holy grail !!

disponible en version française ici

hola todos !!

 yes, yes, i know, i haven't given any news in a while

well, guess what ? i was busy !


i've been in my AuPair family for a week and a half now, so let me tell you
the tale of an AuPair's life in New Jersey

friday, a shuttle takes me from YMCA to Newark airport, for the "meet and greet" with the family.
at 12.30, as planned, the father, Joel comes to pick me up with his two daughters (Tara, 13 and Leena, 5), and their former AuPair, Charlène.
we went to the restaurant for lunch, then to the house so i could settle down in my room (photos coming up in a later article, k?). then Charlène and i took the girls to the park.
i am taking a lot of pics, but i don't feel comfortable putting photos of the girls online so.... i'll just put a lot of photos of food instead !


we played ball, and tag, and went on the swings, etc.


and then we went for frozen yogourts....

for those -like me- who don't know the concept : you help yourself to frozen yogourt, like in the picture
 

as much as you want, as many different flavours as you'd like

then you had toppings : fruits, chocolate, various nuts, cookie dough, brownie pieces, etc. like a MacFlurry but a million times better

coconut froyo woth strawberries, blueberries, almonds, cookie dough and peanut butter. me likey

frozen yogourts are from now on my number 1 favourite food

after that we went home, prepared diner, and i the i met Sheila, the mom.






on saturday, Charlène needed to go to the mall to get her iphone screen repared, so Tara and i went with her. yihaaa, my first mall since i'm here ! of course everything is huge and the clothes are cheap. i am going to be doing alot of shopping this year
we did a lot of clothes shop, me keeping an eye for something looking remotely alike Krysta Rodriguez shoes. without of course forgetting about our iphone-repairing mission.
said mission was a total failure, by the way, since after taking it to a phone-reparing chinese booth, then to the apple store, and back to the chinese booth, no one could repair the damn phone.

then the girls smelled the sweet fragrance of pretzels, and attracted by the smell, managed to localize the stand...

so we shared a box of of sweet preztels with cinnamon (yummy!) then the girls shared a second box of salted pretzels
we ended going home empty-handed but with our stomac full 


on sunday, we went to Sheila's parents, Pop and Mama, as the girls call them. Pop is just adorable. he is Irish (arrived in the states around 18), and we have talked a lot he and i, about ireland mostly.
they have a huge swimming pool so we spent the day jumping in and out
i also met one of sheila's sisters and her kids.
...and then we grilled the unavoidable hotdogs and hamburgers

on monday and tuesday, charlène and i took care of the girls while joel and sheila were at work.
also we went out for lunch in a diner

real burgers, pancakes, bacon, and free refills on soda : welcome to the United States of America !!

then on wednesday i took charlène to the station so whe could go to the airport, and i officially became the AuPair of the family !

this was followed by a whole week of parks, coloring, disney channel, origami frogs, origami frogs races (why did i have to suggested we do LEAPING frogs ??), games of 7 families and 1,2,3 soleil...

then monday being labor, we really took advantage of the long week-end :
saturday : pool party at a sister of a colleague of sheila's : traditional american combo : swimming pool/hamburgers&hotdogs
sunday : neighboor's party : hamburgers&hotdogs

i also discovered monkey bread !! (a cake made of bread batter, cinnamon, brown sugar and butter)

monday, bank holiday : family gathering at the grand-parents' house. guess what we did ?? swimming pool, hamburgers&hotdogs !!



it was really nice to see again/meet the girls' cousins and to be able to chat some more with Pop. we shared anecdotes about working on the assembly line, it was fun. i think he likes me. like he already invited me and solenn to come for christmas, even though my AuPair family won't be going.




and this week it's "back to school" week : it was tara's first day this morning, and tara starts kindergarden on friday. my days are going to get a bit lighter ! yieh ! more time for me to hit the treadmill to balance out all those hotdogs...




to be continued....

current song : Holy Grail, Tara's favourite song. we blast it super loud in the car, we open all the windows and we sing along. yeah, we are cool people.

also the "holy grail" refers to the one day off i'm going to get on sunday. finally. i haven't had a day off since i've been here. and guess what i'm gonna do ?