Sunday lunch and Endurance Horse Race

Today was one of those days when it was difficult to choose what to do as there were so many things on offer.  My village, St André, was on the route of the horse endurance races – 20km and 40km – and at the next junction towards town horses and carriages were racing down the lanes.  There was a car boot sale at Duault where I have been promising myself I would go, a plant sale in Mael Carhaix and the market at Bon Repos.

Yesterday a friend of my son who is over in France at the moment, suggested that we have lunch together and I proposed that we should eat at the Café de l’Abbaye at Bon Repos so we could see the market too.  Although the temperature board at SuperU was showing 17°C there was a brisk, chilly wind and it was not the best day to sit outside the café watching the world go by so when S arrived we went inside to have lunch.  Afterwards we wandered around the Abbey de Bon Repos and took some photographs.

 

A bloom from a rhododendron and a novel way of storing empty wine bottles.

When I got back to the village the afternoon horse entrants were just starting to come through the village so I put a scarf and coat on and joined my neighbours watching them running up the lane to the calvaire.  The supporters were there with buckets of water for the horses to drink and bottles of water to pour over their necks to cool them down and refresh them.

 There were some very young competitors as well as the obviously experienced riders.

Once they had all come through we went down the lane to the next junction to watch the carriages coming towards us on the bend. 

 

 

Here are three generations of my lovely neighbour's family.

I love how when events like this happen everyone comes out to watch and there's such a good sense of community.  









Three things I like:

1.   Meeting friends unexpectedly while wandering around the market at Bon Repos.
2.   A very rare steak sandwich for supper with garlicky, mustardy mayo.
3.   Finding the runner bean plants I put in the ground yesterday haven't been attacked by slugs - yet!

Spring has sprung in St André - at last!

Spring has finally arrived here in St André and everywhere is bursting with green and with blooms.  There are just four bluebell plants in my lane which are quickly becoming hidden by the other verge growth of grass, dandelions, celandines etc. etc.

 

This is a bank outside my neighbour's house studded with primroses, muscari and forget-me-nots.

When I walked out to the animals this morning there was a toad at the back of the little flowerbed on the drive.  He was plump and looked in really good health in the shadowy bit at the back of the flowerbed.

Dandelions are everywhere brightening up the verges and field with their bright yellow flowers.  I am considering making wine with the blossom this year.  The first and last time I made dandelion wine was back on 7 May 1982, when I was pregnant with my first child.  I made it on the morning of the day I moved house while I was waiting for the removal lorry to arrive.  It smelt terrible while it was fermenting in the wine bin but tasted wonderful when it was ready to be drunk.




The rabbits have a couple of large handfuls of dandelion leaves and flowers everyday - they just love them.

This little white flower which seems to be one of the first wild flowers to bloom around here is Stellaria holostea  - Greater Stitchwort - and should have five pairs of  petals as in this first photograph.  However, just a few metres from this is the plant in the second photograph with only four pairs of petals  - a mutant has somehow been produced. 

One of my favourite trees, beech, which comes into leaf first along the lanes and I just love it's vibrant green airy leafed branches.

Here are bracken fronds unfurling - aren't they beautiful?

The horsechestnut leaves are dramatic against the blue skies we have finally started to enjoy.  I was beginning to think that blue skies were a figment of my imagination after the  very wet and grey winter.

Oil seed rape fields are brightening up the Breton landscape.  I love to come round a bend in the road and see these zingy crops.

Today, the bowls club I belong to are having a lunch at St Gilles Vieux Marché.  As I am still dressed in my scruffs from doing the animals this morning I think I had better go and shower and change.

Sorted and ready to go 

Three things I like:

1.   Friends expecting their second child, a boy, were told yesterday that if he hasn't arrived by Monday he will be induced, so not long now until my first cuddle to welcome a new life into my bit of the world.
2.   The wisteria well in bloom along the cottage walls in the garden - it looks so beautiful.
3.   Watching the incubating eggs turning automatically in their new incubator - I can't wait for the chicks to hatch out - around 20 May.

