Introducing...
The Black Nightmare
The Red-Hot Lava
The Pink Fairy
The Silver Streaker
Their alternate identities, thanks to their Canadian grandparents
Friday, December 26, 2014
Superheroes with bed head
Their alternate identities, thanks to their Canadian grandparents
Wednesday, December 24, 2014
'Twas The Night Before Christmas (Freeze Family Edition)
I thought of writing this entire post in rhyme mimicking the original poem...but it's already past midnight so I threw that idea out the window.
'Twas the night before Christmas, and at the Freeze house...
We draw pictures (we're halfway through our second ream, thanks to four children who start drawing the minute they wake up)
We decorate with paper. Because it's pretty and it's cheap!
We are tearing apart our master bedroom/bathroom, putting in a shower, and installing a sleeping loft. There is plaster/cement/rock dust everywhere.
Which means we are sleeping on the living room floor. See our mattress next to the dining table?
We have beams and plywood and other building materials inside and out
We also bought a big Jacuzzi corner tub for our other bathroom (floor model! 1/3 the original price!) and are storing it on the bed in Ivy's room. This means I have to curl up on a tiny spot on the bed to nurse Ivy at night. Kind of a pain. Oh, and to get it in the bathroom we have to open up a hole in the wall :)
We have art on our walls! (on loan from an artist friend)
We are reupholstering our daybed
We are making and eating lebkuchen
That's our night before Christmas!
Read more ...
'Twas the night before Christmas, and at the Freeze house...
We draw pictures (we're halfway through our second ream, thanks to four children who start drawing the minute they wake up)
We decorate with paper. Because it's pretty and it's cheap!
We are tearing apart our master bedroom/bathroom, putting in a shower, and installing a sleeping loft. There is plaster/cement/rock dust everywhere.
Which means we are sleeping on the living room floor. See our mattress next to the dining table?
We have beams and plywood and other building materials inside and out
We also bought a big Jacuzzi corner tub for our other bathroom (floor model! 1/3 the original price!) and are storing it on the bed in Ivy's room. This means I have to curl up on a tiny spot on the bed to nurse Ivy at night. Kind of a pain. Oh, and to get it in the bathroom we have to open up a hole in the wall :)
We have art on our walls! (on loan from an artist friend)
We are reupholstering our daybed
We are making and eating lebkuchen
That's our night before Christmas!
Saturday, December 20, 2014
Christmas meal at a French public school
This Thursday our public school served a special Christmas meal for lunch. When I read Zari's menu, I had a "we're not in Kansas anymore moment." You'd never see anything like this back home!
Read more ...
Au menu de Noël:
Bagel de saumon fumé et ses légumes croquants
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Quenelle de brochet, sauce américaine à la bisque de homard
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Riz pilaf (bio)
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"Ma bûche créative!"
sur la base d'une bûche patissière traditionelle
~
Clémentine
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Chocolat de Noël
Christmas menu:
Bagel with smoked salmon and crisp vegetables
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Pike quenelle with tomato-wine sauce and lobster bisque
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Organic rice pilaf
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"Decorate your own Yule Log!"
on a traditional Yule log pastry
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Clementine
~
Christmas chocolate
Thursday, December 18, 2014
Nice at night
Last week we went on a walk to see the Christmas lights. It was drizzling but warm. All these places are just a few minutes' walk from our front door!
On the Promenade du Paillon is a structure reminiscent of the off-shore Casino Jetée-Promenade, built in the late 1800s and destroyed in 1944 by German troops. You can see the fountains of the Miroir d'Eau behind the casino. The kids ran and rode their scooters through the water. Amazing how they don't care if they get wet even in cold weather.
The original casino circa 1891. This was at the height of Belle-Epoque Nice, when the English came down in droves during the winter season. Hence the walkway along the ocean named the "Promenade des anglais."
Read more ...
On the Promenade du Paillon is a structure reminiscent of the off-shore Casino Jetée-Promenade, built in the late 1800s and destroyed in 1944 by German troops. You can see the fountains of the Miroir d'Eau behind the casino. The kids ran and rode their scooters through the water. Amazing how they don't care if they get wet even in cold weather.
The original casino circa 1891. This was at the height of Belle-Epoque Nice, when the English came down in droves during the winter season. Hence the walkway along the ocean named the "Promenade des anglais."
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| Ferris Wheel on the Place Masséna! |
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| Place Masséna |
Friday, December 12, 2014
Why we moved our family to France
We made this 5-minute video about our family's decision to relocate to Nice--who we are, why France and why Nice specifically, some of the risks and challenges of leaving our life back home, what we were looking for versus what we ended up with in an apartment, and our life now in Nice.
Enjoy!
Why we moved our family to France from Rixa Freeze on Vimeo.
Read more ...
Enjoy!
Why we moved our family to France from Rixa Freeze on Vimeo.
Wednesday, December 03, 2014
A somewhat melancholy post
Ivy and I have lots of one-on-one time during school days. During the mornings I can pretend that I'm a mom of just one child instead of four. We go on long walks, run errands, clean the house, go to the park, or just side by side as I read and she plays with toys.
Ivy is little enough that I can pretend she's still a baby. She will be our last--barring some extraordinary circumstance--and I am already mourning the loss of her babyhood. It's more than that, really; it's the end of a stage of my life as a young mother. As long as I have one baby, I still feel like I am in that group. But it's coming to an end. I'm not sure if I'm ready for the next stage of my life. I keep thinking of what's coming and honestly I don't know if I'm very excited.
Parenting keeps getting more complicated as my kids get older, and I miss the sheer joy and simplicity of raising babies. I don't have much to look forward to once I no longer have a baby underfoot. Teenagers? Bleh. My kids turning into adults and leaving me alone? Sob.
So tell me I have something to look forward to. Because I thinking of growing older and aging and getting wrinkles and health problems (okay, maybe some of this is a long way off!) and my kids getting bigger and none of it seems interesting. What I'm trying to say is: having newborns and babies has been, for me, the Best Thing Ever and I don't know if anything else can make up for the loss of that part of my life.
Read more ...
Ivy is little enough that I can pretend she's still a baby. She will be our last--barring some extraordinary circumstance--and I am already mourning the loss of her babyhood. It's more than that, really; it's the end of a stage of my life as a young mother. As long as I have one baby, I still feel like I am in that group. But it's coming to an end. I'm not sure if I'm ready for the next stage of my life. I keep thinking of what's coming and honestly I don't know if I'm very excited.
Parenting keeps getting more complicated as my kids get older, and I miss the sheer joy and simplicity of raising babies. I don't have much to look forward to once I no longer have a baby underfoot. Teenagers? Bleh. My kids turning into adults and leaving me alone? Sob.
So tell me I have something to look forward to. Because I thinking of growing older and aging and getting wrinkles and health problems (okay, maybe some of this is a long way off!) and my kids getting bigger and none of it seems interesting. What I'm trying to say is: having newborns and babies has been, for me, the Best Thing Ever and I don't know if anything else can make up for the loss of that part of my life.
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