Patty Rose Design

Day 4, Saint Antonin Noble-Val

It is Sunday, October 14.  We start the morning with a simple breakfast of croissants, bread, jam, yogurt, hard boiled eggs and fruit. There was much ado about the boiled eggs.  Soft center, not soft center?  Slice off the top or gently break around the shell with a spoon?  I asked for mine scrambled.  That solves that.

After breakfast, we load into the van and head for the market at Saint Antonin Noble-Val. 

We park the van and head up through the narrow old streets to the market area. Before we go any further, let's put on a little music to get you in the right frame of mind...

 

Ahhh, okay, here we go....

The market is bustling with people and full of magnificent colors, sounds and smells.  The market stalls overflow with gorgeous fruits, vegetables, spices, meats and herbs.  It is a foodie's paradise.

In the market, we find this young boy roasting chestnuts.  Dad is close by which made the mother in me feel much better. 

After we walk through the market, we continue through the streets and alleys, exploring the ancient village. 

The streets are filled with lovely visions.

The village sits on the beautiful banks of the L'Aveyron river. 

After our stroll along the river, we head back into the alleys and streets of the village.  We find a couple of brocantes to explore, including one with a business sign written in chalk on the old door and a picturesque little courtyard. 

There seem to be cats everywhere in these little villages.  This guy seems to be a bit irritated about something, evidenced by the bent back ears.  Maybe he is not a fan of cameras and giddy American ladies.

These hand door knockers are on many of the ancient doors.  They are known as the hand of Fatima and are believed to protect the house from evil. 

My treasures for the morning are a French market basket, handmade by the young woman who sold it to me, some yarn to crochet my son a new hat on the train back to Paris and some soap that smells like heaven.  I'm thinking they will make the perfect little gift, if I can part with them.

 

After a chilly morning in the market, we gather at a cafe near the market and wait for everyone to find their way back.  A little snack of roasted chestnuts, café au lait and expresso.  I sit with my expresso, hands holding the tiny little cup for warmth, wrapped in my jacket under a tree full of golden leaves, breathing it all in deeply.  Again, my soul is flooded with gratitude for the opportunity to experience this. 

The day is only beginning and already it is so full that my heart and soul are bursting.   

Next, we visit Charlotte and Tom....

 

Day 3, Arriving at Chateau Dumas

We meet Lizzie at gare Montauban at 3 PM.  I am so happy to meet her that I hug her as soon as she introduces herself!  We pile all the luggage into the little car (I am always amazed at how much they will hold) and head for the chateau. 

We drive part of the way on the French highway (they look exactly like ours) and then through the tiny town of Caussade, to Auty (pronounced oh-tee). 

The first afternoon at the chateau centers around everyone arriving and getting settled in.  Our luggage is taken to our rooms as we are invited onto the outside patio to enjoy introductions, the view and a cup of hot tea.  The patio overlooks an amazingly beautiful vista. We sit, soaking up the sunshine, enjoying the beautiful day and feeling very pampered and grateful.

After hot tea and a bit of conversation with the other guests, we settle into our rooms, freshen up and take a walk around the grounds.  The grounds are so beautiful.  They are old and full of character and a bit of mystery.  The chateau sits on a hilltop in the midst of 22 acres.  There are formal box parterres, a walnut grove, courtyard gardens, meadows, fruit orchards and grape vines.  The house has been there for a very long time and I imagine the lives that came before us.

We make our way down the old road and with cameras in hand, we begin our exploration...

We discover a large, heavily loaded fig tree with bees buzzing about and ripe figs bursting open. So begins my love affair with figs...

We pass the poolhouse and make our way to the edge of the hill to stand on the overlook.  We look out over the vista and 10 hot air balloons are floating across the blue horizon.  I think about the recent book I read with the story of Marie Antoinette and her thrill in watching the very first balloon float over Versailles.  Tonight, I am a thrilled as she must have been.  The sight is spectacular.  I close my eyes, breath deeply and feel gratitude to the core of my being.  I am so very lucky to be here.

