Brrrr

We're back, from very chilly Normandy.  Possibly the coldest holiday ever, in a lovely but quite basic and VERY COLD gite....with no woodburner.  

It was so cold the simnel cake I packed nearly froze and needed to be hacked into pieces with the one and only sharp knife provided...

and the well-known brand of hazelnut spread needed to be chipped out of the jar...

But at least it was sunny.  Most of the time.

I have no idea what you call these stacks of wood, but if we'd had a woodburner we'd have pinched them.  We almost burnt the furniture in desperation as it was...

But despite the cold we managed to get out and about every day.  Random photos of old road signs were taken:

I indulged in the obligatory embarrassment of the Girl by taking photos of cheese:

We couldn't find any pirates, but we did find lovely chocolates and pastries within:

And we ran the legs off the Whippet with a 19 mile walkies (bike ride for us) on a resurfaced railway line.  Here are the Girl and the Boy disappearing off into the haze...

We didn't mean to go that far...

When we weren't out and about we wore as many layers of woolly clothes as possible without restricting the use of our arms, and sat in the sunshine on hideous velour-covered armchairs.  Or Mum, as the case may be...

Warmer than a hot-water bottle...but it made my cutting and sticking and sketchbooking a bit tricky...

We weren't completely without our comforts.  Gite cooking always starts unpromisingly, given the basic equipment and uncontrollable gas cookers, but I was very chuffed with this leek tart invention baked on a pizza tray:

although we all picked off the cherry tomatoes....

And come evening, what could be more cosy than a glass of wine by the fire?

Hmm.  I have a few thoughts....

But a sign of a good holiday must be that we were glad to be home, and appreciative of our warm house with a well-equipped kitchen and the lack of any need for woollen fingerless mitts while chopping vegetables, or the need to wear a hat in bed.  

And I got a ton of cutting and sticking and organising finished, and I'm all inspired and ready to go for the summer term, so that's very good indeed.