Any longtime follower of our family’s trips to France will know that Melinda is pretty clever. Early last year she starting playing this “game” with credit cards that allows a person to earn a lot of frequent flyer miles. She’s such a good “player” that she earned enough to fund a free flight to France and decided to take advantage of it over the past week.

Christine, her best pal who happens to live in Nantes, had the last week off from work and PSCS happened to have an abbreviated week of school. Melinda has accrued a number of vacation days and decided to cash in three of them. Presto-chango, eight days ago I dropped her off at Sea-Tac. I pick her up in a couple of hours.

Melinda stayed with the Bertails, specifically in Celeste’s room (who was gracious enough to give it up). On Tuesday night she had dinner at the Boudeau’s. And on Friday night, the Boudeaus came to the Bertail’s home for a gathering of our best friends. Melinda connected with me via FaceTime in time for me to watch them all pop open a bottle of wine (Friday night in Nantes was, of course, noontime in Seattle and the middle of a workday for me).

The photos I’m using to illustrate this post are from the few sent me while Melinda was gone. I might add a few more, depending on what she brings home.