Our Juicy Life

New friends far away

In September we went to the Aveyron region of France for 3 weeks. We had never been there before, didn't know anyone, but figured we'd check out this remote beautiful region. We stayed in a gite called Le Roucan, owned by Nala & Neerva. It was amazing and very rural. When we arrived with our bikes Nala said to us "my neighbor down the lane owns one of the lightest bikes in the world". Sure, Bruce said....right...in the middle of nowhere a guy has the lightest bike. Nala promised to introduce us to him.

The next morning Nala is tapping on our door telling us he spoke with Jacques, who is the man who has the lightest bike. Jacques will take you on a bike ride today...now....get ready! WHAT? So back down the road we went. The place we were staying was the last house on a very long road (about 1 mile up), it was at the end of the road. Jacques place was the 2nd house on the road, called Feniryols. So, we drive down to his beautiful french home with our bikes. Jacques is about 60 and fit as anything. He kisses us 3 times and was so warm and welcoming. He immediately took us into his "bike room" and there it was....his bike....and Bruce was amazed. It weighs 4,257 kg. That's nothing! His bike is worth probably 15K - 20K. Seriously, we were shocked. We weren't in Paris or Toulouse or Nice...we were in the middle of nowhere, in rural france and here we are with this man who loves bikes as much as us. FATE.

We went on many rides with Jacques and his girlfriend Fabian and our new friends Fabrice & Anke. We instantly made a connection with all of them. It felt so comfortable...like home. Jacques invited us to his home for dinner one night. Which I hear is very very unusual. Most french people who have only known for 2 week don't invite you to their home for dinner. We were honored. Our dinner included Jacques, his daughter (who was visiting for the weekend from Pau) and our host Nala (unfortuantely his wife Neerva was out of town). We had duck, fois gras, amazing wine, great conversation, etc...it was a truly magical night that ended at 2 am. We knew that we had met people who would be friends for life.

We spoke with Jacques today on the phone. It was great to hear his voice and we can't wait to see him. But we heard some sad news. Fabrice and Anke have separated and are getting divorced. They have 2 beautiful girls, but sometimes that's not enough to keep a marriage together. It was sad to hear that, boy you really see people differently when they are out of their home. Jacques told me that Anke wants to move back to Germany (where she was born and all her family is) and that made me sad too. Anke and I really hit it off. I am very athletic and love to bike, run, swim, etc...and she is exactly the same. I was so looking forward to having a good friend there. I am trying to reach her now to see what her plans are. I hope she'll be around some of time we are there, but who knows.

We are still so excited about our sabbatical, but it's strange how much can change in 6 months. We know that we still have very good friends waiting for us to return, but it's different somehow. When I was there the landscape and the lifestyle, it all seemed so dreamlike to me, but when you look at it you realize that people are the same all over the world, be it in a big city in America or in the rural countryside of France.

Sugar Snap Pea Salad

There is a restaurant across from our studio called Beacon it's about 2 years old.  Lately I've been going there for lunch with my 2 friends Laury and Stephanie.  The first time was with Steph and she recommended this salad.  I loved it so much I decided to make it at home, so we had it for dinner tonight.  I had to share it with you, because not only is is really good, but it's really easy.

The ingredients for the salad are simple (this is for 4 servings)

6-8 ounces of sugar snap peas
5-6 radishes (sliced very thin)
goat cheese - this you'll have to eye, some people like loads of goat cheese (like us) and others might not like so much
cashews (I used about 1/4-1/3 cup)
vinaigrette (recipe to follow)

Slice the radish's very thin

In bowl combine sugar snap peas, radish, goat cheese and cashews.

For the vinaigrette

1/5 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup rice wine vinegar
1 teaspoon dijon mustard
1 teaspoon honey
1/2 cup sesame oil

Mix all together

I then lightly mix up the salad, plate it and then drop the dressing by teaspoon over the salad.  yum yum.

Book Rentals Cars - check!

We booked our rental cars - yes CARS for our sabbatical in France. Why are we booking 2 cars you ask? It's going to be a crazy couple of days when we first arrive. Remember, we are taking the Queen Mary II from New York to Southampton, England. It's the only way we can get there without having to put Dashell the Golden Retriever in the belly of the plane. So, instead of arriving in France, we arrive in England.

