happy fourth y’all!

Jean Moulin Lyon 3 hosted a cocktail party for the LSU Law Lyon Summer Program yesterday. Dressing snazzy and sipping on wine was a great way to celebrate America’s birthday, but it was only the beginning. After the party, a group of us celebrated with the worst sangria and terrible tapas: lentils, raw salmon, and guacamole (if you call a mushed avocado guacamole). If my three months in Spain with the best hosts I’ve ever known – Maria Jesus and Carlos – have taught me anything, it’s how to appreciate the culinary art of tapas, and this restaurant didn’t make the cut. Naturally, the only way to save our stomachs and the celebration was to head over to McDonald’s and finish our meal there. We ended the night drinking Budweiser at an Australian bar overlooking the Rhone river. Hope your celebration was more American than ours. God bless America!

rowan and charlie

walrus

two peas in a pod

emma and kyle

angry walrus

mcdonald’s

katie

icecream sundaes

 

avignon adventures

Avignon is the home of nine former popes and surrounded by massive lavender fields. We learned that and more when we visited Avignon on Sunday. Kyle, Katie, Carson, Becca, and I ate lunch (bacon, cheese, and potato sandwich for me!), toured the Papal Palace, visited the Saint-Benezet bridge (Pont d’Avignon), and made gelato and beer stops before heading back to Lyon. I spent the tour of the Papal Palace with my ear glued to an audio-guide that informed me of the palace’s construction, demolition, and reconstruction. On the tour, we discovered a secret treasury chamber where money was kept beneath floor stones and learned that the palace turned into a military prison and then barracks after the French revolution. Katie, Kyle, and I were spoiled rotten traveling first class on the train for 5 euro more than the cost of traveling economy. We ended the exhausting day with some late night Pizza Pino in Bellecour.

pianists

mean muggin

traveling in style

carson and becca

beer stop

bus smiles

“Smile down at the plebeians.”

roommate lovin in avignon

happy in avignon

making friends

view from the top of Papal Palace

Papal Palace

Saint-Benezet Bridge

stylish bikes in avignon

piano playing in the train station

making friends

hey there

famous dead people

could this BE more adorable?

 

love in lyon

My sweetheart, Kyle, arrived today! Katie and I enjoyed introducing him to our favorite bookstore while we got some work done. (See Mama? Still focused!) After walking with him around Bellecour – the largest public square in Europe – the three of us met up with friends for dinner at Little Italy and ate our weight in pasta outside under colorful Christmas lights. Something tells me it will take no time at all for Kyle to fall in love with Lyon the way we have!

see mama?

working and map reading

kyle after international flight and katie 24/7