Normandie Impressionniste Festival begins 1st June 2010.

Inside Rouen Cathedral The major cultural event of the summer here in Normandy promises to be The Impressionist Normandy Festival which begins 1st June 2010, continuing throughout the summer until September 2010.
Horse Drawn carriage in Rouen.
The Festival's website is rightly very proud of the event:
Initiated under Laurent Fabius and numerous governmental authorities, including the Regional governments of Upper and Lower Normandy, the counties of Seine-Maritime and Eure, the Cities of Rouen and Caen, with the support of major businesses, this multidisciplinary celebration is on an unprecedented scale for France. For the public, it will be the perfect opportunity to discover exceptional cultural heritage and all the creative talent of Normandy, homeland of the Impressionist movement.La Dame au Balcon. Henri Ottmann.
One of the special exhibitions is to be held in the Fine Arts Museum in Rouen.

It is entitled "A City for Impressionism" and will include paintings by Monet, Pissarro and Gauguin, many of which will be on show to the public for the first time.

The streets in Rouen's historic district are lined with ancient half timbered buildings, and here you will find many excellent small cafes and restaurants.

Click here to read my Monet's Garden at Giverney post

Champ de Coquelicots, Environs de Giverny. Claude Monet.

Nearer to home, I'll be able to visit the Corot exhibition at the Saint-Lô Fine Arts Museum and the Millet exhibition at the Thomas Henry Museum in Cherbourg.

Hopefully we'll get a chance to visit Rouen once again to see the light shows and illuminations at the Cathedral.
Rouen Cathedral by Claude Monet.

More from the Festival website:
Impressionist Normandy encompasses the entire territory of two separate regions (Upper and Lower Normandy) and as such, is an unprecedented initiative in France. The event will take place simultaneously in dozens of cities, towns, and villages. The main Norman institutions, as well as numerous other public and private partners, will be associated with the festival. In addition to the desire to bring together an entire geographical area, the fact of multiple locations also illustrates the precedent established by the painters’ own penchant to wander through the countryside in search of new subjects to paint. Certain exhibitions will be sent to other countries and thus will act as "ambassadors” for Normandy. As an unofficial & unpaid ambassador of Normandy I'm very happy to be able to promote our adopted region of France in with my blog.

If you are planning on visiting France this summer do try and see one of the amazing exhibitions going on throughout the region, and let me know if you'd like some company!

I'm linking this post to Frenchy's wonderful, 1st June French Obsession meme

@Le Château des Fleurs.

I have been lucky enough to have visited the Fine Arts Museum twice now and these photographs were taken during one of my visits.

D is for.......................Donkey

Thursday's here again so I'm off to Jenny Matlock's place for Alphabe-Thursday and a look at what this week's letter D stands for.

Around here D stands for my neighbours Donkey, who has a field to wander in but more often than not can be found standing by the fence watching the cars and the one lone pedestrian, me with Mr Ben, going by.

He's very sociable and always comes over to have a chat and tells me the latest gossip around the hameau.

See you at Jenny's.
Still with me??

Looks like Spring isn't as ready to arrive as we thought at the beginning of the week. I took these pix just a few minutes ago. It has been snowing steadily all night long and shows no sign of stopping yet. My small, bijou (?) attic room where I sit and blog and scrap is freezing cold, the velux window in the roof is covered by inches of snow, there's hardly any light coming in from outside, so I think I'll take my laptop into the bedroom and have a day in p.j.'s

Coquilles

Mary's Mosaic Monday @ the little red house is gathering more and more followers and participants each week.
The variety and creativity inspires me to try different techniques and search out unusual subjects for my own mosaics.

Discarded coquilles (shells) from the fish market at Port en Bessin strewn along the beach as the tide came in yesterday afternoon.

Wednesday's sunrise.

For OW & Wordless Wednesday I shared with you yesterday's sunrise, the trouble with Wordless W is that I can't "talk"!
So, to answer some questions from my friends...............
the time was 8.30'ish in the morning, not very early,
it did come with a shepherd's warning because it snowed again later in the day,
it was worth getting out of bed for, except I was already up and preparing breakfast when I looked out of the kitchen door, saw the beautiful colours, grabbed my trusty Lumix and dashed upstairs to take a photo from the bathroom window.
I thought it might be fun to try and replicate the shot 24 hours later but as you can see no blazing sunrise today, only the slightest hint of pink around the edges.
Thanks for all your comments, as Cindy @ Cottage Instincts said recently

" Nothing would ever get done around here if not for an audience".

