A Visit From The Au Pairs

A visit from the au pairs. But wait…there are three of them so why are they called pairs? ha ha ha.

Friday, while I was at my writers’ group Bob met the au pairs at the train station. Jillian from North Carolina is the daughter of a friend and former co-worker of mine Lisa. Jillian’s friends and fellow au pairs Marissa from Minnesota and Orfhlaith from Scotland. All three young ladies are currently living in France minding other people’s children. Brave women as far as I’m concerned.

While living in France they are making good use of the bit of time off they have and traveling around Europe. For those of you in the U.S. flights around Europe are very cheap and everything is close so it is the best of both worlds. This weekend was their trip to Barcelona. Unfortunately, the Airbnb messed them about and left them without a place to stay. ugh. Thanks to some hotel points they were able to stay the night in Barcelona Thursday. They then booked a hotel in Vilanova for Friday night.

Friday, Bob showed them around Sitges and then after my writers’ group we took them to La Posada for lunch. Always a treat and we love to show visitors the real Catalunya. As always Joan at La Posada was amazing and showed them the kitchen and made us all feel very special.

It was great getting to know them over lunch. I had only met Jillian once before and knew more about her from what her mom Lisa told me…but you know how Mom’s are. (wink wink). The stories of their jobs in France and whether they would be an au pair again and what they want to do with their lives was all very interesting to hear. They are all so young and have their whole lives in front of them.

Following lunch, we brought them to our casa and showed them around and then took a walk in the vineyard. Bob, as always, gave a history lesson on the area while we wandered around. I teased that there would be a quiz afterward but we let them slide. I wonder how much they remember.  I think they understand why we love the village and vineyard so much.

I had an online writer’s boot camp from 5-9pm Thursday and Friday but I joined it a bit late on Friday since they were here. While I jumped online to start writing about 6:30pm Bob drove the ladies to their hotel in Vilanova.

Yesterday they wandered around Sitges and found a hotel on the seafront so decided to book that for last night and tonight. They spent the day in the sun enjoying Sitges. Again, I think they understand why we love it here.

Today we met them at their hotel at 10:30am and walked up to Sausalito Beach (our favorite beach) for breakfast. Last night they took the train into Barcelona and didn’t get back to the hotel in Sitges until 4ish this morning so we were impressed they were functioning at 10:30am. Oh to be young again.

We had a great time at breakfast, the cloudy day that was forecast started out with bright blue skies. This made breakfast on our favorite beach the perfect way to start the day. Oh did I mention there was cava involved? Afterward, we took a stroll down the promenade with them before saying farewell. Bob had work to do this afternoon so we needed to head back home.

Tomorrow they are on a very early plane back to France and to their excitement (wink wink) back to minding the children almost as soon as they get back. I hope they fell in love with Spain as much as we have. We loved spending time with you girls! Come back and visit anytime!