Nous sommes arrives!!

Bonjour tous le monde! Hello everyone! Thought it would be a good idea to get a quick, first entry into the blog of our second “Almost year in Provence”. Truly, we have to pinch ourselves! When we first set off on this adventure one year ago, we never dreamed that we would have the opportunity (or even the desire) to come back for a second year---but here we are!!!

Our flight from Boston to Marseille via Dublin was uneventful but also without much sleep so we were exhausted upon arrival but had plenty of adrenaline to get us through the day! We picked up our rental car (another Peugeot station wagon exactly like the one we got last year) at the airport and drove immediately to our ‘new home’. 950 Chemin des Lauves will be home for us this year and we are quite pleased with the accommodations.

The nice owners, JP and Odile, are still here, living in a small, separate apartment they have in the lower level of the house. They have been teaching us about the pool, house, lawn care etc before they depart Saturday for their ‘almost year in Toronto’. The house is very comfortable-spacious, really, when compared to our rental house last year. It feels a bit large for the three of us right now but when Nicholas and Lindsey or other guests are here it will be perfect. We look forward to being able to use it to entertain friends and host group events and really share the space. As you can see, Sarah is already making good use of sharing the pool with her Dutch friends, Jeanne and Lara.

The weather has been lovely but cooler than it was when we arrived at this time last year. Warm sunny days-up into the 80's but we’ve been using quilts at night when it has been down in the 50's. Also, we have already had our first mistral!! The house is situated on the top of a ridge so when the wind blows we really feel it!

Since our arrival, we have been busy getting settled into the rental home and seeing and catching up with friends. Many of them, like us, have been 'home' in the States or in other European countries, for all or part of the summer so we all have tales to tell. Which brings me to the last thing for this blog entry. When we left Duxbury, it was with heavy hearts and tears in our eyes. It was difficult saying goodbye to family and friends. We had a wonderful summer with them all and will miss them a lot. It was such a great 10 weeks I never had time to sit down and write but one blog entry the whole time, so hopefully I'll get that chapter of our lives onto the blog very soon.

A la prochaine!
Susie