Presidents Weekend in Paris: Turn 4 Days Off Into 6

Presidents Weekend is the most underrated school holiday on the New Jersey calendar and nobody is going to tell you about it because nobody else is using it correctly. Officially, it is a long weekend — Friday off, Monday off, the kind of break that gets sold to you as "a great time for a quick local trip," which I am here to tell you is a lie invented by people who have never tried to enjoy Mystic, Connecticut in February. With two pulled days and a half-day on Wednesday, I turn it into six days in Paris every other year, and the only reason it is every other year is that the alternate years Lila is at Jayson's.

I have done this trip with Lila four times now. I have it down to a system that is mostly Vivi's apartment, mostly Air France, and mostly the sort of pacing where you don't try to see the Louvre and instead spend two hours in the Marché d'Aligre buying cheese you cannot legally bring home.

The Math

Here is the calendar arithmetic. Presidents Day falls on the third Monday of February. Lila's school typically gives Friday off too, sometimes as a teacher PD day, sometimes just because. So the official break is Friday through Monday — four days. Here is how I stretch it:

Wednesday: Lila has a half-day at school. I pick her up at noon. We are at EWR by three, on Air France 023 to CDG by six. Sleep on the plane.
Thursday: Land at 7am Paris time. Croissants on the way to Vivi's, a nap, and the rest of the day is ours. This is the day I would have lost if I had stuck to the official break.
Friday: Officially off school. A full Paris day, no jet lag.
Saturday and Sunday: Weekend in Paris with Eloise.
Monday: Presidents Day. Museums are blissfully open. Most Americans are flying home.
Tuesday: Pulled day. We take an evening flight, AF 022, lands at JFK at 8pm. Lila is back at school Wednesday morning, mildly broken but functional.

That is six days on the ground in Paris for two missed school days. The flights cost the same. The apartment is free. The only added cost is two extra dinners and a metro pass that has paid for itself by Saturday.

Vivi's Apartment

The whole thing depends on Vivi. She is a French translator I met through a freelance project a decade ago, she lives in the eleventh, and her apartment has a small second bedroom that Lila and Eloise have shared since they were nine. We pay her in olive oil and a stack of US books she cannot easily get, and we feed her cat. The apartment is on a street so quiet you can hear the bakery downstairs opening at 5am. I would not do this trip from a hotel. The whole point is the rhythm of having a kitchen, a Monoprix, and a friend.

What We Actually Do With Six Days

Four days in Paris is a checklist. Six days is a life. Here is what changes:

We do the Marais on a Thursday afternoon when there is nobody there. Falafel on Rue des Rosiers. Lila tries every macaron at Pierre Hermé and decides on the rose-lychee one, every time.
We do a half-day at the Musée d'Orsay and then go home and nap. You cannot do this in a four-day trip. The nap is the trip.
Eloise and Lila go off together for an afternoon in the Tenth, no parents, and come back with stories I am not allowed to know.
One full day is what I call a "nothing day" — a Sunday at the Buttes-Chaumont with sandwiches, a book, and Vivi's husband's dog. This is the day Lila remembers a year later. Not the Eiffel Tower.
We do one nice dinner. Last time it was Septime's little sister, Clamato, where Lila ate a whole plate of sea urchin and decided she was a person who eats sea urchin now.

What I Email the School

The note is short. "Lila will be absent Thursday Feb 13 and Tuesday Feb 18 for a family trip. She will complete missed work upon return and is happy to make up any quizzes during office hours." I cc her advisor. I do not over-explain. I have been doing this for nine years and I have never gotten a no.

Six days in Paris in February costs the same as four. The two missing days are the trip.

What Lila Does for Missed Work

Honestly? Less than you think. Two missed days in February is usually one math worksheet, a quiz she takes Wednesday during a free period, and a reading log she does on the plane home. Her teachers do not assemble special packets. She is a B+ ninth grader and the world keeps spinning.

If you have a Vivi — a friend with a couch, an apartment, a guest room — Presidents Weekend is the trip you are leaving on the table. If you don't have a Vivi, an Airbnb in the eleventh for six nights in February is still cheaper than four nights in March, and the city is yours. Pull the two days. Take the half-day Wednesday. Sleep on the plane. I will see you at Du Pain et des Idées at 8am Thursday with my hair still wet.