Welcome to Our Paris Apartment

Bienvenue.  I'd like to invite you into our new apartment in Paris.  It is 215 sqm (almost 2,400 sq ft) with 3 bedrooms + 1 office (or a 4th bedroom) and 2 full baths and 1 half-bath.  It takes Rocky and me a leisurely 10 minutes to walk to her school and Peanut and Jared about 15 minutes to get to his.  We have an elevator, but have chosen to walk up the 3 flights of stairs to get to our apartment.  I haven't signed up for a gym yet, so it's my only exercise.  The building is quiet and stately.  One thing I'm getting used to is having a concierge who delivers our mail and the many, many, many Amazon packages up to our apartment.  She's an elderly lady who lives on the 0 floor (considered the 1st floor in America) and is responsible for cleaning the common areas, and other things.

Without further delay, let me show you around.

Living room

This is our living room.  It is one of the biggest rooms in the place and has lots of great natural light.  It's got many contemporary touches mixed with the old Haussman style of the building.

Living room

We have four of these beautiful marble fire places throughout our apartment.

Entry

This is our foyer.  This is the major intersection of our home.  If you look up, we have a really cool lamp.  I liked it even before our realtor told us that was designed by renowned French designer Ingo Maurer, which in translation means .. expensive.

Entry

From the foyer, dining room is the first door on the left, then living room, and followed by the entrance to the office.

Dining room

The second largest room in the apartment.  You can still see our empty suitcases lurking in the background.  From our dining room, you can see the top of the Eiffel Tower and Montparnasse Tower.  We've hosted one dinner party here already.  Not bad for only being here for 2 weeks.

Office / 4th Bedroom

 Now that we have internet (applause), this is command central.

Hallway

This long hallway leads you into the bedrooms, bathrooms, and kitchen.  We have wood floors throughout the apartment, except in the kitchen and bathrooms which have tile.  These old wood floors are so squeaky that I can hear every time Jared gets up at night.  Our realtor told us that's "very French".  He says the French hate new things and the old floors make this place very special.  Sales people.  Jared thinks it's silly that the landlord spent so much money on the lighting (we have dimmers galore and designer lamps), but didn't fix the creeky floors.

Hallway showing wine refrigerator

I really like the colorfully painted walls.  Fuchsia and turquoise - reminds me of Miami Vice - but it works really nicely.  The gray line to break up the white wall is a really nice touch and makes an already long hallway, even longer.

Master bedroom

The first bedroom you arrive at is ours.  It's the master with one of those Ingo Maurer lights overhead.  We're still waiting for hangers to arrive so we can hang up our clothes and will probably add a couple of things to make the room more cozy.

Peanut's room with bunk bed

Peanut is next door.  We lucked out that his room is painted blue and is the bigger of the two kids rooms.

Peanut's room

The landlord left some games and books behind, in addition, we brought some of his toys from Texas.

Rocky's room

Both of the kids rooms have lots of natural light and large closets.  Space for clothes has not been an issue for any of us.

Rocky's room

Kitchen

We have a nice sized kitchen.  This is where we eat all of our meals.  One key missing appliance ... a microwave.  But, we have a vapor oven.  It's supposed to cook perfect fish and vegetables.  We also have a very useful plate warmer (not!) and convection oven.  We also have a full-sized American style refrigerator, which Jared's friend says is not common in France.

Master bathroom

This is our master bathroom with an awesome, water-wasting but I don't care, 8 jet shower!  There's no inch of your body that can hide from those jets.  One very nice thing about Europe is they like their water hot.  I can blast it to where I come out lobster red.

We Have Arrived!

We're off to Paris!

Thank you to my mom and Phi for taking us to the airport.  We miss you already.

We are really here - pinch me.  Our first glimpse of the Eiffel Tower on the way to our apartment for the first time.

Moving With Kids Tips

A friend asked me for some advice on moving with kids. Here's what I learned from my recent move.

1. Check if you can "rent" boxes instead of buying them. Return them and get your money back when you're done. The moving company you use may have this option.

2. We used mostly small boxes, then large, and the least used were medium sized. I think we had about 100 boxes.

3. Unpacking in order of priority: bathroom, youngest to oldest kid's room, kitchen, then your bedrooms. The rest you can do later.

4. Have an idea where you want your furniture and boxes. Make sure the movers put them in the correct room/spot so you don't have to move them later. This will be a full time job for one person. I just stood there as the movers unloaded and told them where each thing went. It saved us a lot of time and backache later.

5. Have tools available for the movers to use so they can take your furniture apart. Even though they know they're supposed to take cribs, bedframes, etc. apart, they never come prepared! And, remember to get your tools back. We think the movers accidentally walked off with Jared's ratchet set.

6. If you can, take the kids to the empty old house then to the new house. It'll help them connect the dots. Even so, Peanut kept on thinking we left things at the old house.

7. Pack suitcases for everyone with 1-2 days worth of essentials (clothes, diapers, toiletries, etc). Moving with kids is so different because you "go live" as soon as you're at the new house and no matter how well you label, you can never find what you need.

8. If possible, get rid of the kids for the 8 hours or so you are moving. Otherwise, find someone who can manage the kids for that entire time. You'll be too busy to keep them from trying to "help".

9. Order pizza for the movers. If it's a hot day, they also like ice cream.

10. Make sure you tell the movers to put down things to protect wood floors, carpet, etc. in your old and new house. Again, they're supposed to, but you might get a lazy crew.

11. Inspect your furniture, appliances, and other expensive stuff before the crew leaves so they can take inventory of damages. It'll save you some headache dealing with the moving company later.

12. Pack all of the "hidden" things first: your junk closets, cabinets, things under the sink, attic, shed, etc. I too find it much more rewarding to pack the things in plain sight because it feels like you've done so much. However, it really sucks to open a closet packed to the gills with old yoga mats and DDR pads, after you've patted yourself on the back.

We're Moving

It's 107 degrees and what do we do? Let's move!

In a little over a week, we'll be moving into a house that's closer to Jared's office and Peanut's new school. More importantly, the new house has a pool!

Peanut was accepted into this other school we were considering and starts the Monday after we move into our new home. The move shouldn't impact Rocky too much, but Peanut is definitely old enough to be aware of the big changes. He's always been pretty resilient, so I'm hoping any upset will be short lived.


I've been packing like a mad woman, but leaving out the "pretty items" for photos for our listing. I hired a sitter to watch Rocky while Peanut is in school so I can pack and clean, which has been a huge help. Packing for this move is an exponentially bigger job than when it was just me and Jared moving out of our condo into this house. A house and two kids comes with a lot of stuff.