Have a wonderful day, everyone.

Sunrise in Normandy

For Outdoor Wednesday hosted by Susan @ A Southern Daydreamer
and also Wordless Wednesday a pink Normandy sunrise.

Sunday Favourites Rerun.

We are very lucky that twice a week a very nice man in a white van delivers fresh bread to our door.
Whether or not he'll be able to get through the snow to us today I don't know, but I really hope he does.
The reason being, is that, we have ordered from him a very special cake a "Galette des Rois" and since we don't like marzipan our galette will have a filling of apple compote.
The custom of sharing a cake on January 6th, associated in Catholic countries with the visit of the Wise Men to the baby Jesus, dates to pre- Christian times.

Post Script.

He made it!! He had to park in the lane and come up the drive on foot but he did it!!

And, here's the proof.

A special treat for afternoon tea.

For Chari's Sunday Favourites meme @ Happy to Design, here is a post that I wrote a little while back about fèves, the small epiphany trinkets which have been the QCI Meeting Farewell Dinner party favours in years past.
There is also a Sunday Favourites Rerun on the QCI blog today,please be sure to visit Chari and all today's participants.

It's Three or more Tuesday over at Tam's The Gypsy's Corner, a great show & tell party that's a treat for the eyes.

So, today I'm showing off my collection of fèves.

Followers of my blog may have gathered by now that I collect the French pottery known as Quimper faience. Yes, really!
You probably also know that the 10th Annual meeting of the QCI will be taking place next month in Dallas.

Click here to go to the QCI Blog to read all about the fun in store.
I have attended the past 9 meetings, starting with Washington in 2000, up until Philadelphia last year. I even co hosted the 2007 meeting here in France and will be co hosting again next year in Savannah, Georgia.
The meetings are always great fun and a wonderful way of connecting with fellow collectors and meeting up with friends discovered through our shared love of Quimper.

The Grand Finale of these events is always the Farewell Dinner and in recent years each guest has received a small party favour of fèves (epiphany trinkets) as they take their places at table.
In France “La galette des Rois” ("the king's cake") celebrates the Epiphany and is traditionally sold and consumed a few days before and after January 6 (although today in France, it is available in bakeries for the entire month of January). The cake consists of flaky puff pastry layers with a dense center of frangipane, raspberry, apple, and other flavors, as the baker is inspired.

In times gone by, a dried bean was hidden in the cake, and the person who found it was king for the day. The French word for bean is "fève"; however, although beans were replaced in 1870 by small figures in porcelain and, more recently, plastic, these trinkets are still called “fèves.”

The "fèves" are generally produced in theme series, with every possible theme imaginable, including Disney figures, regional motifs, ceramics, antiques, every aspect of modern life, etc. They have become very popular collectibles and can often be bought separately. Any series is generally produced for one year only.

For several years the fèves presented at the Q Club dinner were tiny figurines of Breton people.
In 2008 our gift was a tiny plate decorated with a traditional Quimper motif.

Over the years I have accumulated quite a collection of figurines and I was so enchanted by the little plate last year that I purchased the complete set.

The series of Quimper plates was produced for Epiphany 2008. It consists of ten pieces, each a miniature reproduction of a real Quimper plate, either Henriot or HB. Many "fèves" are titled, and these are marked "Les Assiettes de Quimper" (The Plates of Quimper) on the reverse side.

I believe that stocks are limited but if you would also like to add a set of plates or figurines to your Q collection click here

à bien tôt
Maggie

A kinda blue mosaic Monday

One of our favourite walks is along a country lane which (surprise, surprise!) has fields either side and these fields, in summer, have cows (many cows) in them.

We are in Normandy after all.

Recently, however, because of the inclement weather the river, which meanders through the fields, broke it's banks.

So, for Blue Monday @ Smiling Sally's and Mary's Mosaic Monday @ the little red house grab your coat, hat, scarf, don't forget gloves and come and breath the cold crisp air as we take Mr Ben for his Sunday constitutional.

These are photographs of fields, it's not a lake we're looking at!

