It's already the first of July! The month of June is a blur, and we're very happy to be done with the move-in process here in Laurens. We turned the corner on Saturday, with a trip to Bezier to return items we bought and couldn't use. Now we feel settled in, and spent Sunday exploring and hiking, one of our favorite pastimes here in Languedoc.

But first, a recap of housing adventures. As you all know, we love our terrace (see pictures in our album "Week 2 Settling In) and we spend a lot of time out there, for breakfast, lunch and dinner specifically. Because it's so sunny here, we wanted to install a "parasol", but it had to be one that would be "inclinable" so we could adjust it to the sun's path. After multiple tries, we abandoned the idea. There is so much wind here, and as we jut out into the landscape, we get it from all directions. We bought the heaviest and most reliable parasol available, and even with all the supports installed, and BOTH of us standing on it, it blew over. So back it went to Castorama, the French equivalent of Home Depot. We will use sunscreen and hats instead of worrying about flying parasols!

Have you ever painted ceramic tiles in your kitchen? Well, it's doable. The French do have an amazing "gamme" of paints available for any surface--I've already coated a formica cupboard for the kitchen and it worked quite well. We started with a kitchen window surrounded by what I thought was silver tile, but turned out to be blue tile covered with silver contact paper. So off came the contact paper, and after significant cleaning, on went a special primer, and then the top coat. Now, instead of mostly dirty white and silver/blue tiles, I have all cheery yellow tiles. Whew! That was sure fun!

We've a few minor adjustments for the "living floor". Lighting is an issue here, since the largest wattage I've been able to find for a light bulb is 60 watts. That doesn't give a room with stone walls much light. We are on the lookout for a nice solid floor lamp, so we can see what we're reading on the first floor.

A coat of paint in our bedroom to erase pink walls helped a lot. We are still dumping everything we don't know what to do with in our spare bedroom.

Next, we are concentrating on the terrace. We had "the English plumber" here today to give us a quote on installing an "evacuation", which means a drain for the sink of the summer kitchen. It's a bit complicated, and will be most likely costly, but we are determined that we will benefit from it very much. It's good for exercise to carry dishes and food from the first to the third floor 2-3 times a day, but not much fun. And the stairs are a bit steep and slippery too.

Enough of housing! Yesterday we took a day off and did some exploring. We started in a little town called Sauvian at a "vide-grenier", what we call a flea market. We bought, for the huge sum of 4 euros, a little cabinet for one of the bedrooms. With a few coats of paint, it will work well as a place to store sheets and towels.

From there, we stopped for lunch at a lovely village called Serignan, and then went on to Portiragnes, near the Mediterranean, for a hike, or "ballade" along the Canal du Midi, and then out into a laguna area that sits next to the sea. It was a gorgeous day, and we enjoyed seeing all the different ecology systems in one place. And one of the joys of walking along the Canal is the ever-present platane trees that provide lovely shade.

From there, a stop in Cessenon-sur-Orb for an ice cream, followed by a foot soak in the Orb, where we watched French boys jumping off a cliff into the water. SCARY! I kept thinking about our 4 grandsons...

Speaking of grandkids, we have skyped a bit, which is fun. They are all busy with summer activities, as you all are. Thanks for taking a minute to check out our blog, which we will update weekly.

And have a safe and happy Fourth of July!

Love,

Elise & Les