Now comes the tricky part. We will be arriving in Southampton England and we will have our luggage, 2 bikes in their plastic carriers and 3 dogs. I found out that you can not rent a car in England and return it in France - it has to be returned in England Great! And because of 911, the largest car we can rent is this Renault Scenic (above). Do you think everything is going to fit? Keep your fingers crossed.

Here's our plan. We'll pick up the rental car and see if we can get everything in. If we can, great. We will then drive 2 hours to Folkestone, England where we will take Le Shuttle (the part of The Eurostar that your car goes on - you stay in the car during the trip) and we will go under the channel to Calais, France (about a 30 minute ride). We will have a hotel booked in Calais (next on the to do list) and Bruce will drop me, the dogs, our bikes and the luggage off. He'll then turnaround and take the car back to Dover, England. Why Dover and not Folkestone? Well...the Le Shuttle doesn't accept "walk-on" passengers, only people in their cars. And the regular Eurostar leaves from London (too far away). So, he has to take the ferry from Dover to Calais. Dover is only about 15 minutes by taxi from Folkestone. AHHHHH! So, that takes car of the car from England...we'll have it for 24 hours, we just need to get all of us & our belongings to France and then we'll take it back (well, bruce will take it back). If we find that we can't fit all our belongings in the car, the we move to Plan B, we will either rent 2 cars or Bruce will take the luggage and bikes to France and I'll stay in a hotel in England and then he'll come back and get me and the dogs. I hope we don't move to Plan B.

Then we'll rent the same car (if we find out that all our stuff won't fit in the one we rent in England - we'll get a bigger one in France) and we'll drive from Calais to our new home (about 9 hours). So, we plan on staying the night in Calais and then leaving the next day for our home. It's going to be tricky and probably a bit stressful, but we travel really well together and the nice thing is that we are not here for a 2 week vacation, so we can take our time getting over and getting to the house. We will be keeping the French rental car for about 2 weeks, hopefully enough time to find another car to buy. Something that runs, is cheap and can just get us around, nothing fancy. We'll buy it and then sell it before we leave in September 09.

So, that's the plan, at least the plan now. Who knows what will happen when we get there. But that's the exciting part, that's the adventure. Stay tuned.

A Warm Welcome

                   

This is Bruce when we were in France in 2006.  We went to Provence (stayed in Lourmarin for 10 days) and then went over to the Dordogne (stayed in a 200 year old restored bread oven for another 10 days) just north of Riberac.  It was an amazing trip.  This is Bruce in Perigoux, with our daily baguette.

Travis, who is taking over teaching our classes for us when we leave in September has been in over to the studio the last couple weeks to meet all the kids and parents.  He's been welcomed with open arms and it just makes me smile.  Our customers are great!  They know that we love France and that we really want to take this sabbatical and have been nothing but supportive and positive.  The kids are amazing...they are so open and flexible and have been great, they love Travis already.  Travis looks like Bruce's brother, which helps, but he's also a great teacher, artist and is very personable and friendly with everyone.  We need that...we want to make sure that everyone is taken care of when we are gone.

               

This is a view from our bread oven in the Dordogne.  We fell in love with that area...also called the Perigord.  There are 4 regions (the black, purple, white and green).  We probably would have moved there, but it gets really really cold during the winter.  It's more west and north from where we are renting the house, but hopefully we'll take a weekend trip to see the owners of our bread oven Chris & Mike.

                  

Our first 10 days were spent in Provence...in the village of Lourmarin.  Where Peter Mayle wrote "A year in provence".  It was so beautiful.  We biked everywhere and had a wonderful time.  The only bummer was that is was in March and "les mistrals" were blowing.  These are the spring winds...not warm santa ana winds like we get in Southern California, these were cold, strong blowing winds.  There were some days I thought I was going to get blown off my bike. 

We had our appointment with the Consulate General of France in Los Angeles to get our long stay visa, but had to cancel it because Bruce noticed that his Visa expired in November - oops!  He went to the post office to get it renewed and he should get it in 4 weeks.  Then we'll reschedule our appointment with the Consulate.  We had to get tons of paperwork ready for our appointment.  Marriage license, 3 copies of passport, 3 copies of application, letter stating we have health insurance, copies of our bank statements, copies of our tax return (since we own our own business), letter from us stating that we will not work in France, etc...According to the person I spoke with if all our paperwork is in order we'll get our long stay visa that day.  I hope it goes smoothly.  Will keep you posted.

