OLD STUFF

 

This is a selection of stuff from recent brocantes.

Some of it is old, some not so old.

On the day of our own village brocante the weather was terrible so there were not many stall holders.  This was good news for the lady holding a "vide maison" where people could browse indoors so she had a steady stream of customers.  She said this set of playing card stainless steel dishes had been a wedding present.  Guessing her age I would say they were probably from the 1970's.  I bought them as a gift for some friends who occasionally hold card tournaments.

She also said her house was for sale, or would be once she had cleared out all the stuff (there was a lot of it).  I gave her my number as it could be exactly the kind of small house we're looking for.

This pretty set of espresso cups came from the brocante at Neuilly-le-Brignon.  When I got them home two of them were chipped so I swapped them for some I had already.  It was still a bargain for 2€.

This unusual chandelier came from the brocante restaurant in Pleumartin, the one where everything is for sale, including the dishes you eat off and the chairs and tables you sit at.

It took me a while to find some candles slim enough to fit in it.

This pretty dish is probably fairly modern but it's proved very handy for serving bread or a few biscuits.  A bargain at 1€. 

I got these Pyrex cups from the vide grenier at Le Grand-Pressigny, perfect to supplement my collection of small cups to serve chocolate mousse or lemon posset.  They remind me of the glass cups and saucers that were used to serve coffee in the coffee shops that were all the rage when I was a teenager in the 1960's.

This pretty green plant pot holder looked as though it had never been used.  In fact the price label was still on the bottom of it.  Although the price was not legible I bet it cost a lot more than the 1€ I paid for it.  The pineapple plant is a recent purchase from Ikea.

ROSES

We have had a visitor for a week, a friend of mine that I have known for almost forty years.  She has stayed with us in France before but not since we moved out of the village twelve years ago.

One of the many good things about having people to stay is that we have the reason to do "holiday stuff" ourselves; visiting places that we love and doing the touristy things.  

Every year we visit the village of Chédigny, not far from Loches, where they hold an annual rose festival.  We never tire of seeing the magnificent roses.  The colours seemed to be even brighter on a fairly dull day.

Many of the roses have little plaques which say what the variety is and when it was first planted.

 There are of course many other flowers as well as the roses.

AN OPTICAL ILLUSION ?

 Spotted from the window of the bus, near the Mirabeau stop, in Tours city centre.

A deliberate choice or a design misunderstanding?

UNBELIEVABLE (if we were not in France)

The weather has turned showery after weeks of dry weather.  This has brought out zillions of snails.  This handsome little chap was on the voie verte, the cycle/walking track that we use for walking Hugo in wet weather as it’s less muddy underfoot.  And of course he loves it.

There has been a development on the residence card front.

It is exactly two months since we received our “décision favorable “, confirmation that our applications to renew our CDS was accepted.  On the document it says we would be contacted by the préfecture about when to collect the actual cards.  This is usually by SMS a couple of weeks later.

After a month we emailed the préfecture to ask very politely if they could send another SMS as so far we hadn’t received it.  We got no reply.  

Two weeks later we sent an email to the Ministère de l'Intérieur, the organisation that issues the "décision favorable", to say if they knew if our cards were ready and what we could do to get them.  They replied immediately to say yes they were and that we would be notified when to collect them by our préfecture in Tours, and to contact the préfecture if we hadn't heard anything in another couple of weeks.  

We emailed the préfecture again saying we understood that the cards were ready and could they PLEASE send an SMS so that we could collect them and, of course, pay the damned fee of 225€ each.  

We have so far had no reply to either of our emails.

Yesterday, I happened to have a conversation with a very nice lady who helps British people with all kinds of French matters, from tax forms to hospital visits.  We rarely need her advice these days and the conversation was on behalf of someone else about something completely different but at the end of the call she asked me how we were getting on with our CDS applications.  I mentioned that we had had our "décision favorable" two months ago but still not received an SMS.  

She told us we won't.  The préfecture has changed their procedure and they no longer send text messages (because it's too expensive, apparently)...................WHAT ???!!!

Instead we have to go online and book an appointment for "retrait de titre de séjour" to collect them from the préfecture.  If we were not accepted for an appointment, it would mean the cards were not ready yet.

How long would it be before someone at the préfecture replied to our emails to tell us that text messages were no longer used and we should apply online for a rendezvous instead?!

Unbelievable.  The whole system is in the dark ages and moves slower than Mr Snail.

However, the story doesn't end there as finding the right website on which to book the appointment was in itself also a challenge.  Nothing to do with French bureaucracy is ever easy!

We have appointments for 21st May, nearly three months after our existing cards expired (and nearly seven months since we applied to renew them).  The champagne is in the fridge already!!

FUN WITH WATERCOLOUR

 

At our last watercolour class Nick was away so our teacher felt it was an opportunity to do something girlie and frivolous.

We each covered an A3 sheet of paper with abstract flower designs.

This was then folded and cut through in the middle.

Then folded into a little book.

Great fun and very easy to do.

RECENT PHOTOS

Purple wild flowers at Étableau.

Our lilac rose is in full bloom.

The pansies are still going strong.

Geraniums waiting to be potted up to replace the pansies.

Our yellow climbing rose is in full bloom.

We struggle to grow anything in this bed.

Last year potted colius did really well there so we have done the same again.

New chairs for the picnic area.

One of the old white ones had broken.

It split when Nick leaned back on it.

I thought that could be dangerous so we changed them.

Some geraniums have already been potted up.

We have gravelled the island in the middle of the drive.

The water bath for the birds is very popular.

Two water bowls for the bees.

I read that the pebbles enable them to drink without falling in and drowning.

The park at Paulmy.

The lake at La Celle-Guenand.

Construction work at the lake.

I think it's restoration of the lavoir.

Another view of the new chairs.

All the white ones have now been replaced.

The view from the picnic table.

I went into the barn for something and Yvonne followed me in.

Moments later she came out with a mouse.

She ate it immediately.  Head first of course.

A tidy up of the well room was overdue.

New storage boxes for outdoor cushions.

More pansies.

Pictures from the park a few days ago.

It was a much sunnier day and turned out to be very warm.

Not bad for the end of April.

We are so lucky to have such a lovely place on our doorstep.