buying French groceries

There is simply no comparison between buying your groceries in a supermarket and buying them fresh from an open air market - especially when the sun is shining, the air smells good and all the summer fruits are out on show.

I always return from the weekly market with a spring in my step - stimulated by the beautiful colours, the gentle bustle and the friendly banter between vendors and clients.

Clients dress nicely to go shopping, they often meet up with old friends, share a coffee on the market square, their overfilled baskets sitting at their feet.

In France, when you go to le marché, you know you will find good quality produce, fresh, often sold by the producer directly.  

For the vendors - who work hard on their farm all week -  it's a highlight too, not only do they make some money, they also interact with their clients and catch up on the latest news and gossip in town.

Freshly roasted chicken  yummmm!  soooo difficult to resist when you're already hungry for lunch!

I love the way that in the middle of the fruit and vegetables you'll find hats, baskets, saucepans and even fabric.

Clients are encouraged to taste, and often extra pieces of fruit, or bunches of parsley are added to the basket.  I know this is  a commercial gesture , but I always think the vendor looks like a n artist putting the finishing touch to a work of art, as he offers a lemon or a bunch of herbs.

So now you know one of my remedies for feeling lazy or energy-less
- a trip to a local market.  100% guaranteed result.

french, feminine and chic

With the change of seasons, my redecorating time of year is approaching and I'm looking for ideas at the moment, scouring magazines and blogs for interiors I like.

This one slowed me down.  I spent a long while looking at how the girl has achieved an interior that feels pared down although there are plenty of collector bits;  that feels feminine; that feels modern although the flat is early 19th century and there are plenty of brocante pieces used.

I'm loving the colour scheme, adore the bathroom - who wouldn't?! - admiring her use of huge Venetian mirrors and definitely envious of the lack of clutter... sigh ...

How comfortable would you be here?


PS.   Great excitement here today as the new computer arrived YAY!!  The handover however has not been totally seamless, and some people are having trouble leaving comments or sending me mails.  Please persevere, and if you need an urgent answer from me by mail, you could always message me on fb for safety!  Merci!

all photos thanks to journal de la maison

yesterday's loot shoot and a small country town

Yesterday morning found me up early , driving through open fields as the  sun rose.  I wasn't alone, we have lovely Dutch guests in our cottage and Esther decided to come along for the ride and hopefully find some treasure of her own.

For once the best fair was in a small town.  I generally prefer to treasure hunt in fields, but with the recent rain, dry road offered its advantages.

I forgot to take pictures of the fair, these shots were in the quiet roads leading back to where our car was parked.

Pickings were fairly good and I think that Esther was happy with her share.  I let her snap up any linen we saw and helped her negotiate the prices.   She was particularly happy with the old baskets we found for her, and for the beautiful piece of sculpted wood.

I am in love with the old Provençal hat that I found, it's hanging on a wall downstairs, elegant and feminine.

Also pleased to find these balls of old linen string, the sweet inkwell and the turquoise siphon.

the metal moulds in this shot would have been used for cheese making, probably goats cheese in this shape.  Today they are fun for small plants, or for candles as the light shines through the holes onto the table around.

More little 'perigordine' glasses, but you know I love these for individual flowers on a table.

Maybe the most unusual piece I found was the patented copy binder, brought out for the Universal Exhibition of 1889, the same year as the Eiffel Tower.

I hope you all had a great weekend.  Special thoughts to any readers in the States affected by the hurricane, hope you're all safe.  Also special thoughts to those of you in Australia who are enjoying the first moments of Spring as we begin to pick up the scent of Autumn.

Have a good week!

my first autumn bouquet du jour

Haven't been able to show you any bouquets for a while, August is a difficult month to keep the flowers going in the garden.   Now we have the first of the autumn flowers, dahlias, roses, sedums beginning to turn pink and with a couple of baby apples and some blackberries, the whole things melts in tones of pink and purple.

We are swimming in brocante fairs at this time of the year and I'm off early treasure hunting this morning - hopefully tomorrow I'll have a good loot shoot to show you!

painting and mid-year resolutions - 48 hours and still on track !!

Thursday I announced in a most fool hardy manner my mid-year resolutions - well guess what ?!  48 hours later  and I'm still on track !!  Well almost .....