After our walk, we return to the chateau and freshen up for dinner and remaining introductions. The evening begins with wine and a lovely aperitif called Violette. It is delicious with an aroma and taste that is very floral and sweet.  It is known to date back to the early 19th century when it was served with dry vermouth or alone as a cordial. Yes, I did haul some all the way back home and I'm saving it for the next really special occasion.

For dinner we had chicken wrapped in ham and herbs, roasted vegetables, rice with cream sauce, cheescake, and more luscious French wine.

Can't you just taste this wine?  Look at that color and body.  Yes, it was delicious but not too bold, it was very smooth.

The evening gave us one more beautiful surprise, a stunning sunset over the French countryside.

After more visiting and Lizzie giving us an overview of the week and the following day, I am spent.  It has been an amazing day beginning in the beautiful little village of Montauban and concluding at the much anticipated Chateau Dumas.

I return to my room, arrange my things, slip into my pajamas and socks and tuck myself into the down comforter.  I call Mr. Rose to share the day's adventures with him.  It is good to hear his voice.  After phoning home, I pull out my handmade journal and write down everything I can about the day.  Lastly, I break out the Kindle and fall asleep in the glow of the screen and the glow of my very gracious spirit.  I am so lucky.  Indeed.

To read more about the adventures at Chateau Dumas, please visit some of my new friends,

Laura McHugh and her blog here.

Diana Giambrone and her blog here.

To ready more about Chateau Dumas, visit here.

Tomorrow, our first market day.

 

 

Day 3, Exploring Montauban

We awake on Saturday morning and after a bit of breakfast at the abbaye, hit the streets of Montauban.  We have a few hours to spend before we are due back at the station to meet our ride to Chateau Dumas. 

The city is approximately 30 miles north of Toulouse and has it origins in the early part of the 11th century.  The main bridge of the city (the one we were searching for upon arrival) dates back to the 14th century. 

We walk through the streets of the lovely old village.  We peeked inside the Montauban Cathedral and then rushed through the Musee Ingres which was closing down soon for lunch. 

For the last few months I have been listening to Philippa Gregory's historical novels about the Plantagenets, the ruling houses that preceded the Tudors, and the Cousin’s War.  I imagine the warring French and English kings and their soldiers roaring through these ancient streets.

The time inside the museum passed so quickly.  We go downstairs first and are immediately swept away by the underground chamber known as the Hall of the Black Prince. 

In addition to the ancient chamber, the sculptures, paintings and ceramics are beautiful and mesmerizing...

We stayed in the museum to the last possible minute with the caretakers literally looking at their watches and clearing their throats.  Sorry, we must experience every moment possible, we may never be here again.  They closed the gates of the courtyard behind us.

After our visit in the Musee Ingres we searched out a nice little cafe and had lunch and enjoyed the  beautiful little details of Montauban.

After a few hours in the fresh air, perusing the streets, we made our way back along the river to the abbaye to collect our luggage and hail a taxi for the train station.  Yes.  A taxi.  In our taxi, the one mile to the train station was truly the four minute mile.  

We meet Lizzie at the train station at 3 PM and make our way to Chateau Dumas.  The magic is about to begin...

 

Day 2, Arriving in Montauban

It all started so innocently.  "It's not that far, the map says 1 mile, 4 minutes."  A short little jaunt up, left, across the bridge, another left, then there.  We grab our luggage and make our way across the train station parking lot, across the road and onto the sidewalk.  The very broken, bumpy sidewalk. 

After dragging our suitcases one block, we cross paths with a lady dressed in a long skirt, tennis shoes and a kerchief.  We ask if she might know of the address we are looking for.  In French, she asks us, we guess, if we are lost or in need of direction.  I guess we must have looked a bit odd dragging suitcases across town.  We show her the address we are looking for.  She says, "Oui, oui!"  We continue for a couple of minutes trying to communicate and we finally decipher a "D" out of the entire conversation.  She draws a "D" in the air and also in the dirt on the sidewalk.  She is motioning for us to follow her, in the opposite direction. 

