Hope your new year has started well! Family go back to the States on Monday, so I'll be back next week to share photos and details about their visit (So far they've done Paris, Spain, St Tropez, Monaco, Italy and Carcassonne....). Enjoy the rest of your holiday weekend! Bisous...
Happy Holidays to you all from the Dukedom. For the first time in 15 years, I'm spending the holidays with part of my family from the States, and we are having a great time.
I hope all of you are able to share the holidays with people you love, surrounded by good food and drink, and most of all, health and happiness.
See you all in the new year!
I'm in Paris at the moment, waiting for my family's flight to arrive tomorrow at 6 am. I've been here the last two days, staying in a great apartment, which I'd recommend to anyone wanting to rent an apartment for their stay in Paris and which I'll post details of when I get back.
When I can break myself away from the view from my balcony (I can see the Eiffel Tower, Sacre Coeur, la Grande Roue at Place de la Concorde, and the Seine. Any guesses which arrond I'm in?), I've been doing some Christmas shopping and trying to keep warm by stopping every 100 metres or so to have a coffee.
It's arctic here, and apparently snow is expected this week. That will make the city look even more Christmassy than it already does, but thinking I better go out and buy a hat. We have lots to pack in the next three days as my uncle has never been here, so I expect there will be lots of photos to post when we get back home!
In the style of what I like to call 'French Christmas minimalism'.....
Five recently published books that would make great gifts for the Francophiles on your Christmas gift list:
Writers in Paris by David Burke
Paris Illuminated by Peter Hendrie
Rose En Marche: Running A Market Stall In Provence by Jamie Ivey
A Certain Je Ne Sais Quoi: The Ideal Guide to Sounding, Acting and Shrugging Like the French by Charles Timoney
French Vineyards (Alastair Sawday's Special Places to Stay French Vineyards) by Patrick Hilyer
It's Boxing Day here in the UK, and after living with an Englishman for 15 years, I still have no idea why it's called Boxing Day...
Apparently it's snowing like crazy back home in the south of France, and it's gloriously sunny here in England. That's just messed up. Although I have to say that the English countryside is beautiful this time of year, with the Malvern Hills off in the distance and the green landscape rolling all around us. We've been on some great walks and the littlest lady just can't get enough of stomping in all the cow pats in her wellies. I think that will be her best memory of this trip.
We went into town this morning to see what the sales were like. Not too busy anywhere, and had I had any energy left from my pre-Christmas shopping, I just might have found a bargain or two. But we've come back home now to do what should be done on the day after Christmas- eat, read, sleep, and go to the pub in the evening.
Hope you've all had a good Christmas and are enjoying all the leftovers!
I'm sure the trip would be much more enjoyable on a horse through the snow than on Ryanair, and I'd probably be able to take a bigger carry-on too, but nevermind.
We are off for two weeks in the UK, the girls and I are flying up and the Duke is driving up with the dogs. Not sure which one of us drew the shorter straw there.
The girls have had their Christmas meal at school, here was the menu:
I'm well-aware of the real meaning of Christmas, shop til you drop and see how many useless gifts you can give and receive, and I've even heard some people say it's a religious holiday.
Chez moi, my personal belief is that Christmas is a time to eat. And to eat well. So in the spirit of Christmas, I thought I'd share with you some of my favorite French Christmas food.
Don't worry, I'm sure the following recipe is incredibly low in fat.
They are putting the Christmas lights up in the village already, although I don't think they will turn them on until the first of December. But already I'm feeling a little in the holiday mood. Maybe it's the fact that the little ladies have already given me their Christmas orders, or maybe it's because we've just booked our ferry back to the UK. There was certainly an air of Christmas in Paris, with most of the big department stores already displaying their magical holiday window displays.
I've started going through the toy catalogues that all of the stores around here send, like Joué Club, Eveil et Jeux, Auchan and King Jouet. It always makes me laugh to look through the French catalogues and see all of the names of toys I remember having as a child, although with completely different French names.
See if you can guess what these games are: Bataille Navale, Puissance 4, Docteur Maboul, Hippos Gloutons, La Roue de la Fortune. Not too difficult, I know, but weird to think my kids will grow up calling these games different names.
One thing I have learned this year about preparing for the holiday season- No matter how 'on offer' the chocolate boxes are at the supermarket, and no matter how organized you think you are being by stocking up on them to give out during the Christmas season, don't do it! You'll just end up making your way through them, one by one, sometimes half a box at a time in front of the tele....
My favorite time of the year is upon us, when I allow myself to unabashedly over eat, foie gras, chocolates, Bailey's, smoked salmon, stilton, gingerbread and cranberry sauce. These are a few of my favorite things. Not that I ever think you need an excuse to indulge yourself with food, but I guess this time of year makes me think it's slightly more legitimate.
It's 15 years now that I've been out of the States, and I'm struggling to remember exactly what it was that made up my holiday season when I was a child. I remember random things like nut covered cheese balls, candy canes and marshmallow-topped yams, but I struggle to remember other things like what time we ate our Christmas dinner, when we opened our stockings, why my parents dragged their 3 year old daughter to midnight mass and wondered why she was cranky, etc.
Now that I'm a mother, living in France and married to an Englishman, my ideas of what is traditional is a little skewed. Do I embrace the French ways of celebrating the season, do I try to re create the Christmas of my childhood in the States, or do I go with the Duke's English traditions? My poor little ladies aren't sure if the fat guy in the red suit is called Pere Noel, Father Christmas or Santa Claus.
I know now is the time to start creating my own family tradition with the kids, but I could really use a guidebook on how to mix all of the different traditions into one. I would love to hear how any of you other mothers have done this. I guess I have to pick all of things that are important within all of the cultures and try to make some sort of sense out of it all. I suppose the best bit is that they all include lots of eating, and on that score, I seem to be upholding the traditions very well!
This brings to me to the tricky religious part. It feels slightly strange that my children only think of Christmas as a time to get presents. And as we aren't a religious family, I'm not sure how much or even how I would go about teaching them the story behind the holiday. Again, any input would be greatly appreciated.
Whichever traditions you and your family enjoy this time of year, I hope the season is a happy and healthy one for you all!
On a different note, I finished my Nanowrimo novel, 52,000 words! I plan to start editing in January, and I sincerely hope that at this time next year, I have a fully formed novel to share with the world!
Season's greetings to you all, although I much prefer the Nigella Lawson version, Season's Eatings!
Recipe for the day: a handful of exercise, at least 2 cups of coffee, 2.5litres of bleu de breton paint, and quite possibly, if easily attainable, a quick nap.
I love this kind of morning. Brisk morning walk in to school with the oldest little lady, and down a certain little street, the chateau at the top of the village lights up like a headlight with the dawning sun beaming on it. Come back into a warm and cosy house, to find everyone is still asleep.
With peanut butter toast and a cup of coffee, I hid away in my office, enjoying the silence.
Of course it doesn't last long, and the littlest lady comes running downstairs with her shoes on the wrong feet, a purple fluffy eye mask on her head, and snot pouring out of her nose, to give me a hug and eat the rest of my toast. Now the day begins.
The Christmas lights have been put up in the village streets, but not turned on yet. It's almost, but not quite, the Christmas season.
It has been unseasonably warm here, and I find I'm missing the usual smell of the smoking chimneys as I walk through the village. There are irises flowering in my garden. I'm feeling a little freaked out by how warm it has been, and can't help thinking about how little I know about Global Warming. Where's Al Gore when you need him?
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