Thank you for all those who expressed concern that I may stop blogging - you really are the sweetest.  My intention is to blog as before, each day, but to use my time more efficiently.  So,  for those who are interested

1. YES I have cycled each day (we are only talking about two days after all!)


2. NO I haven't ridden my horse yet, but it has been pouring with rain


3. YES I have spent more time en famille


4. and NO, unfortunately the novel isn't finished yet, but maybe that was a little optimistic  totally unrealistic   sigh ..........


5. AND I had the huge pleasure of dusting off my easel and spending a couple of hours painting

I'm not a painter, I have no training or expertise, but I do love to sit in front of an easel.  Transferring colours from a palette to a canvas is quite hypnotic.

I only paint in the summer.  Firstly because I love working outside, but more importantly because I am so messy when I work that  painting indoors is way too dangerous!

Some people's art is produced with a camera.  When Julie of Being Ruby came to stay with us a few weeks ago, she kindly gifted me several of her photos.  Lucky me!  I adore her pictures, her sense of composition and her talent for reworking them so they become painterly.

 

I particularly loved this beach picture, and inspired myself by it when painting yesterday.    It sort of feels as if I'm cheating to paint from a photo, but it is very relaxing, rather like using those painting by number cards we all played with as kids.

I didn't really achieve Julie's wonderful colour mix and softness, but it doesn't matter, it's only for me. I popped it up on the wall to dry safely

While in the South this summer I took this photo, specifically to paint from.  I knew that if I didn't freeze the moment with my camera I would never be capable of remembering the different shades of grey/blue/green as one layer of trees follows another till they reach the horizon.

This has to be the most relaxing thing I do!

I wish you all a happy and relaxing weekend, doing whatever you enjoy most

playtime in France

How many hours can be whiled away with a game of boules or petanque?  Played by all generations in every corner of France, taken seriously, played for fun, it rarely fails to please.

Of course it helps if you can play on a perfect boules ground with the finest sand and gravel, surrounded by stone walls, ivy and the sound of cigales, but failing that a regular gravel drive works well too.  We have had memorable boules evenings here, with teams, trophies, champagne and a lot of loud French discussion over winning points.

If you've never played,  you may enjoy this light hearted extract from Le Gendarme de St Tropez.





It helps to have a minimum ability to aim, and if you get to a good level you can start flourishing your arms and using key phrases such "je pointe ou je tire?"  ("do I roll up to it, or do I shoot it out of the picture?").

Whichever way you play, whatever your style, it is a simple game needing a minimum of inexpensive equipment that guarantees an instant French moment !!

Vive la pétanque!

my mid year resolutions and why blogging isn't good for me

I love to blog.  I love all those amazing blogs out there to be read, I love receiving loads of messages and mails and I love my brocante site, but the time has come to admit that it's doing me no good!

Before I knew what the word b..l..o..g meant I used to spend hours in my garden; bake cakes for my kids; talk to my husband; exercise regularly and  ... my ironing would be up to date.

Since the fatal day, 18 months ago, when I started this little blog, all that has changed ....  my children only have odd socks to wear, my garden is disappearing behind a jungle of weeds, I am growing stiff and unsupple and if anyone wants a hot meal in this house then my husband has to cook it  ....  OK that is a bit of an exaggeration, there is however a grain of truth, and so I have decided to make some mid-year resolutions.

I need to limit my time in front of this screen.  

One way of achieving this is that I have bought myself a new computer ..  YAY ! ..  to replace the steam driven model I'm typing on right now.  The new baby will arrive at the end of the  month and hopefully photos will upload to my blog posts in nano seconds instead of the current half an hour, and I will be able to continue writing My French Country Home in a fraction of the time it takes me today.

The other way to extract myself from the chair in front of  the screen is by sticking to those resolutions I just mentioned.  Namely ( and the idea here is that if I make them public, then I have to stick to them, right?!)

1.   I shall cycle or walk for m-i-n-i-m-u-m 30 minutes each day

2.   I'll ride my horse several times a week like I used to, instead of the irregular hacks out that I surprise him with today

3.   I shall  rise early and keep my ironing and gardening up to date before turning on the computer

That's for the physical and practical benefits.  There are a couple of resolutions aimed to benefit  the intellectual and social side to my life too:

4.   This is the year that I take Italian classes - having self taught from books for a while now, I need to crack on and make real progress before my brain goes into meltdown and can no longer tell the difference between linguine and spaghetti!