So now we are dragging our luggage back to where we originally started across the street from the train station and up another street.  The suitcases are getting heavier by the minute and the sidewalk more broken.  We turn the street corner and she tries to flag down a passing transit bus.  We have concerns, but fatigue is possibly clouding our judgement.  We continue up the block, around the corner and down the next street only to discover that she is leading us to the bus stop.  The "D" she was trying to communicate was the "D" bus.  We thank her graciously but try to explain that we are sure it is very close and we don't want to take the bus. 

At the very moment that we are saying farewell to our gracious gypsy angel, another woman appears.  A bit of hope bubbles up again.  This polished lady speaks a teeny, tiny bit of English.  She points us toward the river.  This is feeling a little better.  There is a bridge on the map.  Where there are bridges, there are typically rivers.  We might be on to something here.  After much French discussion, none of which we understand, we part ways with both of the ladies. We confidently head toward the river and the bridge, our hopes renewed. 

We walk down the street a bit and decide that the particular bridge we are looking for must be in the next block.  We take a left and head down that street.  As we are walking down the street, there is honking from a car in the roundabout.  We look and they seem to be waving at us.  "Who knows we are in France?"  We joke and drag our luggage and hope behind us and continue on.

In front of a neighborhood bar, we stop for more directions.  The French men are very friendly and try to figure out where we are trying to go.  Suddenly the polished lady that we met on the corner and a young girl appear waiving car keys.  Again, much French conversation between the lady and the men at the bar.  We are trying to wrap our minds around what might be happening.  It was this lady who was honking at us from the roundabout!  She came back to get us and give us a ride!  She is showing us her car keys and pointing up the block. 

We begin walking in the direction that she is heading with her keys. One of the men from the bar is walking with us.  We are having a hard time believing that she would be so kind to come all the way back looking for us to assist us in our journey.   We are hopeful, grateful and elated.

We get to her car and discover the reason that the man from the bar was walking with us.  She has a baby seat in the car.  It will have to be removed to make room in the tiny car for the two strangers and all their luggage.  They take out the baby seat and a cargo cover from the trunk area of the car.  The man helps to put the luggage in the car and then hauls the removed cargo back to the bar.  Wow.  We are so very grateful for all of the trouble that she has gone through for total strangers.

The young girl is Margaret and she is learning English in school.  She shows us her notebook.  The lady and Margaret have shown us amazing kindness.  We work to communicate with each other during the short ride to the abbaye.  We are so grateful for the ride.  We exchange email information and think we decipher that she wanted to teach young Margaret a lesson in kindness and maybe a little English.  I am sure we were the topic of conversation in English class the following day.  Our French rescuers were certainly the topic of conversation for us for many days to follow.

We arrive at the abbaye and are pleasantly surprised with the size and quality of the room.  We settle in and then head to the restaurant for some dinner and drink.  We sit outside in the fresh evening air for a bit with our wine and talk about the kindness of the woman and young Margaret.  We enjoy a lovely dinner with a delightful waiter who draws us pictures of mushrooms to help us understand the ingredients.

We toast to the kindness of strangers and the great story we will be able to tell.  We also decide that there will be only taxis in the remainder of our visit to France.

After dinner we both fall asleep quickly to the glow of Kindles and Ipads.

Tomorrow, discovering Montauban.

Day 2, Train to Montauban

After a lovely petit dejeuner breakfast at the hotel, Kate and I hailed a petite cab and made our way to Gare de Montparnasse to catch the TGV to Montauban. 

We arrived at the station a bit early so we popped into the convenience store to get lunch, a magazine and water for the train ride.  While getting our sandwich, we saw armed men patrolling the station.  I still can't get used to seeing men walking around with heavy guns.  I can't decide if it is comforting or disturbing.  Maybe a bit of both. 

After securing lunch and magazines we faced the prospects of having to drag our luggage through the station to find the train.  As we stood examining the gate assignments we were approached by a porter.  Now, everyone we have told this story says that they have never seen a porter at any train station in Paris.  Honest!  He spoke English, had a cart and offered, for a fee of course, to take our luggage and lead us to our car.  Maybe he was an angel.  We didn't care, he had a cart and was offering to help.  He took the luggage, brought us directly to our cars, waited with us while the train arrived and then showed us to our seats and placed our luggage in the hold.  Easy peasy. Who says money can't buy happiness?

