From Carolina to Clermont: Our Family Adventure to Auvergne: Life

You know it's funny, it doesn't matter where you are in the world, life goes on. We live in a beautiful French village. Live in a house built in the 1800s. Walk everywhere other than large grocery store runs and yet I still had to potty train Ruthie, Charlie doesn't want to go to school 40% of the time and Lily gets up in the middle of the night screaming her head off from time to time.

I feel like this time in our life is strangely magical. We get to go on amazing vacations during August breaks, our kids (at least the oldest 2) will learn to read, write and speak French and we get to eat fresh baguettes everyday. But Charlie and Ruthie still throw fits every once in awhile, Lily's molars are taking FOREVER to come through and they don't sell turkey anything here.

Life goes on.

Charlie is doing great in school. He of course has days he doesn't want to go but I think that stems from Ruthie being able to stay home and play. For a few weeks he insisted on wearing his tie to school everyday. He even started a little trend and all his buddies started wearing ties. It was super cute. I think he is picking up French pretty well and will start staying at school all day after the April break. He is such a caring, smart, tender hearted kid. It is amazing to think he might be 9 when we move back to the states!

Ruthie is her crazy, fun loving, servant self. She loves to help people, especially Lily who wants NONE of her help. She pretty much potty trained herself after she realized diapers were gone for good. I'm hoping she will potty train Lily for me. She is such a motherly little girl. She loves on everyone and wants to take care of them. She loves to give hugs. She starts school in September. I think she'll do great. She is a social little thing and loves to be with people. I cannot believe she'll be 7 when we move back!

Lily has grown a lot. She learned to walk in France. What a memory! In the Cathedral to be exact. Every Sunday she would practice walking up and down the sides of the church. She has started talking. She says: pease (please), dada, mama, arlie (Charlie), papa, ma (more), bye, dis (this), down and up. She'll still be home with me for a few more years. She may actually not even go to school here. It just depends on how long we stay. But she could potentially be almost 5 when we head back to the Greenville.

Here are some recent pictures of just everyday life for us in Clermont...