Orangerie and Giverny

It is hard to appreciate artwork when you only ever see a photo of it in a book.  I have seen Monet’s “water lily” paintings many times, and I found them pretty, but my interest ended there.  When I saw some real works by Monet two years ago, I was shocked at how different and utterly beautiful the real paintings were.  I actually though I had seen the water lily paintings, and had no idea that the ones most people are referring to are massive paintings in a museum called the “Orangerie.”  There are 8 canvasses in two huge oval rooms.  Half of the canvasses are 50 feet long.

Yesterday the boys and I went to the museum to see them, and the three of us were shocked.  All of us sat in complete silence for a long time.  Finally Jack stood up, and I got up to follow him out.  But he simply went to the other side of the room and sat down again.

“I want to go to where Monet was when he painted these!” I whispered to the boys.  “Yeah.”  they both whispered back.  Even later when I explained that we would have to take an long train ride to get there, and give up our plans for the next day – the boys were in.

The town where Monet painted these was called Giverny.  The gardens were his back yard that he designed and gardened.  The y were stunning – I have never seen anything like them.

I did recognize many flowers from grandmother’s yard, and wished very much that she could be there with me.  She would have loved it so much!

The second garden is the one including the bridges, pond, and weeping willows.  The boys and I sat on a bench for quite awhile just enjoying being there.The boys definitely enjoyed the visit, but were much more interested in the “wildlife”  - all the bees on the flowers including the massive bumblebees,

snails,

And a little brown duckling that was so light it hardly weighed down the lily pads when he walked on them,Monet’s funny chickens (Jack named them something funny, but now it slips my mind…grrr)

As the gardens got crowded, the boys got antsy and Jack said, “Ok, we’ve see everything.  The water lily things and all.  Can we go now?”  A large group of 70-somethings got a kick out of this.

But when I showed the boys that I had some art supplies, they were really excited to return to the pond bench and try their hand at creating a masterpiece.

Jack experimented, but was frustrated with the discrepancy between Monet’s talent and his own.  Owen was very serious and focused and was quite pleased with his piece.

We finally left Monet’s lovely property and headed back toward the bus.  The boys started playing in this tree until I realized that the bee that kept bothering Jack was actually a large number of different bees, and there was a hive in tree…

So I found a spot in a grassy field by a brook with a small waterfall. I sat on a little blanket and read and dozed while the boys ran in the field and played spies in the edge of the nearby woods.

Later Jack ordered a cappuccino and hot chocolate for us at a little stand near the bus stop.  It was the best coffee that I have had my whole time in Paris!  The boys’ drinks were amazing too.

It was one of those unexpectedly perfect days that makes you glad you are alive.