The train ride was very comfortable and roomy.  The countryside was beautiful albeit passing extremely fast.  The trains can reach speeds of 200 mph so photos are a little tricky. 

I decided to just relax, read and enjoy the sunlight through the window.  Note to self however, I did need to find something to crochet for the train ride back.  I don't relax very well.

One of the things I found interesting about the countryside was that in France, they don't seem to paint the outside of their homes.  Many of the buildings are the color of old stone, some brick and peeling stucco.  A patina of sorts.  There are bold pops of various blues, greens and red here and there on the shutters.  Every now and then we would pass a picturesque little town with a large chapel on a hillside or vineyards.  It was lovely breezing by us.

We enjoyed our simple little lunch of a bagel sandwich, Fanta and some chips.  Very French.

It was also kind of interesting how people try to steal seats on the train.  I saw several individuals walking up and down the cars avoiding the ticket taker.  There was much ado when an elderly lady tried to take a reserved seat.  There was much French debating, the elderly woman giving it her very best to argue her stance in keeping the better seat.  She was eventually convinced by the ticket man that she needed to move to the correct area.  Unfortunately for the young man that she sat next to.  Apparently she hadn't taken a bath in quite some time.  Once she was seated properly she took out her cell phone and proceeded to talk loudly for quite some time.  So much for sweet, old French ladies. 

We arrived in Montauban late afternoon on Friday.  Unfortunately, there was no porter in Montauban.  You have to be kind of fast to get your luggage and get off the train before it takes off again.  People start lining up in the aisle of the car before the train even reaches the station.  So when in France, do as the French do.  We lined up and prepared to depart the train once we hastily grabbed our luggage from the hold. 

I guess in the countryside they expect you to be a little more robust and self-sufficient.  I was thinking there would be someone who could at least grab your hand for the three foot drop to the station platform.  Nope.  I do credit my survival on my quick thinking.  I lobbed my 47 lb suitcase onto the platform first, hoping that if I didn't quite make the dive properly, I would at least have the padding of my suitcase to break my fall.  Luckily, I did manage to remain verticle for the dismount.  Thank God, my luggage had not yet multiplied at this point.  Note to self, LESS luggage next time.  No really, I mean it.

Tune in next time for "The Gypsy, "D" and the Five Minute Mile."

 

 

Day 1, Paris

My flight left Ohio in the late afternoon. Flying felt wonderful.  I was free and headed for Paris.  The fear of flying seems to be dissipating with each trip.  I'm glad of that.  However, a couple of glasses of wine and a bit of prescription was enlisted just to be sure my new found courage didn't wane.  

I arrived in Paris at about 7:30 AM on Thursday which was about 1:30 AM Ohio time.  I'm not a night person, and that is an understatement.  The adrenalin of being in Paris got me through the airport and transportation snarls and I finally made it to the hotel around 11:30 AM Paris time.  By this time, I have been up over 24 hours and am absolutely d.o.n.e.  I have not one ounce of energy to even walk down the street to find a cup of coffee. 

I pleaded unsuccessfully to get into my room early.  I matched the lack of mercy with pitching camp in the lobby and tried not to pass out cold onto the floor.  It's hard to look polished and patient when your head is nodding off. 

Yep, imagine me, dead-dog tired, camped out here, luggage and all, until they let me in that room. 

They finally had mercy on me (or needed their lobby to be more presentable) around 1 PM and let me in the room.  I took a hot bath in the very nice tub and then passed out until Kate arrived a few hours later.

This bed was the most beautiful sight I had laid my eyes on all day.... The room was about as big as this photo but the bed was really comfortable. I love the European comforters.  So soft, light and warm.  Opening the window required standing on the bed out of the way.  Getting in the bathroom required closing the window.  If electricity was required, then the window and the bathroom door had to be closed to access the one lone outlet.  Kate had to move her luggage to open the hallway door.  But, it was Paris!  And it was just one night.

After my nap and Kate's settling in, we walked down the block a bit and had our first Paris dinner in the first cafe we found.  Hamburgers and French fries.  I think we both needed some comfort food.  If you add the Cote de Provence wine, which we did of course, then it was French enough.

