A century of posts!
Hello again
I can’t believe that my last post was my 100th post for the blog Coffee and Chocolatines. The blog set out to portray our life in South West France, our renovation project and introduce you to the area we live in now. So much has changed since we arrived here in 2019. A pandemic took us all by surprise, our renovation plans stalled, we acquired 4 cats and seemed to have been through a series of unexpected adventures that were not on our to-do list at all (nor in our contingency plans)!
As I write this, the sun is shining and the wind is blowing again. It has suddenly become much warmer and the garden has exploded into life, much of it in need of urgent attention. One day it was freezing and we couldn’t do anything, the next sunny and there is too much to do. I have promised myself to just tackle one job at a time, but it is so easy to start looking around and think I must do this, and this, and this….. Not conducive to a calm mind. The plum trees are in full bloom, the pear is following close behind – beautiful.
This last week has seen my younger son turn 25. Doesn’t time fly! Max and I had a trip to Albi with a long list of DIY things we needed. We managed to get everything we wanted and didn’t go off track too much, and avoided the brocante! We sat in the square in Albi enjoying a coffee in the sunshine – bliss. Life almost seemed normal watching the world go by. We had tea with our neighbour and made a list of jobs she needs help with in the garden, admiring the fabulous blossom, including peach. Now to work out how we fit these jobs in, alongside our infinity list. The rest of the week I have been working and popping out from time to time to do a brief bit of gardening. Max has been busy in the copse, clearing the area where the pine was to make way for our leaf bins, for our future ‘gardeners’ gold’!
To celebrate the 100th blog I have looked back at some of my posts. I started this blog on 19th October 2020. The renovation plans have not gone ahead quite as speedily as we hoped. We have had so many jobs to do to fix things and firefight emergencies as they appeared. Two very cold winters have made those jobs so hard, as the house has been unbelievably chilly. I even got chilblains this year! We have added to the infinite list of jobs again and again, but are now focussing on ensuring the rooms we have offered to refugees are ready, should we be asked. Although we have had hurdles to get over and not everything has turned out as we hoped, we still have lots of plans for our petit château here in the Tarn. This old stone country house is charming and quirky, not always on our side, often testing our resolve but also welcoming and interesting. As I have said on countless occasions, what stories she could tell, what experiences she has lived through. I continue to be fascinated by her history but have had little time recently to progress my research.
I hope you will continue on this journey with us and be part of our adventures. There is so much still to share. Onwards to the next 100 posts! Onwards to finally revealing some more of the changes we are making. Onwards to more recipes, places to visit and a few new features too! Onwards of course to more coffee and chocolatines. I am looking forward to Easter when I can eat chocolate again – I have given it up for Lent (childhood thing), along with meat this year as my tiny contribution towards climate change. On that note we took part in Earth Hour yesterday evening. Across the world at 8.30pm local time, people join in by switching off all their electric lights for an hour– a small gesture for our planet.
Enjoy the week. We are off to change all the clocks!
Thank you for your support.
A bientôt
Ali xx