The Always-Painful Visit to a French Hair Salon

(Warning, this is a long, babbling blog about nothing more than a trip to a hair salon.  Feel free to scroll to the bottom to skip the story and just see an updated baby bump picture.)

Once, not so long ago, in a far away land called South Carolina, I enjoyed going to the hair salon.  It was something I looked forward to.  An hour or two of pampering, someone "playing" with my hair (which I love!), and walking out feeling lighter, with my professionally styled hair. 

Then I moved to France.

I avoided getting my hair cut like the plague.  I didn't get my hair cut the first 4 months we lived here, and would cringe every time I saw how long my highlight roots were getting.  When I couldn't stand my hair any longer, I printed out a photo of what I wanted my hair to look like, so I could just point and say "comme ça".  My appointment was made with the manager (possibly owner?) of the salon, Nicolas (pronounced Neee-co-la).  The appointment went fairly well except for when the girl shampooing my hair asked me something and after about 5 minutes of gesturing and babbling, I figured out she was asking if I wanted conditioner after the shampoo.  Then there was the moment when Nicolas asked me to stand up for him to make the initial cuts.  I have never had to do this before in the US, so I was clueless about what he wanted. It took him practically pulling me up out of the chair to understand.  Now that I have conquered that fear, I have my hair cut fairly regularly, but still can't work up the courage to have highlights done in France.


After my last appointment, Nicolas suggested for the next time some sort of treatment they put in, leave in for 10 minutes, and it is supposed to make your hair "more brilliant".  One of the things I miss most about highlighting my hair is the lack of shine.  I just feel like my hair is dull.  So I was excited to hear about something I could do to bring back the shine.  It was time to make my next appointment, so I went in (making appointments over the phone is impossible) and the conversation went a little like this:


(of course Nicolas wasn't there, which would have made this all a little less painful)
Me:  Je voudrais un rendez-vous avec Nicolas.
Receptionist:  D'accord, quand...something something something (no problem, I knew she was asking when I wanted my appointment to be...)
Me:  La semaine prochain. 
Et aussi, la dernière fois, Nicolas m'a dit qu'il y a quelque chose pour...um...faire le brilliance???
Receptionist:  (confused look on face) Uh... something something something...

Then she turns around and goes to get someone else to try to help.  Another girl comes and she seems to understand what I am asking for.  Then I have to stumble through asking her if it is safe for me since I am pregnant (insert lots of gesturing and rubbing my belly here).


That brings us to my appointment day.  I go in, tell them my name, they take me upstairs, and I am told someone will come soon.  So far, so good!  A young girl comes up and walks me to the shampoo chairs and asks, "Quel nom?"  Oh, how nice (I think to myself), she wants to know my name, that is so friendly.  

"Kim"
blank stare
(ok, I need to say it with a French accent)
"Keeem" (then I spell it for her) "Ka-e-emm"
blank stare

Then she walks over and picks up a book, opens it up, and starts pointing to all the hair color samples. Ohhh, she is asking me the name of the color.  
"Non, pas de couleur.  C'est, uh, um... je ne sais pas le nom..."  ("No, not color. It is, I don't know the name")

So she starts opening cabinets and pulling out bottles and powders, showing me all the different products.  This is the first time I have done this, I have no idea what it looks like!  So this starts the torturous/awkward period of time where we are just staring at each other, neither one knowing what to do next.  Thankfully, the girl that helped me make the appointment walked up at that moment and explained what I wanted.  Phew!


Ten minutes later, with whatever-it's-called in my hair, I was under the dryer.

Ten minutes and another shampoo later, it was time for my haircut with Nicolas.  He walks up, and I am already expecting him to ask some sort of question involving what I want done with my hair. I have several key vocabulary words in my mind that I am listening for.  Unfortunately, I didn't hear any of these words.  So, I just stared at him, and he said something else.  Which, again, I didn't understand any of it.  I just started laughing, because there was nothing else I could do.  Matthew says it is a good thing that my pregnancy hormones didn't kick in right then and cause me to sit there crying instead of laughing.  We finally worked it all out, and he started cutting.  We were able to carry on somewhat of a conversation, mostly about my pregnancy, when the baby was due, boy or girl, etc.  

As painful as it was, I survived.  But I am definitely looking forward to when we move home to the US and I can truly enjoy the hair salon experience again!

So, without further ado, here is a picture of my haircut (really just the same, but shorter, but with more shine!), and more importantly- an updated baby bump picture (32 weeks).