On the way back to the hotel, we stopped in a chocolate shop (here) and a little kitchen shop and made our first purchases.  Chocolate, tea, and tea for one diffusers. I got a cute little spoon too.  It has a brown pearle handle and "France" stamped in the metal.  A spoon is a must have in your tea emergency kit.

I also managed to score my first Parisian treat, a slice of exquisite lemon tarte from Pierre Herme.  Heaven knows I can never refuse any tarte, especially while I am in Paris.  This would be the first of a tarte-tasting extravaganza from north to south and back to north again. 

With chocolate, tea, and a bite of lemon tarte, I felt fully equipped to now move forward with the adventure.

A walk back in the rain made it feel like real Paris.  I loved it.  I was a little bit rested and fed so now even rain without an umbrella was good.  It was Paris rain after all.  A good nights sleep and tomorrow, the train to Montauban. 

Lucky Little Sachets

The Saturday prior to leaving for France, I spent the entire day making little lavender sachets.  I wanted to take a little something to share with the other participants of the workshop.  A little something for them to remember me. 

I gathered together some yellow and blue quilting scraps and some vintage fabric and the cutting, stitching and stuffing frenzy began.

It's funny how you get an idea and what happens is seldom ever where you thought you were going. 

I envisioned using clip art transfers or patchwork or maybe mixed media.  Digging through my fabric I came across a vintage blue and yellow tablecloth with large flowers and the direction was established.

Lucky me, I have a mom who is an avid quilter and who supplies me with boxes of great fabric scraps. Oh, how I love those boxes...

And of course, seldom is a little sewing project complete without a bit of contrasting stitching to finish things up.

And then these little goodies are packed up and on their way to France.  Lucky little sachets. 

Saturated

Saturated.  It seems to be the most fitting word to describe the last three weeks.  There are so many things I want to share with you about all that happened on this trip to France.  Over the next few weeks, I'll attempt to peel back and share all the delicious layers of the experience.  There is so much.  It's really big, fat and juicy, I promise.  Here's a little peep...

Anticipation

Twenty one days.  Disconnect.  Rest.  Inhale.  Let go.  Play.  Reset. 

It has been a hard year.  I've let things get out of balance.  I'm looking forward to the long flight, the change of scenery and change of pace.  I need time, distance and strange surroundings to clear my mind.  Parts of life have gotten a little off track, time to realign. No place like France to get it done.

The anticipation is delicious.  The first time held such poignant moments.  My first visit to Europe.  The surreal swirling of the unfamiliar sounds all around me.  The awe-inspiring sights.  The magic and magnificence of it all.  The overwhelming joy and gratitude for such an opportunity.  The tears of appreciation and adoration.  Scenery so full of life, history, culture and beauty that it left me breathless.

That little blond-haired girl from that tiny little town in Florida who might not have stood a chance without the faith and love of a few.  Standing in the middle of Paris. 

I am convinced there were times when my feet left the ground...no steps involved.  Not only once, but now for the second time I am privileged to visit this beautiful county.

I never stopped believing that it was all possible.  Still is.  No matter what they say or what wrong turns you may have taken at some point.  Faith will take you where you want to go.  The Universe will conspire on your behalf.

Time to once again remind myself of what is possible when we just believe and get ourselves out of the way and allow.

Twenty one days to reset...

Little Thank You's

Made a little something for an event at work next week.  I took a 10" x 10" piece of scrapbook paper, shaped it into a cone and filled it with chocolate and candies.  Once full, I folded down the top, added a little bit of embellishment and stapled.  I also stapled the bottom for extra support.  Love how they turned out.

Piles of embellishments...I used a label punch, a medallion and a butterfly.  Stacked them on top of each other and stitched down the middle.

Rolled the paper into a cone shape...this is a little tricky but with practice it gets easy.

Aren't they so sweet all lined up and ready to go?

Three large bags of candy and chocolates, a handful of doilies, a few punches and some scrapbook paper.  It took a couple of hours to do but was very inexpensive since I have a few pieces of scrapbook paper just laying around. :)