More from Paris...

Well the past five days have just flown by! I've been busy catching up on sleep, touring around, and getting to know the wonderful ladies I'm here with. Don't worry, there's been some studying in there too. I take my placement test this coming Wednesday and classes don't start until February 12. But let's not think about school yet. I wanted to take some time to share with you all what I've been doing these past few days, because it's all been pretty cool :)

As you may have guessed based on my Facebook profile pic., I've been to the Louvre! The building was breathtaking (I think I might have liked it better than the art being displayed). It was a fortress, royal residence, and now is a museum (apparently the largest in the world). Olivia, you asked for a picture of the outside, so here are a couple. This place is massive!

This is one of the sides of the building. You can see the overall shape better based on the map, but there are a bunch of archways for traffic and pedestrians.

One of the side doors.

The main pyramid is on the far left of this picture, so this is one corner of the courtyard.

I had no idea where I was in the museum or where we came in until I saw this section of the museum handout. I just thought it would give a better idea of the overall size of the Louvre :)

Going through my pictures now I realize I took a lot of pictures of the ceilings. They were all so elaborate! I personally get tired of looking at photos of artwork, so I didn't take many.

On Thursday it was raining again, so we took a day to stay around the residence and get some studying in. We went to bible study at a Baptist church not too far from our residence, and it was great to meet so many friendly people! Never mind we showed up exactly half way through because we misunderstood the pamphlet. Canadians, eh? But the people there were really welcoming and I am looking forward to going there on Sundays as well J As a side note, I bought a French language bible today, so I’m also looking forward to using it too.

Today was gorgeous outside! We packed lunches and met Tiff and Mindy to eat in the Luxembourg Gardens. There was grass in most of the main areas and the flowers were starting to come up! It made me so happy to see flowers and sunshine! So here’s some for everyone freezing in Canada to see…

The ducks in the fountain were so friendly!

Me in front of what I think are present day government buildings/offices. 

Flowers :)

The gardens were full of statues, mostly of different kings and queens. This statue had some more flowers in front of it, so I had to take a picture :)

This is one of several fountains around the gardens (this was the only one with this much water, besides the main one).

These trees were so cool. The bark was three colors (beige, purple, and green) which is apparently due to how long the bark has been off the trees. They're quite old, and during each of the world wars they would have been exposed to quite different types of chemicals in the air which is part of what causes them to be colored this way. I'll go back and take a picture once the leaves are out for sure!

Another cool thing about today was that I got to sample some fresh pastries. We got pain du chocolat for breakfast (which was a croissant-type pastry with chocolate in the middle). The bakery is just around the corner, so it was still a bit warm when we ate it. And then Rachelle bought us some macaroons to try for dessert tonight, which were also delicious!

Well, that's it for now. Have a good night everyone!