Weekend with Harlan and the 'Rents

Saturday morning, we had decided that I'd get my work done. Harlan was going to Versailles early, so I got up when she did (rather, laid in bed and tried to go back to sleep for a few). Harlan decided to leave at 9 am, and so went to open the door to the apartment. I then hear, "Um, Sarah? Andrea's out here sleeping in the hall. Should I wake her up?" I got up, expecting Andrea to be in the hallway of our apartment, but no, she was actually curled up right outside our doorway. (She had apparently came back pretty late and didn't think to knock on our door.) Melissa woke her up, and at that same time, Ashley woke up and went to get Liz. (Backstory: Ashley, Liz and Melissa had gone out the previous night, and they wanted to come back earlier than the others. But Liz and Ashley had locked themselves out of their room, so Andrea had given them her key so that they could sleep here. Once here, they realized that there wasn't enough room for all 3 of them, and so Liz went to sleep at someone else's apartment.) Liz and Ashley then spent about an hour trying to call various PAA people for Jean-Michel's and/or Visgitah's phone number. After that was unsuccessful, they tried calling various locksmiths around Paris to get an estimate on how much breaking the lock would be (around 140 Euro, it turned out). Since that was too expensive, Melissa suggested that they try getting the landlord of their building to let them in. So Ashley and Liz left to try that, while I finished my evening wear illustrations, which I had been working on while they discussed solutions. (I was surprised by how short of a time that took. I was painting them in with gouache, which I've never worked with before. I started it at about 11 am, and finished after 1 pm. For 12 sketches of varying colors, that's great time. I don't know if that means I did it efficiently or just badly/sloppily. I'm sure Susan will tell me Tuesday.)
Around 3 pm, Sharon came over and we photographed our bras. Actually, we photographed me in both of our bras (though not at the same time). For mine, I posed as I adjusted an earring, and it was shot with the top of the photograph being my lips. (I'm going to put it into Photoshop Monday and playing around with the contrast and stuff to make it look more "Vogue-worthy".) For Sharon's, she posed me near the window, and had my arm holding the window open. Here, the photograph was from my neck to my waist. After we were done, I downloaded them and sent hers to her, and she, Melissa and I sat and talked for awhile. She left, and I did some more work (I started making my maquettes-rough construction ideas-since I needed 5 of them). Harlan came back and told me all about Versailles, and she and Melissa went out to get some food and necessities. My parents came up about 2 minutes later, and we chatted about our respective days while waiting for the two of them to come back. After they arrived, I went out with my family and Harlan for dinner.
We went to a place called La Petite Perigourdiere, which was really good. We all got wine, and I had duck in cabbage with carrots. (It was tasty, but paled in comparison to the confit de canard that I had had earlier in the week at L'Oree du Parc. I think that duck is becoming the new chicken for me.) For dessert, Mom and I had the profiteroles (they had a sort of hazelnut ice cream along with it) and Harlan had an apple crumble tarte with ice cream. After dinner, Mom and Dad walked us back, and we went upstairs. We then decided to look up the term "perigourdiere", since neither of us knew what it meant. My French dictionary was no help (the word was too specialized), and the online translating site I use turned up the same word in English. Then Harlan attempted to search for it, and was successful. (It turns out that "perigourdian" was a French term for the Paleolithic historical period. So "La Petite Perigourdiere" translates to "the little Perigourdian girl". Mystery solved!) That search so exhausted us that we soon went to bed.
Early this morning (Sunday), Harlan left. I was sad, we had such a great visit! (This room is so empty now.) But I had to get up and get ready to go to Versailles with my parents! I left a little before 9:30 am, and met them at their hotel. We walked to the Saint-Michel/Notre Dame metro station and took the RER C out of Paris. (This one was a double-decker, so we sat on the top level and had a great view. We even saw the mini Statue of Liberty.) After about half an hour, we pulled into the Chateau de Versailles train station, and walked to Versailles. (Harlan was right to warn me that it really spoiled the effect to see all the tour-buses parked right in front of it.) We waited in line to get our tickets while it rained on and off (as it has been and is normal here). Then, we had to stand in another line to actually enter the castle. Getting closer to it, we could see that they were doing some renovations on the front and center section, and had covered it with very roccoco-esque large hangings (that actually looked like cardboard, they reminded me of paper dolls and doll houses).
We finally got inside, and wandered around the first floor. We first saw the chapel, which was beautiful, especially the ceilings (covered with murals, or relief sculptures, depending on where in the chapel it was). Then, we walked many rooms of portraits, both of the royal families throughout the ages as well as important figures (such as Ninon de l'Enclos and Moliere). We also walked through various rooms, with lots of ornate decoration (which I took lots of pictures of). Most of these rooms were bedrooms or libraries, and many were pastel green or deep red. (The wallpaper was a lot of burn-out velvet, meaning the decoration part was full tufts of velvet, and the rest was shaved-or burned-off. I really like that effect, and I've been seeing a lot of it lately, like on lampshades at BHV. I guess all the trendmasters saw "Marie Antoinette" and predicted that everything from that time period would be making a big comeback, and so put the word out accordingly.)
After some confusion, we made it to the Hall of Mirrors! Wow! I could just imagine myself back during that time, strolling along the Hall, looking out at the grounds. (Actually, the whole day, I felt that I should be walking around in appropriate attire, i.e. hoop-skirts). (The only thing that prevented it from being seriously awesome was that my camera chose that moment to give out from a full memory stick.) That led into the Queen's chambers. We saw her bedroom, with wall hangings pulled aside so that we could see where she escaped through when the mob came.
Since it had gotten nicer outside, we decided to stroll the grounds. We walked out pretty far, to the reflecting pool (although it was bigger than a pool, so I'm not sure what exactly to call it). We stopped at a restaurant beside it for lunch, and I got a hot chocolate (the best one I've had since I've been here) and a croque-madame (a ham-and-cheese sandwich with an egg on top).
We left around 4:30 pm, and went to the train station. While we were waiting for the train, an announcement came over the speakers, saying that a train had had an accident and that we'd need to go to another one nearby. So a whole throng of us walked through town (it must've been interesting to see).
After we got off the train in Paris, I went to Mom and Dad's hotel room, and we all relaxed for a little while. Then, we walked down Rue Saint-Jacques towards my apartment, looking for a place to eat. We stopped at Cafe Soufflot, where I had a raspberry mousse (yummy) and shared some of Dad's cheese plate. Then, they walked me back and I relaxed.