Strasbourg, France

We made our way all the way from the western coast of France (Questembert near Damgan) to the eastern edge of France (Strasbourg) in one day. It went well considering there was one mother, two children, two rolling, rather heavy suitcases, and three backpacks! (It seemed so easy last January back in Minnesota when I said...France is a relatively small, manageable-sized country and the trains are so smooth...actually doing it was another story. That being said, with my two very seasoned travelers at my side...we made it! What a beautiful place to wrap up our European adventure! We chose Strasbourg, because our friend, Fanny, lives here. Fanny was an intern at Normandale two years ago and we were her partner family. We love Fanny and couldn't imagine going to France without visiting her and her native city, which I'd never visited before.

In Strasbourg we visited the cathedral with the famous astronomical clock, we bought lots of books for the Normandale library at FNAC (which I'm now carrying home!), we visited "la Petite France" and we toured the city via boat. That night we got to meet Fanny's parents and had a great dinner at their house.

Here we are at the start of "La Petite France" in Strasbourg. It's the old tanners' section of town and is full of beautiful half-timbered houses. The tops of the houses overhang the bottoms of the houses because the tanners used to hang skins out the windows to be dried after being scraped and cleaned in the river. Jack's favorite part was the boat cruise and the bridge they called "Crow Bridge" because that's where they used to put criminals into wire cages and drown them in the river. The crows would come along to pick at the remains! Ugh!

Kate's favorite part was probably the spaghetti!

And we all loved being able to spend the day with our friend Fanny! Friendship that spans generations, languages and an ocean, is a beautiful thing!

 

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Stone megaliths, a picnic and a trampoline

Carnac, France.

Carnac is the home to over a thousand stone megaliths that are put in long rows according to size in an area that stretches over two and a half miles. No one knows who placed these stones, where the stones came from, or how they were carried. Jack thinks that they used a chisel and men to get the rocks from underneath the ocean. There is a legend that says that these stones are Roman soldiers that were turned into stone while fighting the Gallois soldiers of France.

We enjoyed a rare sunny day while exploring the mysteries of Carnac.

Stacked stones like these tend to be burial places or tombs.

After exploring Carnac, we went to the beach for a picnic at Trinity sur mer. Jack found a baby crab and Kate found a seashell ring. We all enjoyed baguette and pâté with our friends Marie-Andree and Claude while we watched people dig in the tide pools and relax in the sun.

Jack at the sea port Trinity sur mer.

Kate back "home" in Damgan jumping on a bungee cord trampoline to wrap up another fantastic day!

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Damgan plage: the beach on France's western coast

We spent a fantastic five days at our friend's house in Damgan on the Atlantic coast of France. We fished for crabs and "crevettes", collected shells, made sand castles and made new friends! Above, Jack with his net and bucket hunting for crabs and Jack with Simon and all the neighborhood kids hunting for crabs. It is very good to speak French if you want to go crab hunting in Damgan! Hunting for crabs is Jack's favorite part of visiting Damgan!

Kate and Mama hunted for shells while the others hunted for crabs. Kate found a tiny, baby, cute crab the size of your thumbnail, camouflaged in the sand. We showed the others the crab and then let it go back into the ocean so it could grow big enough for us to eat him on our next trip to France!

The mornings at Damgan were usually cool and cloudy and the afternoons were sunny and windy. Jack and "Papie" Andre worked on a sand castle together one afternoon. "Papie" Andre is a retired school teacher, principal, bus driver and summer camp counselor (they do it all in France!) and he said a very wise thing at the beach this day... "It is important to help children in their creations but to let them take the lead and to make it in their own vision."

It is GOOD to have grand-parents in France too!

While Jack and Papie were constructing, Jack's new friend, Lena, found a rare shell ( une porcelain graine de cafe) and gave it to Jack. The sweetness of summer friendship!

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Lascaux II

Today we visited the caves of Lascaux II. These caves were discovered in 1945 by four French boys, Jaques, Marcel, Georges and Simon when their dog fell into a hole that led into the cave. The Hall of Bulls is the first room you will enter, it is called the Hall of Bulls because there are four bulls, two to the right and two to the left. Underneath the first and second bulls are a lot of horses, scientists think that these drawings of horses are actually one horse in movement...this is a prehistoric movie! Scientists think that this cave was like a church or religious place for the cromagnum man.

Today Jack read a book that told him that when the boys discovered the cave their hearts froze because they saw bones and they thought it was a human skeleton...but then they realized that it was the skeleton of a donkey that had fallen into the opening.

After Lascaux we visited le Thot a place where Jack and Kate could see real animals that were painted in Lascaux like the Auroch.

Jack knows that mammoths are vegetarians and harmless, unless they are being hunted, but this one still "freaked him out!"

Au revoir for today!

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The medieval chateau of Castelnaud in la Dordogne, France.

Thursday we visited the medieval castle called Castelnaud. First we saw the blacksmith making a spear point, it was very sharp! Next we explored the castle and found a secret door. We got to watch a catapult launch and we saw how armor was made.

Princess Kate in one of the small doorways. People were smaller back then!

Here is a knight and his horse in full armor. It took a full day to make just one piece of the armor! It took a week to make the helmet and about a month to make a full suit of armor!

This is the view of the Dordogne countryside from the top of Castelnaud. You can see how it was in a good defensive position for all the wars of the middle ages.

