Travel

"If you are planning a holiday trip with your baby or toddler, make sure to plan ahead. Here are fifteen sure-fire ways to make traveling easy and fun."

1.    Before your trip, visit the dollar store and stock up on coloring books, paint with water books, and age appropriate toys for your toddler. And save them for a trip. There is nothing better than something new!

2.    If you have a small video player, stock up on age appropriate movies for your little one. Baby Einstein has some great videos for a younger baby.

3.    If you can plan your plane schedule around your child's nap time, your trip will be a breeze.

4.    When traveling on a plane, feed the baby while the plane is taking off and landing. This keeps the Eustachian tubes open so the baby’s ears won’t hurt.

5.    When traveling on a plane with a toddler, it's sometimes difficult to sit still during takeoff and landing. Give him a Sippy cup and some goldfish crackers and play a counting game with the crackers. It will be fifteen minutes of fun, instead of fifteen minutes of tantrums.

There are two faces of Carnival. Friday night my husband and I stood next to Hermes parade newcomers from Dallas, and when they asked where to eat I peppered them with questions to find the right restaurant. It's my favorite food writer challenge. They were looking for casual so I recommended SoBou from the Commander's Palace family for cocktails, Crescent City Brewhouse for brunch with a balcony, and Elizabeth's for fried chicken if they make it out of the French Quarter to the Bywater -- ask for Erin. We parted friends, and I hope their bellies benefited from the exchange.

On Samedi Gras, the Saturday before Mardi Gras Day, I had two goals: 1) See my artist friend Shannon Kelly's American Eagle in the Krewe of Tucks Parade; and 2) Stock up on coffee. Enter the other face of Carnival. A woman walked a wheelchair next to the parade barricade and stood on it as floats passed by, while flashing her pasties for beads. This was during a day parade surrounded by families. When a throw didn't make it close enough, she jumped the barricade to grab it and climb back over.

That was a bridge too far for the policewoman patrolling the parade route. “The next time you do that, I'm taking you to jail,” she told the reveler. “I'm DISABLED!” Pasty shouted as she angrily climbed back atop the wheelchair. I hope she really does need the wheelchair and was miraculously healed for two hours by the Ghost of Friar Tuck. But I doubt it. And I miss the Friday couple.

I learned to eat the year
I starved in Paris.

Like so many American kids, I lived the cliché of being a poor, broke, foreign exchange student there to lap up some culture and meet some romantic French men.

All the myths came crashing down the first month. The guys were scruffy, unwashed and uninterested. The universities went on strike. The dollar crashed against the franc, sending Paris food prices beyond the reach of U.S. students.

I was 19 and living in a 12th century building on the rue Seguier and I refused to go home. 

I always enjoy a weekend trip to the Kimbell Art Museum in Ft. Worth. When I found they were hosting an Impressionist exhibit this year, I couldn’t have been more excited. The Age of Impressionism: Paintings from the Clark opened on March 11^th and continues through June 17^th. In fact, Ft. Worth is the sole American city on this exhibit’s first-ever international tour.

The Sterling and Francine Clark collection is world-renowned and includes some of the most famous masterpieces of the Impressionist era from Renoir, Monet, Manet, Pisarro, Sisley, Morisot, Gauguin, and more. In fact, the exhibition, a total of 73 paintings, includes 21 pieces by Renoir and 6 by Monet.

Within the exhibit at the Kimbell, there is an entire room of the most beautiful Renoir paintings I’ve ever seen in one place and in another room, there is a special focus on pieces by Degas. Some of my favorites from the exhibit were Marie-Thérese Durand-Ruel Sewing (1880) by Renoir and A Box at the Theater (At the Concert) (1880), another portrait by Renoir. There are also several breathtaking landscapes. The Cliffs at Étretat (1885) by Monet - took my breath away.