Finding Magic

About this time last year, we had just returned from a Parisian adventure with a singular goal: to find some Christmas magic. I'm not going to lie, it was hard to leave home, with all the madness of the holiday season swirling around us. But I couldn't shake the feeling that, as the kids get older, we're not going to have as many opportunities for adventures like this. What if this is our last chance? A little dramatic? Probably. Do I have any regrets? Absolutely not.

The lights. The elegance. The splendor. Walking around Paris, you can't help but think the French really do do everything better. OK, maybe not everything. But definitely this thing. Over the top, and just the right amount all at once. Incroyable.

The activities, the events and the "to-dos" that almost kept us home completely vanished from our radars once the prospect of eating éclair in Jardin du Luxembourg on a Thursday morning became a reality.

And so, we played.

We really, really played.

And, we walked. We walked and walked and walked.

We even ... talked.

Completely food obsessed, we sniffed, we gawked, and of course, we ate and ate and ate. Hot drinks thawed our cold hands, and melted cheese in myriad forms kept our bellies full and warm. We had daily chocolate and daily baguette, and yes, sometimes in that order.

And, we found magic!

Some trips can really punctuate a feeling in time so powerfully that you'll never forget it. What if this is our last chance? Well, it wasn't, I'm very happy to say. But I loved that we acted like it was. I loved that our most pressing decisions were baguette versus croissant. I loved that our pockets were always full of chocolate. And I loved that for that brief moment in time, we were all little kids who believed in magic.