Yesterday, we went to the Montmartre area. This is the neighborhood to the West of the Sacre Coeur Cathedral (Sacred Heart Cathedral) which is famous for it's artists that meet here to paint and try to become famous. Picasso, Renoir and others hung out here in their day.
Here are some of the stairs that we climbed to get up to the Montmartre area. This was one of 2 sets we climbed before we got to the top.
Here's what is at the top of the stairs. The vines above this cafe are wisteria. When that wisteria blooms this place will be even more incredible!
A little of the neighborhood views...
The square where artists gather to paint. In addition to the artists stationed in the courtyard, there are artists wandering all around with sketch pads asking if you want your portrait painted.
I'm guessing that this fella's favorite color is neon orange.
We had crepes on our minds. It's been quite a while since we got crepes with the kids. It is obvious that this will be a very fond memory of living in France, so I decided to take photos of the place, the kids waiting in anticipation and the enjoyment of eating a fresh, hot Nutella crepe!
Yum!!!We continue to see the most interesting of people wandering around. However, when you are in the very touristy places, you never know if they are French or not. But, it's still highly entertaining!
There are two original windmills in Montmartre, each of which were painted by VanGogh and Renoir. Here they are.
The windmill is up on the hill behind the trees.
Here's Renoir's house...with blooming wisteria!
Todd on the wall opposite Renoir's house.
O.K. I just have to show you wisteria. I have only read about this vine (in the Mitford Series books), but I have never seen it before. It is in bloom all over Paris, and it is just FABULOUS! 
Back in the day, many of the famous painters hung out at this cafe/restaurant called the Pink House.
The only remaining vineyard inside the city limits of Paris.
We encountered a pile of garbage which included an old typewriter. It was very difficult to drag the kids away from this treasure. Kids are amazing! They are in one of the most famous and beautiful places in the world, and a typewriter on the street has captivated all their attention. :-)
For Mom, here's a store we passed. The name made us all smile and think of you!
As we rode to our next adventure on the metro, we encountered this new billboard. If you'd like to see Steve Wonder, come to Paris at the beginning of July for his concert.
Our next stop was to the Holacost Memorial. It's amazing. It is located in the heart of Paris, just two blocks from the Seine River. We arrived just 20 minutes before closing, so our visit was short. But, given the subject, it maybe was best for our kids that it was a quick visit this time.
There are 78,000 names of men, women and children engraved on these walls. They are the French Jews who died during the war.
This is the crypt that holds the ashes of thousands of Jews from France who were killed.
The files kept by the Germans. Each file card carries the information of a Jew in France.
Some of the memorabilia. The word for Jew in French is "Juif". It's sobering to see the star of David with this word on it; the patches that the Jews here in France had to wear during the German occupation.
The kids were fascinated by this machine. Then, when we read the sign, it was horrifying. They burned the bodies of the Jews, and then to remove all evidence of who they were, they put their ashes through this machine which ground everything to nothing. So sad.
The walls of photos of the French Jewish children who were killed.
We passed the Hotel de Ville on our way back to the metro. It is just an amazing building!
We had stopped at McDonalds for dinner, and Todd gottten a dragon as his Happy Meal toy. He was having a blast chasing pigeons all over the squares in front of the Hotel de Ville and the Notre Dame Cathedral with his fire-breathing dragon. :-)
Then, this past Sunday we went to church and then had a picnic lunch on a bridge over the Seine (our church is just 2 blocks from the Seine river) before we were off to our next adventure. Here are Mark, Lena and Todd on the bridge where we ate.
As we were eating, these folks "strolled" by. 
We walked along the Seine to our next stop, and I decided to take pictures of the trees. They are rather unique. I am not sure what they are, but maybe you do?
They have these funny little spiky balls hanging all over them. I'm wondering if those spiky balls are going to fall someday.
Boats parked along the Seine River.
We walked under many a bridge. Todd was excited that he could touch the ceiling of this one.
Ah...our destination! We decided to take a boat cruise on the Seine. Definitely an activity worth doing (and not terribly expensive either). It was a 1 hour and 10 minute ride right through the heart of the city. You can see so many of the sights from one boat ride...it's really wonderful!
Todd was marching down the side of the boat over and over again. He just couldn't sit still that long. As we went under the bridges, he would run from one end of the boat to the other...trying to reach the end of the boat before we got past the bridge. 
The train that is passing is the train we take to get to the eye doctor.
After the boat ride, we walked a while towards a convenient metro stop and we happened to pass this.
It is a statue given by the "school children of the United States to Lafayette Statesman Soldier Patriot" for helping George Washington fight against the British. Here's something that I just marvel about. We now live in one of the largest cities in the world, and I would never have guessed that "normal" life experiences from our life in Minnesota that would be here...such as this...
Dandelions! This city has everything. Honestly, it does. Now I will show you a neat thing that we found in our neighborhood just recently. It's a secret passage way (or at least that is what we call it!).
This is located 4 blocks from our home, and it makes a fun cut-through to a big park that is not too terribly far from our kid's school. I have a feeling we will be using this a lot now that we know it is there.
On the other end of the passageway, there is this house that is covered in wisteria. It is just fabulous!
I just had to include a photo of this elderly lady carrying two chairs up our hill. Our hill is not short, and it is rather steep. I couldn't believe that she was carrying not one, but two chairs up the hill! Now, that's something I have NEVER seen in America. :-)
And, then, there is the trip we took to a big park North of us as a team activity. It was a fabulous park, and we will most definitely be returning to this park during the summer. They have rides, animals, huge swings, fountains to run in and incredible playgrounds. They even have picnic tables and they encourage sitting on the grass! Yeah!
This is a clock made of flowers.
We encountered this man planting seeds in some of the herb/vegetable gardens.
This is what the buildings look like. This is a little cafe. Even their "feed stands" for the animals looked similar to this.
They all have thatched roofs.
Here's a photo of one of the swing sets. The kids had so much fun trying to swing high enough to touch their feet in the middle of the circle!
And, lastly, here's Todd on a bumper car. I can't remember exactly, but I find it hard to imagine that any amusement park in America that would allow a 4 year old on a bumper car. But, Todd loved it! And, so did Lena, Ryan and all the other kids on our team. It was a fun day!
And, we also found a huge mall this past weekend! Our teammates had told us about it, but we had not had the time to go and check it out. But, Saturday we took a bus for about 40 minutes and discovered a genuine mall about the size of Maplewood Mall (for those of you who live in the St. Paul area)!!!!! Yeah! And, they have a Toys R Us there! Best of all, all the stores we go to, but have to travel by metro from place to place are all under one roof!!!! What a day of total joy for our family it was to find this place. When there's genuine shopping work that needs to be done, we now know where to go.
And, we are excited that we will be off to the gardens of Versailles with our neighbors in the next couple of days. We went to the Chateau a few weeks ago, but the weather was terrible and we had decided to return during the vacation for a picnic together in the gardens. We are looking forward to spending a day with them, and looking forward to see more of France's amazing beauty!
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