New year's eve

So it's nearly the end of January and we're writing about new year's. So we've been a bit lax about updating the blog. Sorry.

At left are a pirate and a butterfly we took to a NYE party at the house of the parents of a couple classmates of Molly and Betsy. This was fun: There were several other families there, hence lots of playmates for the children and lots of native speakers of French to dilute our negative influence on the level of conversation.

For the French, midnight on NYE seems to mark roughly the middle of the party. In fact, it is apparently roughly the middle of dinner, which is a several-hour-long affair beginning around 10:00 or so. Another friend of ours told us that she and her husband went to a party at which dinner started after midnight (they finally apologized and left the party at 4:30am, as the hosts were starting to prepare the dessert).

For us, the evening ended around 2:30am, for which we and the children paid the next morning of course. But it was worth it; we all had a great time.

This picture doesn't really add anything to the story. We just think it's funny. ("Arrr! Heck if I know!")

Molly created most of this costume by herself, by the way.