A Sunday Stroll in Paris

Well our first night of attempting to sleep in Paris was terrible- between the crowds and the cars below the hotel and Grace not being able to sleep until well past 3am there wasn't much sleep to be had.. In the morning we took a walk up to the Rue des Abbesses and found a cafe to have some breakfast. We sat outside at a tiny table on tiny chairs and had eggs (omelet with cheese) with salad (?!) and bread of course. While playing with her straw, Grace accidentally splashed some hot chocolate on the woman's black suede boots who was sitting next to us. She was talking on her i-phone and gracefully pulled out some wipes to clean her boots. When we left she spoke in perfect English and told Grace to have a nice day. We have been treated very nicely here. The cafe's are a great place to people watch- the Parisians are very stylish, beautiful and fit. So are the dogs. I have challenged Grace to try to photograph every dog we come across.. So far the Jack Russel Terrier seems to be a favorite here. We did meet some cute apricot poodles whose owner stopped to let G get a picture of them...We have also seen bull terriers, a boxer puppy, a dachshund, shih tzus and a yellow lab or two.
We got back just in time to catch our cab to the Marais district. We had instructions to meet Chris at the Cafe Charlot at 1:00 where he would walk us to the apartment we are renting for the week. I think Chris is an ex-patriot...and he is very fond of this cute apartment.. If anything is spilled on the (antique) rug he wants us to notify him right away. He also wanted to make sure that Grace was past the 'writing on walls' stage. (Normally he does not allow children in this rental). Anyhow, to get to the apartment you enter through two huge red doors, go through an iron gate, down a hall, through a courtyard and then you see it.. It's a studio apartment with wood beam ceiling, stone walls and wood floors.. Super cute and cozy. Grace is happy it has a big tub. After showing us how everything works and going over a local map where the best restaurants, bakeries, cheese shops, etc are located we were free to unpack. Grace wanted to take a nap but I knew if that happened we would probably end up awake all night so I decided we'd go out and explore the Marais. We checked out the nearby food market that has all kinds of ethnic 'fast food' that you can take to go or eat there. We walked to the Picasso Museum and found out that it is closed for renovations until 2012. The Picasso Museum was the highlight of my previous short stay in Paris 19 years ago..it is even better than the Picasso Museum in Barcelona. We came across the Musee Carnavalet and checked out an exhibit on the French Revolution. Then we walked to the Centre d'Art et de Culture Georges Pompidou and the Stravinsky Fountain. On the way we stopped for crepes- sucre and chocolat...Our feet were getting tired so we started heading back (Grace really wanted to go see the Eiffel Tower all lit up but I wasn't really in the mood to navigate the Metro so we'll do that another night)..we ate at a cafe on the corner of our street- we shared tomato and mozarrella salad and penne with tre fromages. Grace took a bath when we got home and I made her go to sleep before 8... Now look who has the jetlag! It's only midnight although it felt like I slept all night....She is snoozing away next to me...I might need to watch a movie on the laptop...