Hike at Lac de Guery- Part Deux

With both Freddie and Matthew out of town (correction- out of the country!) on business trips, Jen suggested taking the kids for a picnic and hike.  This hike had to be "Emily friendly" (ie. easy enough for a 2 1/2 year old), and "Kim friendly" (ie. easy enough for this 8 months pregnant/28 year old).  I suggested going back to Lac de Guery.  Matthew and I have snow shoe-ed there, as well as doing one of the trails during the summer.  I remembered seeing a path that was marked with a yellow butterfly, showing a trail appropriate for kids. 

We started with a picnic by the lake.  Fall is definitely here in the Auvergne!  We sat in the sun, but when the wind blew, I was definitely chilly. 

After putting our picnic gear back in the car, we set off following our 'butterfly trail'.  It was a great trail for the kids, with lots of wooden bridges to cross, flowers and insects to inspect, we even found a dead mole. 

There was quite a steep climb up to an overlook by the waterfall, which the kids climbed like champs! 

The best thing about this trail is all of the different types of terrain you see.  You start out by the lake, wander through the forest, hike up to the waterfall, meander through a field beside a stream (with amazing views of the puys in the distance and hills dotted with clusters of black and white cows), climb a ladder over a fence...

...back into a dense pine forest, alongside a pasture, and then head down back into the forest. 

Believe it or not, we ARE on a trail here... (and ps- do you see the incredible views of the volcanoes in the distance???)

 
And because hiking wasn't enough to wear these kids out, some wrestling/tackling was needed....ahhh to be young again...

Playing 'Hide-and-go-Seek'

 
What a beautiful day and a beautiful setting for a hike! 

For anyone living in or near Clermont, the hike we did today was 2.3km and the sign says it should take about 1 1/2 hours.  It took us closer to 2, but I highly recommend it!

Ahhhh...August in France

I would say that the vacation time in France is on the Top 10 list of things Matthew and I love about France (it quite possibly might be on our Top 3).  The last two summers, Matthew has been required to take 3 weeks off, in a row, during the summer.  This summer he took off the first 3 weeks in August- the month where all of France pretty much shuts down.  The first week was spent in Holland for Mark and Silke's wedding, then we came back to Clermont for a week.  That week was spent getting the nursery ready and rearranging furniture in the living room to accommodate our new couch. Then it was off to the beach for a week.

We spent the first 3 nights at Cap d'Agde.  Our hotel was right on the beach, and we spent three wonderful days lounging at the beach club that was attached to our hotel.  This was the same beach club we spent time at with my mom back in May.  The weather was just perfect.  It was hot, but not so hot that you had to get in the water (which was a good thing because the water was cold!).

Capao Beach Club

What the beach looked like around 10am...

 What the beach looked like around noon...

and what the beach looked like by 4pm

After Cap d'Agde, we drove about an hour east to another beach- La Grande Motte.  As much as we enjoyed our time at Cap d'Agde, we actually preferred the harbor area and restaurants in La Grande Motte.  It wasn't as crowded and was a little less touristy.

view from our balcony

 front of our hotel

Our hotel was really nice, and because I found an early-booking deal on booking.com, we had free access to the hotel's spa.  I booked this hotel before I knew I was pregnant, and was kind of bummed because I figured that I wouldn't be able to use the spa.  The first day we went to see what the spa offered, we were pleasantly surprised.  First of all, there was no one else there.  We had the whole place to ourselves (complete with different refreshing flavored waters and snacks- like mini pain au chocolates!).  The hot tub was located in a courtyard inside a little enclosed gazebo.

The hot tub was like one someone would buy for their home.  Each corner had a different kind of seat, with different jets.  One corner was even a "lounge chair" set-up. And the best part was we had complete control over all the settings, including the temperature.  We googled "safe bath temperatures for pregnant women" and were able to set the hot tub to a safe temperature for me.  The massaging jets felt wonderful on my back and legs! Matthew also took advantage of the saunas and hamman.  During the 4 days we spent at the hotel, we  only ran into one other couple in the spa.  And even then, we only had to wait about 10 minutes for them to finish in the hot tub and then they left the spa, so we had it all to ourselves again!
Our days in La Grande Motte went a little something like this:  breakfast downstairs around 9:30, out to the beach by 10:30,

a walk down the beach around 1:00 to the area with all of the restaurants for lunch, back to the beach til around 4:30, spa for about an hour, then showers and getting ready for dinner, and around 7:30- a 10 minute walk down the "boardwalk" to the harbor for dinner.

It was four days of pure bliss!

Sunset in the harbor at La Grande Motte

A

Artist on the boardwalk.

Dinner at The Yacht Club

 Matthew trying to pretend to take a picture of me, while really trying to take a picture of the huge seafood tower ordered by the table behind us.

Just a few more pictures from our trip:

This was back in Cap d'Agde.  The black sand beach, La Grande Conque, marks the southern most part of the Auvergne volcanic chain.