Salut!


This past week, I have been out of the house and in the mountains! The first day we visited Nathalie's parents in the Puy en Valey. We went into a smaller town nearby, and half of it was built in the Middle Ages, and the other half the Renaissance! Ludmila and I went into the Puy Cathedral that was built in the 10th and 11th centuries. The history behind the creation of the cathedral is amazing, and today people still take pilgrimages here. However, I have learned that basically nobody is religious here! I was explaining Ash Wednesday and Lent to my family and Nathalie and Olivier knew of it but had never known anybody that practiced it. 

The view from inside the cathedral. 

Last night at around 12pm we returned home from skiing in the French Alps. My week was amazing and I did sooo much! All week I had a 2 1/2 ski lesson with my instructor Georges and four other students. It was really fun and it was good for my French because Georges only spoke French and the others couldn't translate very well. Each day after my lesson, everybody (my family, all their cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents—there were a ton of people here) would all sit at picnic tables and eat our lunch. They brought good French bread with ham, cheese, salami, and foie gras. I always had ham :) They also packed apples, and chocolate and water and we all sat for about an hour and talked and ate. After lunch, or as they would call it "pic nique" the kids (besides me) would go skiing some more on the piste noir and I would go with the adults to the cafe and wait for them to finish coffee. Everyone here is a REALLY good skier. Even the little kids (3-6 years old) were flying down the black slopes and doing jumps off the little bumps. I, being a beginner, stuck to the "piste vert et piste bleu" all week. I have to say though, I am proud of myself! I didn't even know how to put my skis on the first day and by the end of the week I could ski parallel :-)


We stayed in Olivier's dad's chalet. It was amazing.  

This is a picture of it from the outside, and you can't really tell, but it is massive!

After skiing, we enjoyed cafe au lait on the balcony of the chalet overlooking the slopes!

This is my view from my small slope and that is the cafe where we had coffee.

After a week of lessons, I had earned my "premiere etiole" or "first star" which means I mastered the first phase of ski lessons. Hopefully one day I can come back and get all 7 etioles :-)

This is Ludmila's cousin Noa. She was the cutest thing in the world and six years old! She loved to point out objects and tell me what they were in French. 

On the last day, Ludmila, Emma, and I sled down the "piste noir" on our butts!