Bastet

This is certainly well worth bookmarking, thanks.  There's a little haberdashery in our village where there is a small selection of delighful patterns, circa 1950s, costing around €10 each.  They'd probably make a fortune as collector's items on eBay.

Lots of root veggies, soups, pulses and grains, as delicious Indian or Italian dishes. I don't eat much meat but for the OH, I find Lidls offers good value for minced beef, chicken, sausages and frozen fish e.g. 1kg bag of fozen cod for about €8, 700g salmon fillet for €6.  ED sells frozen mince which was less than €5 kilo a while ago, which is handy to keep on hand for emergencies.   For the two of us, frozen veg is cheaper than fresh, I freeze stale bread crusts until there's enough to make savoury bread and butter pudding and I have a very obliging OH who will eat more or less anything, so I am able to get away with all sorts of interesting creations from leftovers.  

Sunday 14th December - Marché de Noël at La Mothe St Héray in Deux Sevrès.   Includes marché aux truffles from 9.30am, and truffle recipe tastings from 11.30.   There will be craft workshops for children at the restored water mill (Moulin du Pont l'Abbé) from 2pm, and guided tours of the mill at 3 and 5pm (with a bilingual guide)    Plenty of street events, including performances by local choirs, as well as the 60 stalls both indoors and outside.  These include handmade gifts, local handicrafts, local food and drink delicacies and British Christmas goodies!.   Something for all the family, well worth a visit.

Interesting reading Craig. The feeders are nowhere near the windows so maybe it was a reflection of the tree & sky. If it's not minus 5 degrees after dark this evening, I'll take a bird's eye look at the house from the outside.  It was more odd though, the way the little chap sat on the windowsill looking in for so long. Nothing resembling a silver milk bottle top is in that room !!

These are not companies, but sites offering home owners and sitters the opportunities to contact each other directly.  Whatever arrangements are made between the sitters and sittees are private. The sites offer guidelines as to basic contracts and agreements etc. if the parties so wish.  Besides, most insurance companies would be happier to have a home occupied than not.. If you look at them, you'll see what I mean.

Although we have four cats, three of them are very lazy and hardly ever leave the house in the winter and the other seems to be more interested in mice. We put seed etc out for the birds around and near a tree about 20 metres form the house but blue tits & robins often come right up to the back of the house & perch on the back of the bench outside the window. One evening recently a blue tit keep dashing itself against the back windows and then just sat on the windowsill, looking in for about 15 minutes. It didn't seem injured or stunned at all.  I thought it was attracted by the light so I turned it off and the bird still sat there.   We turned the outside light on, went out & moved the window box a few inches and it finally flew away. We left the outside light on for about 10 minutes and thankfully, it didn't return. What would have caused this behaviour?   Can they lose their bearings?

You might want to look at these websites for house-sitting. You can register as house-sitters and wait for the offers to flood in...!! www.housecarers.com www.mindmyhouse.co.uk    

In the Leclerc in St Maixent L'Ecole (79) there are veggie-burgers but they're not very inspiring.  OK for a barbie I suppose, if the vegetarian doesn't want to be left out. 

........is the title of a letter I received recently from the Chambre de Métiers in Niort.   It's all about their opposition to statutes articles 3 and 27 of this law.   Article 3 they seem to be saying in a nutshell, will "légalise le travail noir", but I'm not so sure what they're saying about 27. Has anyone else received anything similar?  They're drumming up support for their opposition.

I can't speak for the electrician C&G qualifications, but my OH registered 18 months ago as a menuisier with his C&G carpentry & joinery certificates; They had to be translated by an official translator ( we used an English guy in another department, I can give you his details if you PM me), but they were accepted by the CdM without any problem. He also has decennal insurance; again, no problem with having english qualifications. Makes a refreshing change.

Thanks. I know how to post a photo and intend to, as I said.  I just won't be able to take one until this afternoon. Update: Camera batteries died at crucial moment but we think we've browbeaten someone into having kitten.

A french neighbour has a kitten desperately needing a home. It did have one lined up but the people were given another one so don't want this little thing now.  The owner doesn't buy kitten food or even wet food, so this kitten & its sibling have been weaned on adult size croquettes; not the easiest for little tummies to digest. Although they're only 6 weeks old, the owner can't wait to get rid of them and we think in any case theyd be better off in responsible caring homes.  The owner already killed 4 kittens in the litter when they were new born and I don't think would hesitate to chuck this one over the wall into the river if she thinks she's going to be stuck with it. Friends of mine are picking one up tomorrow which leaves one. I can confirm the gender and post some photos tomorrow. They are so pretty, a very pale gold, and very friendly.  We're near St Maixent L'Ecole, Melle, Lezay, Pamproux  79.

"...does it seem a bit expensive to you?" Yes, it's certainly not cheap at that rate of coverage, but I suppose you could just pile it around the vulnerable plants, not cover the ground in between...It's also possible that the price varies with other suppliers but I haven't been anywhere else to look for it......

Was in Melle today so checked out the garden centre & found that this product is actually sold as Paillis Chanvre, (did I say I couldn't read the handwriting?) and is in 100 litre bags for approx 19€. That amount supposedly covers 2-3 sq m.

My pleasure.  I just hope I've read his writing correctly. It could have been chauvre, so I posted a question on a language/dictionary forum about mulch possibilities and the response was it was definitely chanvre.  If it wasn't for the fact that the cats would probably love it as a loo, I'd look into getting it for our garden....