I am back on the château steps again, but this time it is just me. Zion has gone away for ten days to visit family, so I am home alone for the first time. That is not a problem, though. I have more than enough to keep me busy. And of course, while the cat’s away, you have to visit a brocante or two.
This feels like one of the first proper weekends for antique hunting in France because the weather has finally changed. It is now April, and today we have beautiful sunshine and temperatures of around 24 degrees. For the past two months, everything here has been mud. It rained every single day, which brought almost all progress to a halt. Seeing the ground finally drying out is a relief, although it does mean a new challenge: keeping all the plants watered.
I am very pleased with my little haul from today. I went to a market in Chauvigny and found some wonderful pieces. I picked up two door headers for around fifteen euros each, which will look lovely above the doors in one of our bedroom suites. I also found forty old château-style keys. When the gentleman selling them asked what I wanted them for, he clearly suspected I might own a château. I did not confirm it, knowing full well the price would rise if I did.
There were a few other great finds as well: wall light fittings for our hallway, which we badly need; an antique jug and basin for twenty euros; two old frames for canvases at five euros each; and a marble-topped chest with yellow marble. I was particularly pleased about that, as yellow marble is much harder to find than the more common pink, and it matches the furniture in one of our bedroom suites perfectly.
My main job this week is planting white bedding plants in the wedding garden. I managed to find some at the Chauvigny flower and food market. The plan is for all the plants in the wedding garden to be white, and they will go into the ceramic pots Zion has been making on stands.
Alongside that, I am creating two new flower beds for hydrangeas, which need to be kept out of direct sun and well watered. I am also watering our fifty small olive trees, which are drying out quickly now that the sunshine has arrived, and tidying the greenhouse ready for the new season.
The biggest development is that we have finally started work on the rock wall in the wedding garden. For weeks, we could not get any machinery onto the land because it was so wet. At one point, even our cars got stuck. Now that things have dried out, we are building the wall using rocks collected from all over our own land.
We have also had gîte guests and friends helping us out. Inside the château, there has been plenty of painting as we continue to remove the graffiti in preparation for upcoming weddings. With more guests arriving soon, there are sheets to change and cleaning to do. I certainly will not be bored while Zion is away.
I am looking forward to showing you how it all progresses.
Bye for now.