The dogs have a vet appointment tomorrow for their rabies blood test - titer test.  It must be done 30 days after the rabies shot and it has to be sent to an approved university (university of Kansas) to be processes and then the results need to be sent back and I need to send these over to Cunard Cruise line by May 1st.  I need to send them paperwork to show the dogs are micro chipped, then rabies shots and then the titer blood test (needs to be negative).  All this has to be done in order and at certain times or we won't be able to get them into England.

We have started to clean out our closets and get rid of stuff.  We are not pack rats by any means, but man there are things I don't even remember that I have.  How sad!  I packed up 2 bags full of clothes and shoes and gave them to a woman who lives down the block, she's a single mother, her daughter is 11 and her mom lives with her, they have garage sales a lot and I know that money is tight, so I hope that she can either use the stuff that I gave her or sell them.  I makes me feel good to help her out, she's a good lady just trying to survive in Los Angeles, not easy.

We only have April & May left for our after-school classes and then June-July-August for our 1/2 day camps.  Then we'll spend the first 2 weeks of September with Travis and then we'll take off for our cross country road trip and then leave NYC for England on October 4th.  It will be here before we know it and we are so excited.  I can't tell you how excited we are.

We are lucky we have such great customers, who are supportive of our sabbatical and will still continue to send their kids to our studio.  I know they will be pleased with Travis and his passion for art and kids.  It's the most important thing, to make sure that our customers are taken care of.  We wouldn't be able to leave if we thought that  the studio would suffer...we know it's in good hands.

PRO BAKING I

                  

This is our neighbor at our studio ...The New School of Cooking.  What a great neighbor to have.  Anne is the owner of the business and it's a wonderful place, it's also nice when Anne brings over this amazing flourless chocolate cake!  2 years ago I took a Crepes class and loved it. I bought 2 crepe pans and have made many sweet and savory crepes over the years.   I love to cook and love to bake and I was checking out their schedule and I have always wanted to take their Pro Baking I series.  It's on Sunday from 9:30 - 1:30 for 10 weeks.  So, I'm going for it...here's what it's all about.

PRO BAKING
The professional baking program teaches the foundations of classic baking technique for
anyone who loves to bake and wants to understand baking in depth, or for students who
are interested in a pastry career. We will teach technique as well as the chemistry of
baking so that students will truly understand what they are making. Classes meet once a
week for four hours and emphasize seasonally appropriate ingredients. Each student
works on their own. Students can miss two classes and receive their diploma.

CLASS 1 Quick Breads: Muffins, Scones and Quick Breads
CLASS 2 Custards, Bread Pudding and Ice Cream
CLASS 3 Soufflés, Pate a Choux and Pastry Cream
CLASS 4 Tarts, Pies, Cobblers and Crisps
CLASS 5 Chocolate Tasting, Double Chocolate Cake with Milk Chocolate Buttercream;
Flourless Chocolate Cake with Ganache Glaze
CLASS 6 Classic White , Cake with Buttercream; Meringues
CLASS 7 Artisan Breads
CLASS 8 Flat Breads and Brioche
CLASS 9 Puff Pastry and Croissants
CLASS 10 Complete Puff Pastry and Croissants

I have decided to take this program over the summer.  I wanted to take it last summer but I was so into my pottery that I didn't want to give up 4 hours on Sunday to do it.  But, I must say that I haven't thrown pottery since November.  I feel a bit like a poser, because on my "about me" link I say that I'm a potter....well I am a potter, but I haven't been that into it lately.  It's OK, it's not my full time job, it's just a love of mine and sometimes it's good to take a break.  It was a very rainy cold winter here in Los Angeles and my studio is in the garage...a non-insulated garage.  It was cold, wet, damp, freezing, windy, cold, cold, cold...I had NO desire to get out there and throw. 

