All about Grey & Coffee ....

 

 

Tulips fully bloomed, this stage never happens in Australia

  

Does not the best grey palette come from nature ?
these greys are all sampled on Provencal platane trees 

Off to St Remy Market!

 

Shall we ride the bikes or shall we ride in style ???

                  

"L'ail rose"this pink provencal garlic is a new dicovery for my kitchen.When freshly picked, i use the whole of the bulb without peeling it as the skin is soft and moist.Cut it in slice right across, mix it with your salad, use it plentiful in your stir fry...i am such a huge garlic consumer than one of my Australian friends once told me : "The day you die, all the garlic growers will go broke!!"...so whilts I am in Provence i shall use this delectable juicy, mild but flavousome wonder of garlic   "Vive l'ail rose!!!..."

              

How about some freshly bake chichen with those little potatoes cooked in the chicken drippings? Oh yumm

such a choice of vegetables i find hard to make up my mind

yet these super large asparagus look very attractive, i have never seen them THAT big in Australia...

 Sweet juicy early spring strawberries look attractive, and we could get some gateau at this pattiserie

 Chek the name out - Mon pere etait patissier - Ma father was a pastry maker -

 do you think that name breathes a family reputation???

olives,olives,olive everywhere !!!! too many choices. i want them all.....

The Spring-y Lambs are in the fields

Count down to Spring in Provence...are the newborn lambs in the fields or in the paddocks???

   

Bien sur ils sont dans les champs!!!...

A couple of days ago I was riding my pushbike thru Molleges country lanes and cam across this big woolly family....a big "playgroup" with some babies only a couple of days old..

how lovely ...

 I have never seen a lamb that colour before ??he seems to be looking for his maman..

How sweet is that little face, just angelique !....

Where is home?

Some of the bloggers were talking about home to-day - where is home for me???

when i am in Australia i talk about "home" being France, being Bretagne, the water side , the rock smelling of seaweeds, the seafood, my French family, my old family homes, summers....

When in France i sometimes talk about "home" in Australia

This riverside cottage with a tropical garden near Byron Bay (the further eastern point on the australian coast) was my last home until one year ago..

I still dream of my skinny dipping in the river, my long walks on the beach with my dogs.... only 200metres away...

the warm surf, the sun...

My collection of frangipanis, all diffent colours, my garden pride...most of the trees i grew from cuttings....

At present i live in the most gorgeous little provencal "mas" set on my friends property on the outskirt of St Remy de Provence.This is my new "home" for the time being.

I love this countryside, the multitude of villages full of history, the lavender fields, the vineyards , the olive groves....AND ....the wonderful singing provencal accent 

 
At my every visit to France direct from Australia, my french is so mixed up with english and my combined autralian french accent, that people ask me "where are you from  ?" or start speaking to me in broken english and i dare not embarass myself or the speaker to tell them that "I am French, but my french  is a bit rusty for now

".....after 2 weeks it all changes and i start incorporating without knowing the "local accent"  of wherever I am...

So where is home?

Australia where "my flowers blossom in the sun"

Namaste.......

                                                 

Wherever I can make my nest, reposition the furniture to please my eyes, add a cushion or two, light loads of candles, fill up the pantry like a bunker in anticipation of food ration ( i grew up just after the last war)  fill up the fridge with my favorite of everything, international food with a touch of French, preferably be by the seaside or the countryside with the ability to escape to the sea every so often....

                                                                                

 

Home wherever my friends are near, close to my family and friends on skype.... Home is in my heart and it follows me around

  

Benodet my birthplace, the village who nurture and witness all my youth , my home where my "roots are kept moist with the rain"