Cognac Country

Fields of gold and Cognac vines, pretty villages, romantic architecture, the most friendliest people, even the Tour de France (making a return to the region after 20 years ) and of course BROCANTE .... 

The region is renowned for its Cognac and there are cognac vines as far as the eye can see not to mention beautiful sunflower fields too. The sunflower heads always straining to turn for the sun, there is always a little one facing the wrong way ..... aaahh bless.

Shall I take you on a little Tour?

I was really surprised to read that Angelina Jolie had visited this little village just before us. No doubt recommended as it was for us.It has a castle and a glorious chateau and the church has the most romantic architecture.Plus they have brocante markets there too! I will return!!

Here's the house we stayed in, it's style is called Maison Bourgeois.

 

This house used to produce cognac and the huge barn still houses the cognac vats.
 

Do you want to take a peak inside ....?

The front hall and the pool beyond, the kitchen, and salon were tres elegant.

The Master room was huge!

 
Great furniture, loved the armoires and outside was just as good,

































 great pool (note the budding syncro swimmer:))

A beautiful BBQ area and a wowey log pile ......practically an art piece.
Verdict ....... I LIKE!!!
We caught up with the Tour de France while we were here.
If you know much about it you will know that it started from London this year and travels through France, up mountains and all the way down to the the south of France back up to Paris. The cyclists can be on their bottoms for 8 hours without stopping.

Well we had to stand around in the hot sun for a couple of hours (which pales into insignificance really compared with what the cyclists have to endure).

Ya know how we all moan when the adverts come on TV for a few minutes well the start of the caravan ( the sponsors) presiding the tour is really like 2 hours of adverts going past at speed.
.... a bit like a parade or carnival at a very fast pace, only you have alsorts thrown at you, hats, bags, shower gel, key rings, paper ......... yes you scrabble for everything ...... the most reserved housewife will find her self scrabbling along the floor after every bit , yes even paper pleading for more ....... so unrefined :)))))) but fun!
Some of the sponsors.






















Oooo I could do with a nice cold drink!























 Take a LOOK Natasha The Australians are coming - they had kangaroos on top of their cars!!
Then finally what we had all been waiting for. The leaders of the pack - 15 mins ahead of the peleton. The white jersey in the middle won that day.















































Well that's all folks ;0) .........Did I forget something ........ OH YES.... !

BROCANTE!This is all the stuff I could manage, as you can see some great little lamps and a large frou frou one with sheer fabric -

And on closer inspection -Lots of scrap books with magazine scraps and art nouveau papers, even found a big roll of pink crepe paper.
























A large file of music and even handwritten musicFrench linen - 'Je t adore'






















I was after some old suspenders for my mixed media art and discovered loads in this box - well it all came together so I have 3 lovely pink corsets with their old pink suspenders, cotton stockings still in the packaging and loads of suspender spares still in the packaging.


































 

I love this old pin cushion doll from Limoge - but she needs some TLC.
 Loads of this lovely cherub fabric.



























 And last but not least my most favorite find. This chandelier with the palest pink drops in opaline glass.

Well I hope you enjoyed the trip as much as we did.

Its an Artful Blogging Party!

Hello I'm back!! and a warm welcome to everyone who comes by to visit. I had a lovely holiday in France, great weather and really beautiful countryside, lots of brocante which I want to tell you all about.

But first when I arrived home from holiday I was met with a huge amount of mail and in the pile was my pre -ordered Artful Blogging mag. Many of my favorite bloggers were there including Kari at Artysmama and it made the magazine even more special that I knew of so many bloggers. Kari is celebrating her entry in the first edition by having an art party and just in the nick of time I am joining The Artful blogging day with her ( http://artsymama.blogspot.com/ ).

She has asked everyone to submit some inspiration in the name of art. Since I have just come back from France I am rushed with this and so no tutorial I'm afraid, but would like to share with you some textile art that was inspired from frescoes, and one of my favorite artists KLIMT
The Kiss by Klimt

To get the effect of a fresco I have used layers of felt and crumpled tissue then teastained and painted the layers. Once dry I have free machine-stitched the image of the lovers on to both layers and to get the effect of the lines of age and stone I have used a product called webbing spray in black by Krylon(that is really fun to use).

You might like to see something my mum has made to, she is also a textile artist (at a spritely 73 years of age)
She has designed this jewellery from scratch inspired from the art deco era. She used layers of gauzy fabrics on a backing of interfacing and free machine stitched the pattern in and then burnt back using a heating tool to achieve the pattern.

Hope this has added to the party atmosphere, and now with any good party where's the food:))

A Post Card from France ~ we are on holiday ~ see you soon ~ A BIENTOT !!

It started with a wreck ..... I mean DECK !

Yuck it was time for the truly weathered deck to be remodelled, good weather encouraged the workers, SO with great gutso my hubby started to take the thing apart, note the table is still in situ ....
However some workers sat down on the job .... far to many interesting bugs to be monitoring.

Then the wood arrived .... the deck is going to be larger than before so a lot more wood.
The workers had all but vanished except muggins here.....
Oooooo my back:(

It was great to see the lovely wood finally oiled.
BUT THEN THE RAINS CAME!!
Then finally this weekend the sun came came out, (yep and Wimbledon Tennis Tournament even managed to end on time) AMAZING.

The deck rail was painted and the debris cleared away.

I was able to use my new chairs, put my new umbrella up, (although so far no bunting)

gather all my big cushions up get the vintage linen out,

I love old linen especially french monogrammed linen.
Old 30's hand embroidered tablecloths
and a favorite vintage Durham quilt
the pots now in situ A lovely pitcher of summer fruit Juice
A basket of fav magazines
And to top it off my magazines from the US arrived -

- Oh I think I'm hooked ....... oooo such bliss .........

Et Voila
ANYONE FOR TEA

Better make it quick, I hope that's not rain yonder ..........:)

Avoiding the rain showers!

Looking out on the garden I can see it's just loving all that rain. But I would love to be able to sit outside and enjoy the blooms. June has ended up being the wettest month ever recorded. There is no doubt that the garden is flourishing though.

But while sitting here enjoying the view I decided I might venture out in the few sunny moments to take some pictures. But felt I was being looked at.

This bull looked pretty powerful, especially when I had is undivided attention,:))))

Arrrghh he's just after a tasty leaf or two.

The garden has an abundance of blooms.

I love the Roses.

I love these for baskets.
Notice how they all seem to be PINK :)

Here is the finished Matchbox for the swap I took part in - see flikr.

It was sent to serendipity-werx - hope she got it ok.