Celebrating with L'Oreal!

However, all has not gone according to plan. Since I knewI'd be in Paris for L'Oréal's big event, I took the opportunity to spend the weekend in this amazing city with my fiancé. Here, you can see me getting ready to enjoy some of Paris' amazing strawberries that are currently in season! 

After a couple days of sight seeing, we headed over to the Westin on Saturday morning to check in for the event. As we drew closer to the hotel, I was people watching out the car window through the Paris drizzle and spotted actress Mary Louise Parker darting across the street. Her hair was very long-she had it pulled back and wore thick-framed black glasses, so I almost didn't realize it was her.

We had a warm welcome from the people at L'Oréal, but not so much from the staff at the Westin. In fact, not at all. They were on strike.

Apparently, this is quite common in France. In fact, our driver from the airport told us all about the striking problem. Little did we know it would affect us!

Fortunately, the L'Oréal staff were somehow able to secure another hotel and get everyone over to the new location. We weren't the only ones put out. President Obama and Mrs. Obama were also staying at the Westin for their weekend in Paris after visiting Normandy on the anniversary of D-Day.

I'm assuming the Secret Service found another place for the Obamas to stay. But that wasn't the last of the Obamas for us. Later in the day, we took the Metro to the Notre Dame. We had a quick bite at a café and then headed over to the cathedral to see it before it closed. Guess who else was going to see it? That's right, the whole place was barricaded so we couldn't get near it. We did hang out for a while to see the President's motorcade though-what a circus. There were snipers at the top of buildings, a helicopter, police everywhere, bomb-sniffing dogs, Secret Servicemen-you name it. Here's a shot of Notre Dame all blocked off for the president's arrival!

We didn't get to see the inside of Notre Dame. Trying again tomorrow!