'Tis The Season

This is the doorway from our kitchen to what is now our living room. The house used to be the village café and grocer's shop, and when the door was open it allowed anyone in the kitchen to see what was happening in the bar.
The greenery came from the edge of the wood up the road and this year I was lucky to get there early and find holly with berries- a few days later all the rest been taken.

On Saturday we woke up to snow and had a pretty walk up the hill as far as the old stone cross. In the early afternoon we tried to drive to a friend's house as she'd got the Christmas edition of the 'Radio Times' for us and they're like hen's teeth round here, but we had to turn back after getting stuck partway up a very slippery hill and narrowly escaping a JCB which slewed out of control on its way down and headed in our direction. More fun as a car skidded into it with the bucket smashing into the driver's window. Now, that's what I call excited Frenchmen! Enough thrills for the day, thank you very much, and we headed home. It was just starting to go dark when I drew the the snowy scene from the bedroom window. It had a sense of urgency and oncoming night, time to close up the curtains and stoke up the log stove.

At the busy supermarket on Tuesday large tables had been set up, laden with Coquilles St. Jacques, or scallops, covered with seaweed to keep them cool and fresh. I ordered a tea at the café and when I asked for milk, the man asked if I wanted hot or cold..the French rarely take milk with their tea.

A friend's small sons spotted me sketching and came over to have a look- I teach them drawing, and I was pleased they'd seen me working 'out in the field'- such a good example!

It's Christmas Day, and you don't have to be a monarchist to find yourself watching the Queen's yearly speech to the nation!

As I'm finishing off a drawing from the TV, our neighbour from the farm across the road (who's a bit of a 'rough diamond') comes round to use the phone. Apparently, he's no longer our neighbour as he and his partner have split up.. he tells us she's expecting a baby- they already have a six-year old daughter. He's worried because their Alsatian dog's loose in the village, and no-one home. When I ask him he says he lives 'nowhere' at present, but has work repairing and constructing earth-built houses, and the use of the works' van.

We give him coffee and home-made ginger biscuits and he says we can have his remaining chickens, then he asks if we could do a portrait of his daughter sometime, he would really love a picture of Tia.....