I have been cooking much more and I like a warm kitchen to a cold studio any day.  I would like to take some pottery classes/workshops while I'm in France but for now I'm into cooking and baking.  I'm super excited and can't wait to start.  Unfortunately it doesn't start until June 1st, but that will be here before you know it. The do have one that starts in a couple weeks but it's during the week until 10:30 at night and I just can't do that...I'm in bed by 9:00 -9:30.   Summer is easy for us - we work Tuesday-Friday from 9-1pm.  So we have Saturday, Sunday and Monday off and the afternoons free Tuesday-Friday.  It's something to look forward to over the summer.  Look at all I'll learn.  And my teacher is Carol, who I know well, her daughter Pearl took classes from us, she's an amazing teacher & cook.  If you live in Los Angeles I highly recommend the new school of cooking!  I'll be blogging about my experience too, so stay tuned.  I think I'm most excited about week 10 - Croissants...I have tried so many times to make croissants and I just end up with dinner rolls.

Banana Bread

This is NOT my image above.  I took it from Elise, her blog is Simply Recipes  and it's great!  All of her recipes are excellent.  I wanted to make banana bread and found this recipe, so I tried it and it was amazing.  I've made it twice in 2 weeks.  I was never patient enough to get a good shot of the bread after it came out of the oven...I couldn't wait to taste it.

The ingredients are simple.  Bananas, butter, sugar, egg, vanilla, baking soda salt and flour (nuts are optional). The recipe is so easy. 

First, you don't need a mixer and you only use 1 bowl.  With a wooden spoon, mix butter into the mashed bananas in a large mixing bowl. 

Mix in sugar, egg and vanilla.  Sprinkle the baking soda and salt over the mixture and mix in.

Add the flour last, mix.  Pour mixture into a buttered 4x8 inch loaf pan and bake for 1 hour.  Cool on a rack.  Remove from pan and slice to serve.  The first one I made I added walnuts and the second I didn't...both were great.

We like to toast it just a bit and top with butter

It only lasts a couple days...not because it spoils, but because we have it for breakfast, mid-day snack and late snack.  This is the best banana bread I have ever had.  Please try it out Banana Bread recipe  and check Elise' blog daily for new recipes, you won't be disappointed either way.

All about Augie

                   

I wanted to take a moment to introduce everyone to Augie (Augustus).  He is 15 1/2 and a "smutty" pug.  He has been gray since I rescued him at 6 months.  They call this type of gray pug "smutty", which I don't think is a very nice name to described him...his coat is lovely and soft and salt & pepper.  His face was pure black, but now it's almost all gray.  He is the man, the Buddha pug, my baby.  He has been with me for so long.  This picture above was taken about 4 years ago, when we was 11 1/2. 

Augie was rescued from Little Angeles Pug Rescue here in Los Angeles.  He was 6 months old when I got him.  He had been thrown from a car and picked up on the street, he came with the name Dino, but I changed it to Augustus (Augie for short).  He had pneumonia and was malnourished (patches of his hair were gone).  He was skinny and scared.  But he soon realized that he was safe and became my shadow.  He has followed me to every room I went to since I got him.  But that's changing a bit because he is so old and can't hear anymore.  Because he is getting older I wanted to do a post about him.  I'm not sure how much longer he'll be with us.  The average life span for a pug is 13 years.  Augie is something like 107 years old in human years.

This picture above was taken a while ago too...notice the black his face, not pure black but not completely gray.  Right now Augie is deaf and is loosing his site.  He doesn't produce tears (which is common with pugs) and so he has developed scarring on one of his eyes.  I have to give him drops, 2x a day.  The prescription says "1 drop 2x a day...FOREVER".

5 years ago we dressed him up as a Bee for Halloween.  He wasn't too happy about it.  He didn't like the costume too much, but he was a trooper and went to the studio so the kids could see him. 

This is a typical scene these days.  He's an old man...and he falls asleep either sitting down (this picture was taken about 2 years ago) or now he falls asleep standing up.  When you are tired your tired!

This was our Christmas card in 2007.  It took a while to take the picture, Augie can't hear so we had a hard time getting him to stay.  Stella is young and moves all the time.  Dashell was great - he sat there with this bow on his head for about 10 pictures, never moving a muscle.

This is Augie at the dog park.  Every day we take all the dogs to the park.  Dashell plays with his cone, Stella plays with her Frisky frolic and Augie roams around.  I have to keep a close eye on him, because he can't see well and can't hear and sometimes he wanders off...not sure he knows where he is going.  Sometimes you come up behind him to grab him or tap him on the shoulder and he takes off like a deer - just running away from you...it's a pretty funny site.  I think going to the park keeps him young.  He has a great time there.

These 2 pictures above are typical Augie when I'm in the kitchen cooking.  He is either alert and waiting for a snack or he's sound asleep.  Either way he's happy just being where I am...and I'm happy with him at my side.  I have never loved an animal so much in my life!

This picture was taken a couple weeks ago.  Notice the gray face.  Augie sleeps a lot and has aged very fast over the last 3-4 months.  Sometimes he seems very anxious and agitated...we think maybe because he can't hear and just can't relax, we are not sure.  He won't lay down, just paces around the house.  Other times he's out...and I mean out!  When we come home and he's sleeping we have to see if he's breathing because he continues to sleep while we are making a ruckus with the other dogs...but he's sleeping, he just can't hear us.

He also just won a cutest dog contest on the internet.  I had all of our customers vote and he won.  Stella won 3rd place! 

Thanks for letting me introduce you to my little man.  Well, not so little, he's 24 lbs and solid as a rock.  He's so healthy, I have never had to take him to the vet for a medical problem.  His teeth are horrible but other than that he's going strong.  I hope he'll still be with us in September so he can go to France.  I know that he'd love it there.  I am getting prepared...I know the time isn't that long away, but for now, I just cherish every day this handsome guy is around.

France...here we come!!!

               

How beautiful is this house?  We loved it from the moment we saw it on the internet.  We knew this would be the house we would live in for 1 year.  It's called Les Costes  and it's in the Aveyron region, our favorite region of France.  It's located about 1 hour northeast of Toulouse.

We sent an email out today to all our customers.  It's official.  We are taking a 1 year sabbatical in France...1 year in this lovely home.  We have been working on our plan for about 5 months, but I haven't been able to post anything because some of our clients read my blog and I wasn't ready to tell them yet.  But now we have a person who will be taking over the teaching of the classes.  This was the hardest part...finding someone to fill Bruce's shoes.  Everyone loves Bruce and I will say that he is amazing with the kids and is casual, relaxed, patient, fun, cool and a great artist.  We have a friend, Travis, who we have known for 15 years.  He's Bruce's long lost soul brother.  Same personality, same gift with kids, an artist, surfer, cyclist, etc...we wanted him, wanted him so bad...well, he accepted our offer to take over the studio for 1 year.  That happened last week.  So now I can talk about it.  Now it's official.

So...we leave the end of September.  We are going to rent out our home here in LA for 1 year.  We will sell the car (it's an SUV and when we come back we don't need an SUV).  We will rent a car and drive across the US to New York.  We will stop and see friends in Ketchum, Idaho and Boulder, Colorado and see my family in Michigan and then drive on to NYC.  We'll have all the dogs with us too.  We leave on October 4th on the Queen Mary II, from NYC to Southampton, England.  6 days on the ocean.  The boat has 1 level that is a state-of-the-art kennel facility, it's the only way we could travel with the dogs, as I would NEVER fly with them in the cargo area of the plane.  We'll arrive in England, rent a car and drive to France.  Then we'll go to our new home and live a new life for a year.

Bruce will spend part of the day painting and drawing and I'm looking into cooking classes and pottery workshops.  We'll bike with our friends Jacques & Fabiana and Fabrice & Anka.  We'll hang out in the cafe, drink great coffee, great wine and eat great food.  We'll travel and see more of France and I'll take Bruce to Italy.  Most of all we will re-charge our batteries.  We are both a bit burned out right now.  We have been teaching art at our studio for 9 years and the longest break we have had was 3 weeks (and that was in September).  Teachers have the summers off and professors have sabbaticals for a reason.

I'll keep you posted as the time comes closer.  We have loads to do:  rent the house, sell the car, get the studio turned over, get the dogs ready to enter England (loads to do there), get our long-stay VISA's, etc...
We are both so excited and so ready for our new life.  I'll keep this blog going while we are there, so you can hear about all our adventures in France.

Stay tuned...

Citizen of the Month Interview

I participated in The Great Interview Experiment which came from the  Citizen of the Month blog.

I interviewed Lesley who is originally from Scotland but now lives in France.  How lucky for me!

               

Her blog is called "PEREGRINATIONS " 
    Noun: peregrination  `perugru'neyshun

1. Travelling or wandering around

1.    How did you come up with the name for your blog?

If I remember rightly I chose the title more for the sound of the word "peregrinations" than for its meaning although as it turned out that the blog has been a meandering journey from point to point with no real focus. I added the subtitle "or maybe just havering" a couple of months ago, if I remember rightly, as an attempt to nip n the bud any expectations random readers might have of an exotic travel blog.

2.    How would you say your blog has changed from 2005 - 2008

I probably post less often and less regularly than in 2005 and I tend not to blog about anything work-related any more.

3.     You have been blogging since 2005.  Do you still enjoy it?

I go through periods of enthusiasm and others of de-motivation but I never force myself to blog just because I feel I should. The aspect I enjoy most is the discussion that is sometimes sparked off in the comments box.

4.    why did you start your blog.  How would you describe it?

I started the blog as part of an online EVO (Electronic Village Online) course for educators. I learned a lot about the tools of blogging in a relatively short time and  quickly put it into practice with a group of students later that year.

5.    What's up with this Wordless Wednesday...I see it everywhere.

I've posted a Wordless Wednesday photo twice now - I can't remember where i first came across the idea. The first time I linked back to the original project page and garnered dozens of pointless comments from people I don't know saying things like "great photo", "love the tree". However, I do like the idea of lazy blogging just a photo with no commentary, but I won't be linking back any more, I don't really see the point.

6.    When did you move to france and what made you move there?

I moved to France permanently in 1984. I studied French at Edinburgh University and came to Périgueux in the Dordogne to do my year abroad. The classic girl meets French boy story ensued and we're still together all these years later. Aaaaaw.

7.    What is the best thing about living in france and what is the worst thing?

The best thing about living in France is the generally relaxed  ambiance I think, or at least that's the best thing about living in the South-West of France, i don't know if it would be the same in paris, or the North of the country. I like the way people take time over meals, over shopping at the market. I honestly don't have any major gripes about living in France but there are plenty of bloggers out there who do. Bureaucracy can be a pain, and so can dog shit on the pavements, and it would be convenient if shops were open on Sundays. Actually the worst thing at the moment is probably the bling-bling Sarkozy presidency.

8.    Give me an idea of a typical day in your life.

On a typical weekday I get up at around 7H30, wake the children up and then get increasingly annoyed as they dilly dally around the breakfast table. I walk them to school and then hop on the tram to the university. My working day is spent teaching, doing the usual administrative tasks, preparing classes etc. I try to set aside at least one day every week for research. I pick the children up after school and then it's home for a goûter and their generally evasive answers about their day at school. We usually eat at around 8 p.m. and he children go straight to bed after that. Evenings are sometimes spent working, sometimes watching American series, sometimes surfing ... actually how do I spend my evenings, where does all that time go? I have no idea, suddenly I look at the clock and it's midnight and time to go to bed.

9.    Disney World?  Why Disney World?   Every time we are in france we find someone who asks about Florida or wants to go to Florida.

In the past our visits to the USA have always been to places like Arizona, Colorado and new Mexico. But my Mum said a few months ago that it wasn't fair that we didn't want to go to Disney because all of her friends got to take their grandchildren there, so we said gave in and are graciously allowing her to  take us to Florida. The children are 7 and 5 so probably the ideal age for this sort of extravaganza.

It was a pleasure to meet Lesley via this interview.  Keep checking her blog to hear how the trip to Disney world was, I'm sure the kids will have a great time.  Lesley and her husband will probably need a vacation from this vacation!

Tour of California

                

We are leaving after class today for Palo Alto...just south of San Francisco.  Tomorrow starts the first day of the Tour of California a 9 day ride from San Francisco to Los Angeles...not the 21 day Tour de France, but all the pro's will be there and it's a big deal here in California.  Our good friend Rebecca is the women's 24 hour mountain bike WORLD champion  and she's being flown up there to follow the tour from beginning to end and she'll do many photo shoots and signings...so she'll have VIP passes for us, etc...we'll be back on Tuesday.   We'll do 2 long rides - one tomorrow in Palo Alto and the other on Monday in Santa Rosa.  We are so excited to get away for a long weekend.