La mousse à raser.

We thought of a great Christmas gift for Marguerite this year - a razor and shaving cream kit for the bath. It was, of course, marketed for boys to model their dads' rituals...but Marguerite showed off how much fun it was for all when she covered every inch of her body and shaved all the cream off. She was giggling the whole time.



I sat down cross-legged right in front of the bath, ready to play a bit and then wash and rinse. The bit turned into an hour and in the time that passed, Marguerite spouted story after story and made up game after game (they largely involved bossing me around in ways that guaranteed I would get wet). One of the games was something only a French child would invent - it went something like this (translation): "OK, Mimi. You know the game where you have several silver balls and then there is a little ball you try to get the other balls as close to as possible? It is called boules. Yeah, well we are going to play that game, except this time with sponge animals and water. You are red and I'm orange." In these games, I generally lose.



She asks a lot of questions about her "petite soeur," who is starting to take up a lot of space (my stomach feels like it is underneath my ribs, maybe some of my intestines too). This time she asked how a baby actually gets inside of a person like me, anyway. Good question. I explained that all girls have human eggs inside of them and all boys have swimming seeds to awaken the eggs. I said that you have to have both parts to grow a human.

Mlle: "Well, in that case, I can have a baby very young because I have a lover at school."
Me: "Oh, really? What is he like?"
Mlle: "He looks like an eggplant. Every time I see him, I want to hug him and I don't even know why!"
** Chutes of laughter **
Me: "What is his name?"
Mlle: "Gustave"
Mlle: "Plus, even when I change schools and Gustave stays at the school further away, we are going to keep his phone number so that I can make a baby with him."
(Translated)