Nancy

As a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we get to attend a regional gathering of our people every six months. In Utah, we would have driven six blocks for the meetings on Saturday afternoon and evening and again on Sunday morning.

In Luxembourg, our ward (single congregation) is part of the Nancy, France stake (an intermediate level in the organizational hierarchy of the LDS Church). This means stake conference is held an hour and a half away in Nancy. 

As is common here among the Saints in Luxembourg and surrounding areas, we got a hotel room at Ariane Hôtel with every other Mormon we know in Luxembourg and made the most of the six-hours of church meetings in a foreign language.

We drove to Nancy first thing on Saturday morning and met the Packer family at the entrance of Place Stanislas. Known colloquially as the place Stan', this UNESCO World Heritage Site is a large, beautiful and impressive pedestrianized square complete with arcs, fountains, and gold plating. 

The boys loved to run around the square, chasing one another and pigeons. We shepherded them through the gilded wrought iron gates and lanterns and past the ornate fountains to Parc de la Pépinière.

A typically French park, Parc de la Pépinière, was complete with lakes, carousels, a miniature zoo, and a playground. We ate our picnic lunches, happily watched all six children play and run themselves ragged, shared our easter candy with a little French girl who only wanted pink eggs, and met up with our friends, Star and Russ Andrews. 

As nap time and melt downs became imminent, we regretted not bringing the stroller, and carried our three-year-old, two-year-old and one-year-old back to the car. 

We checked into our room, set up a pack-n-play in the bathroom, plugged in the fan we brought from home and put Ingrid to sleep. Ben went to the Priesthood leadership meeting, Ingrid slept, and Otto and Aksel unplugged phones, jumped on beds, and wrestled.

Then Ben and I switched places so I could attend the adult session with Becky, while Ben and Nate took the kids to the Museum Aquarium de Nancy and barely survived.

We ate at McDonalds for dinner and the children were elated. I secretly was too until the French people put dijon mustard on my hamburger.

After coaxing all three children to sleep, we joined the Packers and the Andrews (and a few others) in the lobby to eat macarons and talk. At 10:30 pm, I excused myself, brushed my teeth in the lobby bathroom (Ingrid was still sleeping in our bathroom), and returned to our room just in time to helplessly watch Otto roll off the bed and cry so loudly everyone woke up again. 

We made a bed for Otto on the floor and he slept soundly until morning. Aksel, however, woke up 17 times, got on and off the bed, played with the telephone, and wandered around the room until 6 am. 

I took the boys down for breakfast (they didn't eat anything) and then we got ready for a two-hour church meeting with a two-year-old who hadn't slept all night. 

Showing your kids that your family goes to Church every Sunday regardless of the distance, time, smell, language, convenience or lack of sleep isn't for the faint of heart. Flying on airplanes with small children and sitting through church with small children are eerily similar. It strips you down to the core and makes you think you can't go on. And then it's over. And then you eat a pack of Oreos on the drive home as a consolation prize. 

Until September, Nancy.