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LaRochelle in Brittany, France

Jack, Kate and I now are traveling with our friend, Marie-Andre. We have been friends since I stayed with her 13 years ago when I brought high school students to France. Kate and Jack are doing a great job speaking French and Jack gets lots of compliments on his French and his good accent! Here is Marie-Andre, Jack and Kate in front of "le phar des baleines" a lighthouse on the island "Ile de Re" in the Altantic by LaRochelle.

We went to "phar de baleines" today.It was a beautiful day. The skies were blue and we loved the ocean. We learned all about the science of how lighthouse developed. We stacked rocks just like other people that had visited before us.

Kate and I dug the world's biggest sand castle and deepest lake. We found lots of colorful shells, red, orange, yellow, blue and purple. We found big pieces of rock called "calcaire" in French. This rock is formed by crushed shells compacted together under the ocean. We don't know how to say it in English.

Saint Martin en Re. We stopped by this pretty island village to see the boats and look in the shops. Then we went back to the beach to swim and look for shells.

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The last hurrah !

Our last night in Normandy was our last night together as a group of twelve. What a fantastic three weeks it has been! Jack's favorite part of traveling in a group was "rolling with the amigos" ... The amigos = Jack + the three dads. Kate's favorite part was having sleepovers with all the kids.

After dinner we watched a great video that Elle and Lauren put together with all of our pictures and then...we watched fireworks at the end of the driving range, danced, and toasted a great trip.

 

 

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Normandy, France. July 5-8.

We visited the D-Day beaches in Normandy, France. This sculpture on Omaha Beach has three parts; one part stands for the birth of hope, the middle stands for the birth of liberty, and the final part stands for brotherhood.

 

Kate stares at the drops of rain in the reflecting pool at the American cemetery in Normandy. Seeing children with all the graves of the boys and men that fought for our country in the background makes me feel both sad and hopeful...these soldiers died so that children, like my own, could be free.

 

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EuroLauren (saying goodbye) :'(

Yesterday, when I got home, it was a bitter-sweeet moment. I was excited to get back into the swing of things at home, but I kept thinking of all the memories and relationships we built over the course of the weeks that cause a sort of let-down feeling. Even though all of the thoughts made we sad, one that made me choke up the most was the memory of our last day in Normandie. Seeing everyone so amazed at our video (even seeing some dads choke up) was touching. Then reading Jack's quotes caused a much different emotion... Hilarious! Elle and I noticed that half the restaurant was staring at us, but that's because they wish they could've been having as good of a time as we were :) When we all went to the end of the driving range and we danced to the "Euro Kids theme songs" as fireworks boomed over Omaha Beach was like something out of a movie. Of course, to put the icing on the cake, there was a sliver of the moon peaking out of the clouds as we walked back to the apartments. The major part of the let down feeling I had was realizing that you can never explain these moments to anyone that didn't experience it with you. Or that we will never be able to replicate a trip like this again because it was just too perfect. Thank you to all of the Euro Kids for becoming my brother and sisters. Thank you to the parents for getting us to where we need to go. Thank you Dad and Mom for working so hard to pay for this trip. Thank you Laura for being our "tour guide." And last, but not least, thank you God for such a great opportunity! XoXo, Lauren Lyne Steinke :)

Reflections of a "euro mom"

So why would one leave Minnesota during the three most beautiful months of the year to travel by train and metro and plane? Why would one spend a year preparing a four and seven year old for a trip to Europe by reading about impressionists and the French Revolution? Why? Just look at Kate's face the first time she saw the Eiffel Tower and shouted, "Look Mama! It's the Eiffel Tower! Isn't it beautiful?" This is reason number 1.

PARIS spelled out by the "euro kids". Reason number 2 is that my children get to share this experience with other children. Their memories are now interconnected, their lives linked globally.

Reason number 3 is that traveling in Europe and as part of a group of 6 children and 6 adults builds character and flexibility. Kate can now nap on a plane, train, metro, in the Hard Rock Cafe and on my back. (Jack joined Kate for a nap at the Hard Rock and everyone has napped on the train...thankfully, 40 pound Kate is the only one who has napped on my back!)

Eurokids in front of the queen's hamlet at Versailles.

Kate and Abby on the way back from Versailles.

 

The 4th reason that spending the summer as a euro mom is great is just watching our children's minds and hearts open up to new experiences and people. We spent the morning in Montmartre listening to street musicians and watching artists. Sophie and Jack especially enjoyed the experience and sketched right beside the artists. This artist's name as she is known in Montmartre is "Tati Danielle". She loves to paint with oils, she was born and raised in Normandy after the Second World War and she completely gave herself over to Jack and Sophie Sunday morning.

Abby and Jack doing watercolor painting in Monet's garden in Giverny.

And reason number 5... was actually a surprise to me. The best part about our European adventure isn't the places we go and see, but the connections the kids and parents make along the way. For a few short weeks, our kids have new brothers and sisters and a larger and more intimate village of parents looking out for them. Our oldest, middle and youngest children now have someone their own age to hang around with. Wisdom is shared as Elle advises Jack on the trials of being the first born. Lauren is amazing as a "big sister" and her patience with tic-tac-toe and card games never wears thin. Sophie shines as a leader by reading stories to the little girls and guiding our group around Lucerne. Jack gets "boy time" with his dad amigos and learns some flexibility as a "middle child" in the group. Abby shares her good nature with everyone and Kate basks in the glory of her posse of friends. As parents, we get to co-parent with a group of our closest friends, I get to watch others parent my children and I'm allowed to parent their children. I learn and grow. It is an amazing, once in a lifetime opportunity...

 

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