City of Lights

We had a lovely weekend, which included a venture to a different neighborhood of our city, known for funky boutiques and bars. I've been telling Mr. I would love to find a French restaurant and lo and behold! When we had scanned the area twice when we stumbled across a lovely little French cafe.

It was small and perfect. It was painted a fabulous green (think an olive and kelly green mixed..in the best way!), had white wainscoting, fresh fuschia flowers and an ambiance I was eating up. We sat at one of the tables that was bar height, you know, just high enough so you could swing your legs and with a perfect people watching view out the window. I was digging it and the food! Croque monsieurs, fresh salads, and CREPES with anything...including Nutella. Nutella crepes are heavenly. So, we sat there, me chattering away with happiness and drinking my latte in a mug big enough to be a bowl. I ordered an omelette which came with a bread choice, including brioche. Oh yes! Definitely the brioche, I said. Would you like us to put cinnamon sugar on that...ummm YES! When our food came out (me - omelette, fresh and light, puts my eggs at home to Shame!) and I looked over at Mr. happily eating his croque monsieur with a fried egg and dijion bechamel sauce (that was delicious as well) and I had one of those moments. Sitting there, savoring every little bite of the cinnamon, buttery goodness of that brioche, sipping my latte, watching my husband and swinging my legs to the jazz they had playing - I just felt happy, content and reminiscent. It was a delicious lunch and perfect afternoon and reminded me of our first "real" trip together - to Paris.


A little bit of background. Ever since I can remember I've been a "francophile," although I wasn't quite aware of it. When I was younger, I always had the French country side calendars, watched things about France, wrote my 5th grade country report on France and took French throughout high school and college. I became enamored with the French language and culture, especially in high school. I never got to go to visit France but it was on my life to do list.


When I met the Mr., his parents were stationed in Germany for work and they were busy taking advantage of living in Europe. He would spend his summer/winter vacations in Europe and so, after we had been dating, I got to visit Europe and we used their home as a base for traveling. Post 9/11, I was not a good traveling companion (I'm still not!) anxious, worried but still wanted to travel. We planned, talked and planned some more. Initially, we were just going to hang around Germany and make day trips to cities by train. Of course, in my usual way, I mentioned that I wanted to go to France 502495823 times. And we were so close, why not go?

And so we planned our "romantic" 3 day getaway to Paris by train. But, as chez Mr. & Mrs. TP operates, our trip wasn't perfect, but was a picture of our life together. The train ride was about a 5 hour trip, our hotel was near the Eiffel tower and we had a few maps and a little bit of money.


And he also had food poisoning. The kind they warn you about when traveling, the kind you desperately hope you never have. Let's just say the Mr. will probably never eat seafood pasta in Germany again. Ever. The train ride = pitiful for him. Me, I read and scrambled to remember all of the French I should have known!

We got to the Metro, got our bags, my pitiful speaking French got us lost, confused and arguing in the Metro. Thankfully, we found our hotel which was small, clean and had a good sized bathroom (for Europe). We napped and re hydrated because Mr. was still feeling pretty crappy. We wandered around, found the Eiffel tower(yay!), and did the ultimate people watch - from an outdoor French cafe behind sunglasses. We found the neighborhood Boulangerie and I ate wayyy to many pastries. We tried to find le pharmacie that would have medicine for the Mr.

Our romantic weekend in the City of Lights? Our first real trip together? We were in bed by 9 every night, Mr. was only able to make it to one dinner, We made it to the Louvre for an afternoon, I ate french bread, french pastries galore, we hunted the neighborhood for decent pharmacy (not French diet pills, for the love?! a CVS? - was the real mantra that weekend), I perused the loveliest little bookstore that felt like the set of a movie, I read 4 books and watched BBC, Mr. slept and we cracked our inside jokes at zeee frencchhhh.

We laughed at the irony of the the situation and you know, I couldn't have asked for a better trip to the City of Lights. As as I sat in the cafe this weekend, I was reminded of this guy who went to Paris with me, sick, on a train. I pictured this athletic rugby player trying to squeeze into the ridiculously tiny seats at a restaurant and ordering tiny French food and enjoying himself with me. I was reminded of how he did it happily with me, for me and how our life & trips & excursions will never be perfect but they will be ours.


This was the breakfast room at our hotel. LOVED the decor and loved that I got served croissants and Nutella for breakfast. I took a picture just to remember the design of it.



View fr. our hotel.


Pardonnez the cheesy pic but come on, you gotta do it!

People Watching. That is all I'm going to say.