Hottest day of the year so far

What a beautiful day.   I heard my first cuckoo of the year this morning as I walked up the lane to do the animals.   I drove with friends to collect animal feed this morning for their hens and geese and my hens, ducks, rabbits and goats.  It's been the sunniest, hottest day of the year and I've been lying out in the garden since midday soaking it all up. 

 

 
 

 

 

The wisteria against the cottage walls is just starting to bloom again and the tulips under the garden wall are bright scarlet with variegated leaves.  

 

 

 

Basil, Ruby and Bert have been burrowing again in their run.  There's wire going down below ground level to stop them getting through to the next door garden, but this time they are tunnelling towards the cottages.  They then spent an hour or so sitting in the sunshine in a row.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here's the lane going down from the calvaire to my house in the sunshine and forget-me-nots growing wild outside an abandoned dwelling next to me. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The village was really quiet today.  I think I might have been the only one at home most of the afternoon.  I love the peace here.

 

I really spending so much time in the garden, getting a good tan base, eating both my lunch and supper outside and reading a whole paperback - Almost French by Sarah Turnbull.  It's true story about an Australian girl who ends up living in Paris with a Frenchman and how she coped with the culture shock.   

 

 

 

Three things I like:

 

1.   The wall to wall sunshine and heat we've had today in St André.

2.   Walking round in the peace and quiet of the village with my cats following.

3.   Finding the new hiding place where some of my hens are now laying.

Spring and feeling much better

As I drove back from a gentle bowls morning on Tuesday afternoon in the sunshine, I realised that the landscape now has a green shimmer across it as trees are coming into leaf again.  Finally as April slipped into May the weather became warmer and more Springlike.  

Still a bitterly cold wind, particularly in the early morning but often by lunchtime it has dropped and I've spent several hours in the afternoons sitting out in a sheltered spot in the sunshine reading.   One afternoon was with my Breton neighbours and we sat and ate pancakes and drank coffee.   




Here are some of the blooms in the lanes around me.
 

Yesterday I walked over to my car and found this nest on the ground, it had fallen from a fir in my neighbour's garden.  I don't know what bird built it but it was just finished as the moss is still green and fresh.

It's seven days since I came back from hospital and I feel good.  It's frustrating not to be able to do things like lifting and bending - banned for about four weeks - and I'm desperate to work in the garden but I'm going to do as I am told as I want the operation to be successful.
 

The day after I came home I had my first guests of the year in the cottage.  They were from California and I was hoping that the weather wouldn't let Brittany down.  It didn't.  It was dry and warm and they enjoyed their stay here exploring the countryside by car and on foot.  I've managed to get all their bed linen, towels etc. washed and dried today - the first washing on the line this year.

Yesterday evening I prepared a beef casserole with onions, herbs, stock and half a bottle of red wine.  It simmered away in the slow cooker all night and the smell pervading the house when I got up this morning was wonderful.  I had the first portion for lunch with carrots cooked in a little water and butter, buttered boiled potatoes and French beans. There are another 3-4 portions left ready to pop into freezer bags and then the freezer.

I went to the doctor this morning for my usual three monthly prescription and was pleased to see that the list of medications for which the prescription previously took the best part of two A4 sheets has been reduced to six items.  Two allergy products, two digestion items (because of the bypass) and Vitamin D and calcium.  No more statins, blood pressure tablets, aspirin, HRT, asthma inhalers etc. etc.   The French health system has done me proud and I'm so grateful to all the medical people who have helped me here.

Three things I  like:

1.  After an anxious wait for scan and results, hearing that my oldest son doesn't have testicular cancer - thank goodness!

2.  Watching my new incubator automatically turning mixed and Cream Legbar eggs and keeping them at the correct temperature.

3.   Having my first guests of the year in my cottage.