A few of my favorite things

The other night, a friend of mine mentioned she may be earning a trip for two to London through Pampered Chef. She asked if I'd like to go along. Duh. Chances are she's not going to earn it, so her mentioning it was just plain old cruel. But I began to think about the time I did go to London and Paris, and I realized I'm way over due for another trip!

I went with my parents, sister and baby Benjamin. We just got a new camera, and if I knew how to work it yet, a picture of Benjamin's passport would go right here. We had his picture taken when he was 2 months old, and he was screaming in it. It's awesome. So awesome, that as we were crossing the Chanel back into England, the officials in France made a special trip to stamp his passport. None of the rest of us got stamps, just Benjamin.

We had a great time seeing just about everything this is to see in Paris, including Rue Saint Denis! What's Rue Saint Denis you ask? Well, it's the prostitute district! We looked at our map, and found a road that took us from our hotel to the Isle de la Cite, where Notre Dame is, and just followed it! Turns out a little touristy family from the U.S. sticks out pretty badly among all the prostitutes and strip joints.

But Notre Dame was worth it.

My mom had fond memories of living in Paris, and eating the bread, so every chance she got we had bread. And, to my ultimate shame, we were in Paris for 3 whole days before we stopped at a Patisserie! But don't worry, we made up for it with the mille feuille, the eclairs, the tarts, the mille feuille!

I can't say enough wonderful things about Paris. The buildings look like this:

There are bridges across the Seine:

And then there's this: