honey we have lost the kids

I am rather behind in my postings, so hope you will forgive me, for this short retrospective...

My dad and great friend came to stay in the first week of June. As before they are staying with Cathe just down the road from us. We have had some brilliant weather in May so fingers crossed for their week.

Mark did the airport run with moi for assistance. They were out of the highly efficient  airport quickly at five thirty as i had predicted.....all good so far. Lovely to see dad as i have not seen him since October and Shona for a year, both looking fit and well.

With our late arrivals we make it easy for all, so we had prepared a cold platter of meat, bread and cheese at Cathes with obviously a nice glass of something to go with it. Then we left them to unpack in peace.

Cathes beautiful family home

After a trip to the Intermarche on the Friday for some light provisions for their week we all had a chilled day. Marc playing his Parker role in the pink Rolls Royce, picked them up for a risotto at ours with Chris and Annabelle later in the afternoon and very kindly took them home after an enjoyable evening  and repartee at our place.

Saturday i picked them up for the Castelnau marche. In the afternoon we went to the lovely Gertrude and Hannes for their open garden day, the weather was rubbish. This beautiful garden deserves better but sadly the last three years weather wise has been pants! It is the designated weekend that the whole of France open up their special gardens, so their is not so much movement in the dates...but i think once in five years the weather has been good for them.

Later we went to Mirande to the fish restaurant La brasserie des Artes which is very good, Dad and I had a beautiful sea bass, first time in a long time I have had bass. Simply, but beautifully cooked all of us enjoyed the fish, gentle atmosphere and unpretentious but lovely setting. You almost have to come by it in a back street and if you do not know where it is ... it could be possible to that you may miss it.

in between eating we managed a few nice walks

wish i could add more of the colours, the textures and artistry in Hannes and Gertrud's  garden it is amazing 

the iconic sandal could have been cropped out...but it is almost as ancient as these beau barrel  hoops

beautiful poppies in some cases four foot high!

The weather continued to hamper us, in fact all the lunches out proved to be the only good days when we could have walked or gone to another place, a tad frustrating.

On Sunday we invited Jacqueline et Jacque for  lunch with dad and Shona. Mark cooked a 

poulet roule and i did an avocado pesto and cheese starter a new and inspired menu that we had not done for anyone else, plus pud of course. Always nice to have a highly appreciative audience and we certainly had
  

Monday was Pentecost and we had dad and Shona for lunch  and Mark cooked a lovely joint of pork and I helped with a Nigel Slater apple Yorkshire pud, easy and very good. There was of course the full Monty... sounds like we just ate all week...pretty much, with a few gentle strolls in between

On Tuesday we were all invited for drinks and a buffet lunch at Ceciles to say goodbye to Phillippe as he is officially hanging up his teaching gloves...sorry to see him go but cannot say i blame him. 

In the evening we were invited to Cathes and dad cooked for us. Having taken them some inspiration in the morning Dad turned up with a Rick Stein dish from my book that i had never done before...very delicious and one i have repeated often, sometimes replacing the linguine with courgette noodles. Healthier with the latter but not as good as the former! Rick Steins's French Odyssey Provencal fish pasta.

On Wednesday we lost the kids maybe a misunderstanding at all ends. We were due for lunch midi, french terms twelve on the dot. I had tried to put Jacqueline and Jacques off as we were already going to Chris's for supper, but lovely of them to ask. At Midi I rang Jaqueline to say we could not find them, i am worried anything could have happened to them, and it is a forty min drive to Osmets...i had to apologise and say next time. Sadly even though i said before please make it very simple i know she would have gone too a lot of trouble.

We found them around about one they had gone for a long walk in the beautiful woods behind and just lost track of time. I forgot to be cross as i was so was relieved and later we were all able to smile about it as we went out to Chris for an evening meal.

On Thursday I went for my usual stroll with Jan & Taj always good therapy and later took dad and Shona to Toulouse early afternoon for a five-forty departure. Sad to see them go, i think they enjoyed their stay!

 The complete tour!