French in Seattle

What a weekend!!!! Dave and I went to Seattle to see some friends and visit family and we had such a great time. When we arrived in Seattle, a friend of ours came to pick us up at the airport. As we were waiting for our luggage she asked, "are you guys afraid of heights?" "Uh, no," we responded, "why?" "Well," she said, "we're having bed problems." Big grins spread across our faces. I was imagining a big crane in the backyard with a bed swinging from it, while Dave was wondering if we were going to be asked to sleep on the roof. "Um," we both murmerred, trying to stay serious, "what do you mean?" It turns out they just got new furniture for the guest room and now the top of the mattress is about 4 feet off the ground. Dave and I burst out laughing. At least we weren't going to be swinging from a crane in the backyard in the rain! The problem was easily fixed with a little stepping stool so I could climb into bed. Dave decided he'd prefer to get a running start and launch himself into bed. My husband! In the morning when I woke up I mentioned to Dave, "we are so close to the ceiling.....we could practically paint it."

Well, that's how the weekend started, and it just got better from there. We got to spend some great time with Cathy and Martin, and their 3 year old daughter Ella. Ella has gotten so talkative she is absolutely adorable. And I had forgotten, but Martin is French Canadian, so he speeks French! So, we got to practice French all weekend with him and Ella, who is also learning how to speak French. Cathy understands French fine, but prefers to speak English, which is fine by me so I didn't feel like I had to speak French if I didn't want to.

To aid in our learning, we played some of Ella's French games and read some of her books. It's pretty amazing how much she knows, at the age of 3! Any question we asked her, she knew the answer to.

As we were practicing at one point Martin exclaimed "Dave, you have the WORST accent I have ever heard!" And Dave exclaimed back, "Oh, merci, merci monsieur!" To which Martin replied, "and evidently your comprehension isn't very good either." Those two guys! But that did prove to me the thing that I keep telling everyone who tries to correct our accents. Some people think Dave's accent is better than mine, others think mine is better than his. My opinion is that our accent will need to be determined by where we finally decide to live. If we live in Lyon, our accent will need to be different than if we live in Paris. So, as long as we practice the nasal sounds and get our vowels and "r" sounds at least semi-okay, we will adjust when we get to our final destination.

The weather in Seattle was fabulous and we hated to leave. But the weekend quickly came to an end, and we flew home on the 4th of July. I wasn't planning another trip to Seattle before we leave for France, but now I'm reconsidering. Maybe just one more trip......