair organic selection. I'm not sure what the selection is like in other areas. Food is more expensive there, and I bought more things conventional there than I do here. One good thing is that they don't do GMOs, so I felt better about buying things like delicious, but certainly not organic, bakery bread. I saw a couple health food type stores in trendy areas of Paris, but I'm not sure how prevalent they are because I didn't really seek them out.

I'm glad to hear his fever is a bit better, and that you have the cooling blanket.

You can decrease the size of the photo in Microsoft paint. Congratulations to your kitty! :-)

Congratulations!

Following along since Charlotte is on our "possible" list for next year. :-)

I really dislike food as a reward. The situation you're describing would bother me. A lot.

In my family? I would expect the earliest one to be about thirty minutes late. ;-) Really though, I would be irritated if people were more than 15 minutes early. ETA - Not like holding a grudge irritated, but more like rolling my eyes in my imagination irritated.

If I eat something out, it's more likely to be a bacon, egg, and gouda sandwich from Starbucks than anything else, so I chose Starbucks. It's a pretty good sandwich and reasonably priced.

My grandpa was there that day. He passed away about five years ago. I can't begin to imagine the horrors those brave men saw. I haven't made it there yet, but it's on my bucket list. Thank you for the pictures.

Thank you to everyone for commiserating with me. I'm feeling better this morning. The baby woke up bright and early at 6:30. :-) We're visiting my family, and I really am glad be here. We've been having a lot of fun during the days, it's just the nights that are getting too me. I've been trying to keep his routine as close to normal as possible (bath, teeth, story, song), but it seems like pretty much a lost cause. We're here until next Wednesday. Then the fun of adjusting back starts. ;-) Faifarmhand - If you're boring, so am I. That sounds like a perfect vacation.

Well, misery loves company. I'm glad to know I'm not alone. I just don't get how the child can literally *run* all day long and still take two hours to fall asleep. Why can't I have the kind of kids that fall asleep in the car after a long day or laying on the couch watching s movie, and you just carry them into bed? Seriously, it's like the fact that he has to go to sleep comes as a complete surprise to him every night.

We've been on "vacation" for a week now, and I'm about to go insane. We're visiting family, and with all of the excitement and activity, my children's schedules get so incredibly messed up. It's 10:30 local time (11:30 at home), and my four year old is just now falling asleep. We're all sharing one bedroom, so I can't just send him to bed and leave him to his own devices because he would wake the baby (who fell asleep three hours ago...), so I've been held captive in a dark room for two hours while he tosses and turns and asks for drinks. He gets an incredible amount of exercise. I think he sat for a total of about 30 minutes today, but he jut can't calm down to sleep when things are different. So now I have zero down time because I need to go to sleep because of course the baby will be up bright and early. Sigh. It's like a never ending day that just won't stop. Some vacation. Forget the fact that it will take me three weeks of pain to get him back on track once we get home. /rant

So, so sweet.

Have you tried a weighed blanket?

Thanks! My little guy will be excited!

Gender? (Sorry, I'm mobile and can't see signatures.) For a girl, maybe a nice pair of earrings?

Chomp and Clack Alligator? http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B000GZGE3Q/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?qid=1399925538&sr=8-1&pi=SY200_QL40

I can't even, I just can't. I'm so sorry.

We just moved from south central VA to what sounds like a very similar part of Maryland to you. Augh. I miss Virginia so much. We're only in MD for a year, so we're renting an apartment. This very modest two bedroom apartment is costing us $400 / month more than the mortgage taxes and insurance on our four bedroom house with a great yard in VA. Our property taxes in VA are .5%. Yes, you read that right. $1,000/year for a $200,000 house. I'm so glad we're only here for a year!