Brocante in Big Sky Country

I needed an antedote to a week and a half's work on shutters - even thought it went along with fantastic family meals prepared straight from the garden, I was needing a bit of a change today! So two hours ago I drove off into le Gers, which I always think of as my own Big Sky Country...
I was following this sign, which I'd spotted on our local roundabout last week...I do prefer the prices and the wonderful open-air nature of Vide Greniers, but a braderie at a brocante (a closing down sale at an antique shop) really did draw me in!I've been to this brocante before, when we had a rental house not too far from it on our arrival in France. I found the prices of the big stuff quite overwhelming, and didn't yet have my eye in for the small things I've come to cherish and collect over the intervening years.
But it's worth showing you some photos of the 'big stuff', which the brocanteuse had put outside (in the frequent showers). It's worth a gawp - go on, what catches your eye?
Would you snap up those bed ends? I would, given the right circumstances...
And they'd clearly been serving coffee on their antique garden tables - what a nice idea.
Look, shutters! But not at all like ours - more on those to follow (when we actually get them finished).
So, go on, what would you have bought? This is what I picked up - I'll clean it all up and show you tomorrow!
The big sky was wonderful after a week staring at woodwork. The sunflowers in the fields (grown for oil) were also wonderfully cheering.
I was delighted to spot a little patch of 'volunteers' by the edge of an empty field. These self-seeded sunflowers will never be harvested, so I think they're fair game!
They do look cheerful in the house on a gloomy day!

A little bit of everything...

Denise and then Pomona have shown us their darning mushrooms, and used them as a symbol of their 'Make Do and Mend' approach to dottie angel's Utmost Challenge. I thought I should show you what must surely be a French equivalent - do you not think this must be a darning egg? Alternative suggestions are welcome... I bought it as part of a job lot of sewing notions at a Vide Grenier earlier this year. Now, temptations for those of us doing the Utmost Challenge come in all shapes and sizes. Mine was so small it could fit inside a napkin ring...

Look at that - I had forgotten - Ben's credit card offers us a half price subscription to a magazine for six months, starting every September! I already get Avantages, the French version of Easy Living, at a permanently reduced rate - it helps me improve my French, honest, so it's not an indulgence (much). However, la Journal de la Maison and (swoon) Campagne Decoration??? Folks, I resisted. This was my first real trial, I have to admit. On a brighter note, Seranata has just come to my rescue in an extraordinary way, over a bit of trouble finding a second hand guitar tuner! More info to come...

Now to my Rentré Resolutions, which are listed accusingly to your left... As you can see, I'm cycling to school with my boys every morning and it's not usually hard to go on a cycle ride after leaving them behind their bars(!). You saw photographic evidence of a cycle ride yesterday, so that one is going fine...

Watching the French news is just not working out. It's either at 8pm (too early, too busy) or 10.30 (OK if I'm home alone, but annoying if Ben's at home and we're chatting, eating, drinking, working etc). Thus, except when Ben's been working abroad, that resolution isn't happening yet, and I'm feeling the lack of a nightly news update.

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Isn't the photo above just too wonderful? Or wouldn't it have been wonderful, if I'd had the foresight to take a floral mug, instead of the tacky one Ben won at the fair?

These rather scrummy photos kill two birds with one stone. They show you the very charming quilted throw that I bought second hand this weekend (the VG was off, for unpublished reasons, but there was a Braderie in the next village, so I survived).
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They also lead us on to my next resolution, which is about keeping up with my spiritual journal. That's the pretty notebook - Paperchase's recycled range, bought before I started the Challenge! Basically, that's going well, although I need to remember to make time earlier in the day whenever I can (hence the rocking chair under the grape vine), rather than trying to write in it when I'm going to bed, and just too tired to think.

The final challenge is about not taking on too much. It helped me when I saw this great swap (still time to sign up), and I actually took a few days to think about what I would make, and how I would make it all work out, before I signed up. That was a helpful discipline - wish I could do it more often! I'm trying to apply the same principle to Bekimarie's Christmas Stocking Swap; just giving it a few days to plan what I would do and reflect on if I have the time.

It's been a really useful resolution at work, too. I've started some exciting, but challenging, work for a very exclusive Language School. All my training is being done by the boss, and it's a great opportunity, but the school basically has more work available than it has teachers to do it. I've taken on some slots, and some one-offs, but have remembered that I am a mum before I am an earner, and said 'no' when I've needed to. A timely resolution, then!
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Finally, at the Braderie, Father Christmas and his elves (Pere Noel et ses lutins) got involved in the Utmost Challenge in a big way, if you get my meaning. I also bought a Swatch watch for 15 euros - not cheap but much needed and 'as new'. I then waltzed up to the very cheerful ladies at the cash desk with this:

'Ah, une chemise de nuit ancienne!' they exclaimed (with looks of 'How on earth did I miss that one myself?' etched across their faces - he-he!)

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'C'est pas ancienne,' I disagreed, looking at the plastic buttons, the machine stitching, the '70s label inside...
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'Si, elle a peut-etre 30 ans!' they replied... Ooh, 30 years old is ancienne, now... I feel so old...

But it disn't stop me from wearing it as a dress today. Son 2 said I looked like a cross between a ghost and a housemaid. Thanks, Son.

I cried at the Braderie today...

Well, for those of you who don't know what a braderie is, this title is indeed as odd as it sounds. A braderie is only a hyper-organised version of a twice-yearly jumble sale (the French are in fact hyper-organised, despite stereotypes to the contrary), so what on earth could bring tears to my eyes?I'd gone along to the large but slightly down-market braderie near my Thursday lunchtime lesson, mainly in the eternal search for more trousers for Son 2 and some fabric for my stash.

Both searches were successful. Some nice linen here; much cheaper buying it this way:I also discovered the knot of vintage scarves for one euro that I'd turned down in the autumn:

The red, white and black one is smudged and ruined, but discovering that this Pierre Cardin one is a lovely silk, and in great condition, decided me... And this orange rayon one is great fun, even if it's in poor condition.For 33c each, why not?So, taking one last turn round a table I'd visited before, amongst the collected grot of the last two decades, I suddenly saw a glimpse something else:And tears prickled in my eyes! I didn't bawl, you'll be glad to know, but I was quite surprised by the strength of my emotion.

It's not very old, it's not even hand-stitched, but the pearl buttons and the cotton and the careful stitching speak of something else to me, something far away from the nylons and machine production of the rest of the braderie offerings.Even if it's not a fine example, more of a copy, I was transported from mass-production to craftsmanship.Seeing it there, unappreciated, at only one euro when everything else was going for two or more, I nearly wept for it!

But I think this little top has come to a good home now.Are there things in the fabric world that can move you to tears?