France

How the week goes and its less than a week to Christmas. I hope your plans are going well. In our extended family and friends it will be a time of joy and sadness as some of our loved ones will not be here for Christmas. A time to reflect and keep every memory that we make with our families.

Christmas feels quite relaxed here as during the week everything seems the same apart from the Bolangerie which now has all these amazing chocolate logs. The kids finished school last Friday and are now on Holidays.
I will back track to last Wednesday as we had a lovely lunch with Chris and Michéle. She teaches at the kids school and he is the organist/ musician that we saw and met on Sunday evening. He plays in NZ each year as well and will be playing in Whakatane in March 2011 so J is going to go to see him play. Its a small world really. There was another girl who joined us for lunch, as she is learning English. She is 13 years old and is keen to keep email contact with us. She was practising her english. M has to emai her in French and she will email in English.
Anyway back to the lunch. We started with a lovely salad of avacado and different salad leaves with bread. Then the main course was the back muscles on a turkey with mushroom and roast potatoes, then cheese and bread then tart tartin with apple. It was amazing. Of course vin as well.
We got to see the harpsichord, piano and organ in the house. M got to have a go playing as well. They also have a book on NZ in French. We had a wonderful time and their family are coming for dinner this wednesday to eat Indian with French vin and NZ passports which is a requirement! My friend shirley will be here as well so a big party. They have two older children and their son's partner is from NZ!
On Thursday J and I went to Beziers on the bus to do our Christmas shopping as the kids were still at school. J does not like shopping but I was so impressed. He coped very well inbetween lunch and two cafes. I did know which shops we needed to go to and we were on a mission. Then with three big bags we caught the bus home. It is so pleasant going on the bus as it reduces the stress of parking etc. J bought me a special Christmas Bernardaud etched Porcelain half globe ornament. My friend Kirsten has one and we got one with the nativity scene. It is made in France so very special. You light a candle inside so it lights up and you can see the designs/picture. I felt spoilt!
On Friday we went to the school to say thank you to the staff who have been so wonderful. The Deputy principal speaks English and took us to meet the Librarian who just loves Michelle and the chef in the Canteen. Apparently the school canteen has won an award for its food. The kids had christmas lunch on Thursday roast turkey with yummy potatoes and chocolate log. They were to have humburgers on friday when we went. The chef said that the kids would think it was Christmas on Friday as they preferred the Hamburgers!!!!
It was lovely to see some of the staff as well. One of them said oh Nouvelle Zealand, David, Michelle, rugby, happy Christmas all singular words. It was great. They obviously knew who the kids were (and who we were!!!).
On Staurday we went into Narbonne so that J and D could swim in the heated 50m outdoor pool and the girls could look at shops. It was fun with all the decorations up and fair type rides. We had cafe, hot chocolate, pizza slices and baguette sandwiches. Also did some shopping but generally had a look around. Of course everything close at midday and open again at 2pm. We did but poulet and cannard pieces from the butcher so i made that seperately for dinner. The kids ate poulet and we had the cannard in orange, figue and honey syrup. (I had to cook the duck for 1 1/2 hours but it was delice!!!) Also cooked fresh carrots with the stalks still on which were yum too.
No we have not had horse, snails, frogs legs and anything else that sounds interesting hee hee. I know some of our friends would like to try them reading their comments. To answer some of the questions, some of the veges come from Spain as we are so close and are still grown fresh not in hot houses like tomatoes and very nice clementine mandarins. Other green veges like broccoli, carrots, pumpkin, spinach, radish, fennel are still grwon locally. We have one man who only sells whats grown locally and is in season. I love the way they give us fresh parsley, mint and coriander free when they have some.
Hope all is well with all our friends!! More soon.