Jours d'achats

(Shopping Days)

Frenching seems to be like most things, easier when practiced often and a pain in the ass when you have taken a few days off.  At least I seem to make up lost ground faster than a few mois (months) ago, so I guess I can still count that as a win.  I was distracted by some invités (guest) for a few days.  Ma mére et soeur (my mom and sister) visited me Vendredi et Samedi (Saturday and Sunday).  They came to see ma une piece de théâtre.  We also managed to squeeze some achat (shopping) in at the outlet stores.  Figures j'habite (I live) an hour away from prime outlet shopping and it takes ma famille ( coming down to get over there.  J'ai achaté quarte chemises, une robe, et des caleçons. ( I bought four shirts, a dress, and a pair of shorts.)  I also got a Coach bag but I haven't mentioned that to ma mari (husband) yet.

I can now écris (write) or rather type, but I don't know that word yet,  é   â   ç   I still need to know the e with the accent going in the other direction if anyone could be of help.

Trip update:
We are less than 4,000 miles away from booking one of our plan tickets with frequent flyer miles.  The hope is that we can earn enough points to book both billets (tickets).  And are looking at every creative way to generate miles.

Tonight's Picture:

C'est hiver pour l'arbre

Pervious Picture:
The girl pen wears a yellow dress.

Yup, seems a bit ridicules to me too.

Invités Vendredi

Friday Guests

My most recent Roseatta Stoning has enseigné (taught) me about d' argent (money) as well as about value.  The word for expensive made me laugh out loud as it is cher.  I could not help but think of The Cher, music and cliché gay icon.  After a brief search of Wikipedia I realized she just shortened her name from Cherilyn than chose a french stage name.  But, I had to wondering if her french fans were all a te he watching the singer known for being practically naked  while performing named expensive.

But I digress.

Trip Update:
Mon mari (husband) keeps inviting invités (guests) to our apartment in France.  I would like to point out we have no apartment (spelled the same in frech, pronounced differently) currently booked.  In fact we don't even know our dates yet.  But in the spirt of the trip I guess our apartment is always open, keeping in mind no idea if there is an extra lit (bed) or couch.

Today's Picture:

La fille stylo porte une robe jaune.

Pervious Picture:

The green apples are on the table.

So I have realized all of my pervious pictures have been something on something so *hint* I have found a non on picture for today.

Jour de L'amour

(Day of Love)
For some reason Valentine's Day is not covered in the first four lessons.

So my frenching is currently slowing down in momentum this semaine (week).  I am in tech for una piéce de théatre.   For those of you not familiar with tech.  It is the technical week in preparing a play in which all the technical elements of a show come together right before openning.  Lis (read)  in long hours stuck in a theatre living through your own ground hog jour (day).  These are a valuable part of the process unless you have all of your tech stuff done.  So despite not having anything to do I still need to be there and it is a bit bad manners to pop out the headset and start rattling off french.

Not all was lost.  This weekend I launched into the second prong of my french attack plan, Mastering the Art of French Cooking.   And I successfully mastered the art of cooking frech chocolat mousse.  I felt frencher with ever tasty bit.  Again tu (you) might ask how cuisson (cooking) helps, not sure but it sure gout bon (taste good).  Anyone who saw Julie & Julia or read the Julie/ Julia Project,  I understood Julie's cussing and temper tantrums so much more after cooking a few of these recipes.  At one point I was wisked ingredients over a pan of simmering water o the stove for 4 minutes and then wisked the same ingredients over a basin of ice water for 4 minutes and could not begin to tell you why.

Back to the present.  I hope I can find a break in my day tomorrow to get to the supérmarché for some du café or I will be one sad fille (girl) the next matin (morning).  This is why we say stupid tech.

Other helpful things I learned today:

Carte de crédit ( credit card).
And tu (you) guessed it, one more delicious step towards that petit déjeuner (breakfast) crissant.

Tonight's Picture:
This one is for my sister's boyfriend:

Les pommes vertes sont sur la table.