5.   I will try and write that novel that has been sitting in a cupboard beside the fireplace for two years

6.   But most importantly of all,  I shall set aside special time to enjoy with my family, and hopefully they in return will stop calling me supergeek!

So now please, just to encourage me, tell me truthfully how you manage your screen time.  Is is a struggle?  Have you just the read the above aghast with horror and vowed never to read my blog again or do you empathise and feel relieved that you're not alone?!

Do let me know, I'm counting on your support on this one :)

Merci mes amis!

back to school soon

There is a moment on the French school calender that always sends shivers down my spine; that when the "liste de fournitures" drops through my letter box.  This list of school supplies is to be religiously consulted, purchased,  ticked off and jammed into the new school bag each September and  that to me is fraught with danger.

Since early August, the local supermarkets have been devoting  miles of shelving to exercise books, binders, pencils, pens, set squares and compasses.  I watch wistfully as very organised mothers march up and down the alleys, unceremoniously grabbing items from the shelves and dropping them into their trolley with an air of triumph, whilst I know that such organisation is way beyond me, and that we will - yet again - have the humiliation of being the last family in the school to have every single item off the wretched list.

"What is she whining about?", I can hear you say, "it can't be that big a deal to buy a couple of crayons and the odd exercise book", but my dears your have NO IDEA ....

First of all take a look at a typical list ..........

You see, it's awful, never ending and that's just for one child, because of course, no two schools require the same things, that would be far too simple.  Believe me,  when I had all four children in primary education, I needed  to triple the Prozac before I could even unfold the lists.

Pens and pencils are relatively straight forward, providing of course you get the right colour ink, and the right sized ink cartridge for the appropriate pen.  Compass sets get a little tricky since manufacturers insist on innovating and more often than not, what you though looked like a well designed piece of geometrical machinery, turns out to be a waste of money looked down upon by the maths teacher.

It's when you start on the exercise books that the merde hits the proverbial fan.  If you thought that an exercise books was nothing more than some folded sheets of lined paper, stapled together to form a practical sized book then think again.

First of all in France they don't do lines.  They do squares, for maths (I think) and weird coloured grids that make your eyes hurt for all other subjects, unless it's 'travaux pratique, in which case you need the weird grid on one side of the book and plain paper on the other.

Next the size.  Obviously just one or two sizes would be too simple.  No, we have incy wincy vocabulary books (I can deal with that, I am after all a linguist), then we have those nice old square exercise books which remind me of my school days and comfort me, then we proceed to the pitfalls of A4 or 'just a bit bigger', and yes it does matter.  You also have to check the number of pages, 96 or 124, and yes it does matter.

I won't bore you with the choice of colours and designer brands.   I will mention that "la rentrée" (going back to school) costs a small fortune to French families, and most of all I'll have a final moan about the ridiculous weight of the school bags.

France needs to put aside money now for this generation's back problems.  I have seen slightly built 11 year olds carrying half their own weight to school each day - I'm not kidding.  A 13 kilo bag (30 pounds) is not unusual.

Enough from me ..... as you can tell, what I actually prefer is the summer holidays.  Maybe it's the fact that they are drawing to an end that is actually causing me so much grief.

Thank you for listening!

a funny French summer

The weather in France is strangely oscillating between intense and sultry summer heat, sudden storms and even quick premature shots  of autumn.

I took these photos while driving through a delightfully  empty Paris this week on a grey and wet but warm morning, they seem to catch the atmosphere.

yesterday's loot shoot (modest but fun!)

Call me an addict if you wish, it would probably be justified ...  since yesterday morning I was up before dawn and off with a friend to hunt down more treasures.  After heavy rain in the night, the day gradually lifted to bright sunshine and I was happy to discover villages I had never visited and to root around picking out my favourite pieces.  A couple of hours bliss and still home in time for breakfast with the family!

I found some linen that pleased me, and some interesting historical documents.   But I think that my favourite items are the primary school teaching cards, showing maps of the world all in French, and wonderful vintage designs for teaching children how to read.

I am listing all the maps and reading cards in the brocante store.  Here they are shown in their frames, but they will be sold  unframed and posted  in a cardboard tube.

I just love the way the names on the maps are in French and the words in red show each area's speciality.

more spelling cards here

more maps here