Have a great Monday and as a treat, to yourself, do fly over to Sally & Mary's blogs and enjoy all the fabulous photo's on display today.

A village mosaic for Mary

Monday has rolled around again all too quickly, many of my friends will be celebrating Thanksgiving this week and Christmas is but a few short weeks away.
One good thing about Mondays is Mary's get together @the littleredhouse where like minded bloggers share their mosaics.
I'm sure there will be plenty of turkeys on display today but I don't have a single one!
Instead a delightful donkey who lives in my neighbour's garden and is a joy to visit when out on our daily walk around the village.

Thanks to Mary who generously shared her knowledge on how to make my mosaics bigger and for those friends who asked Ben last week what sort of camera the Mrs has now it is a Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ3 with a Leica lens.

à bien tôt
Maggie

Tablescape Thursday for the Over 60's.

I'm not sure if this post really qualifies for Tablescape Thursday over at Between Naps on the Porch, but I hope so.

Please join Susan our gracious hostess for more delightful tablescapes today.

When I was a little girl my Nana B belonged to the Over 60's Club. They went on coach trips, played bingo & had beetle drives. Anyone else remember those?

Imagine my horror when 2 years ago my DH became eligible to join "that Club".
In the tiny commune where we live turning 60 meant that he and his wife were invited to the annual "repas des anciens". A luncheon provided for the Over 60's in the salle communale (village hall).
Twice we made our excuses, however this year when Remy "Monsieur le Maire" arrived at our door with the invitation what could we do but accept graciously?

To our delight we had a wonderful time.

The autumnal floral decorations were unique, I think you'll agree.The walking stick arrangement was perhaps a tongue in cheek homage to the occasion?

The excellent seven course luncheon was catered by a local traiteur and the ladies of the village led by the Maire's wife were superb hostesses, anticipating our every need.

Kir Royal et ses toasts assortis
Coupe de crevettes
Saint Pierre a l'oseille au riz
Trou Normand et son sorbet
Rôti de boeuf et ses accompagnements
Effeuillée de saison
Plateau de Fromages
Pêché mignon au coulis de fraise
Corbeille de fruits
Cafe - vin fins
Champagne


By the way I recently posted about a 3 hour lunch that we enjoyed by the sea, the oldies lunch began at 12.30pm and we were the first to leave at 6.00pm.

I hope you have enjoyed this glimpse into the social life of a rural Normandy village, we certainly had fun.

à bien tôt
Maggie

Claude Monet's garden at Giverny in September.

How quickly Wednesdays seem to come around nowadays, one appointment I always like to keep is with Suzanne @ Southern Daydreamer and her Outdoor Wednesday gathering. Do go over and visit with Suzanne and enjoy the other outdoor glories she has gathered today.

I recently wrote "A final farewell to my summer garden"mentioning a couple of influences from the French Impressionist Claude Monet’s garden at Giverny
Today I'd like to take you on a September tour of that beautiful garden which I so love to visit.
It never seems to matter what time of year I am there, the grounds are always a delight and another tour of the house is de rigeur.

Bequeathed to France's Académie des Beaux-Arts by the artist's son Michel in 1966, Claude Monet's property at Giverny has since undergone major restoration.


With its pink render on the outside, the house where the leader of the Impressionist school lived from 1883 until 1926 has now regained the colourful interior and intimate charm of those bygone days.

Several of its rooms are now devoted to the artist's precious collection of Japanese prints, hung in accordance with the instructions of the Master of Giverny.

Just a few steps from the house the restored Water lily Studio, is now home to the Monet Foundation shop.

Also restored to their original state, the gardens now offer the visitor that "painting made from Nature itself" that Monet's contemporaries regarded as one of his masterpieces.

The house and studios look out on to the geometrically designed Clos Normand, whose stunning flowerbeds are surrounded by arbours of climbing plants.
From spring through to autumn the Clos is the setting for the changing palette of a painter-gardener who was "simply mad about flowers".

Further down, a man-made, willow-shaded branch of the river Epte feeds the Water Garden with its celebrated Japanese Bridge and its wisteria, azaleas and pond.
Once again this spot has become that meeting of sky and water out of which emerged the pictorial world of the water lilies.


I hope that you have enjoyed your virtual tour with me today and perhaps one day, if you plan a visit to France and visit Normandy, we can go there together, once again.

à bien tôt
Maggie