Pervious Picture:
My husband and I on the mountain.

The picture was taken at Hanging Rock, we finally went on a hike there after intending to for the last year.

Fatigué Jeudi

(Tired Thursday)

Some nights I really enjoy my Rosetta Stone and other nights my sessions feels like two hours on the step mill with the television locked on Fox News, exhausted and frustrated.  But we trudge on.  Not a completely lost night, I did learn on very helpful phrase une piéce de théatre. (The "a" has one of those pointy hats on it but I have no idea how to make my keyboard do that, please help).  So if you are one that thought the british " theatre" spelling was pertinacious, I am sure all the accents really seems unnecessary.  I find it a major plus to know how to refer to my occupation.  Hopefully "costumes" and "designer" will be in tomorrow's lesson.

Other helpful things:

Combien coutent? - how much money.

Which I will hopefully turn into:" Combien coutent est la crissant?"  Which I will turn into buttery, flaky goodness in my belly.

Tonight's Picture:

Mon mari et moi sur la montagne.

Pervious Picture:

The dog is on the bed. 

I don't know the word for furry yet, once I do I will be sure to add that.

Je veux le chocolat!

(I want the chocolate)

As I mentioned I have been working at the the Rosetta Stone for several months now, and tonight I started Unit Quatre (4) Shopping, exciting, I know.  What I found note worthy about this lesson were the things they suggested you buy.  Sure there were the standards fruit, vegetables, a coat, but then there was chocolat, gateau (cake), des vetements (clothes), and bioux (jewelry).  Now I am sure I don't have to tell you of our proximity to the holiday that exemplifies these very items.  If I do need to tell you, then you sir (as I am sure no female is confused right now) still have time to pick up a Valentine's card before it is too late.  Returning to the point, I think this was Rosetta Stone's Valentine's gift to me, so I could request the things I want in two languages, as those four things cover everything I could want.

Other helpful tid bit I now know how to ask directions to the boulangerie.  One step closer to that morning croissant!

I have decided to caption a random picture with each entry.  I am guessing this one will be pretty easy to decipher even if you don't know french.

Le chien est sur le lit.

Bonjour

My husband, Daniel,  and I visited Paris on our honeymoon and I fell in love.  With Paris.  It lived up to every 1950's romantic movie cliché I had ever hoped it would.  I have been dying to go back ever since, so we have made a crazy plan to live in France part of the summer next year.  By plan I mean we have decided we want to do this and thus end of planning.  There is one small flaw in our rock solid plan.  I don't speak French, Daniel speaks it pretty well.  But as for me,  my four classes of college and high school Spanish did not do me an ounce of good when I was trying to order a sandwich at the cafes.  So I am trying to learn french, at least well enough to buy groceries and spend way too much on shoes while I am there.

So how to achieve this goal of learning French in a year and half:

1.     Thanks to Santa Claus last year I have in my possession Rosetta Stone French Levels 1, 2 & 3.  And have already been hammering away at them and have vowed to work half an hour to an hour  "frenching" four days a week.

2.    Thanks to Santa Calus this year I now possess Mastering the Art of French Cooking  By Julia Childs.  Is this helpful, who knows but anyone who cooks with that much butter in the name of France is a friend of mine.

3.    You my friends, you my friends who know french, you my friends who forwarded this to someone who knows french.  Please help me out.  This blog will hopefully be more than me just bitching about how hard it is to learn french but a chance to start a bit of French correspondence.

4.    Go to France, everyone says emersion is the best plan.

So help a fille (girl) out.  Chances are at first there will only be a few french words and phrases sprinkled through out.  Hopefully we will progress to actual conversations.  So in payment of your usage corrections and sharing of words I should know, I will keep you up to date on our trip planning and my rants on why I hate 44 ( it is really tricky to say and the stupid program beeps at me every time).  Together we can make my dream of buying shampoo unsupervised by my husband a reality.