Fashion and Flowers

I woke up to grey skies and rain today so decided to head off by bus to a branch of the famous Galleries Lafayette department store chain which is near me in Montparnasse. I was in the market for a pretty dress to wear out to the fancy restaurants that I plan to visit and maybe to the Opera. My mission was accomplished more quickly than I anticipated as I fell in love with a beautiful black dress that was reasonably priced and even better accompanied by a helpful sales assistant who found my size. After that I found an angora jumper just right for this cold weather for 20 euros - what a bargain and soon I found I was panting slightly with a desire to buy the whole shop!  I ended on the lingerie floor and left clasping a silk negligee and a rather battered credit card!

It was Valentine's day and such a delight to visit the numerous florist shops around our apartment - as you can see, after much inward debating, I bought this lovely bunch of roses. The sales assistant was making a gorgeous bouquet with tiny roses and little crocuses and many other delightful flowers in a little heart shaped box which was so sweet, but as she was busy I decided not to bother her by taking a photograph. There are many small wine shops around us too and I have made an executive decision to buy the small bottles (325 ml) they have here once a week to learn more about champagne - it is purely for research purposes obviously! Most French champagne is consumed by the domestic market with many small companies which we never see in Australia. That night the rain miraculously stopped so we walked to a nice little Burgundian bistro that I had seen on my travels and ate a delicious potato galette and a huge creme caramel( we shared it) accompanied by a nice pinot noir wine from Burgundy. A great treat to spend Valentine's day in romantic Paris.

The next day was sunny, so after meeting Hugh for lunch, I wandered down across the river to the Place des Vosges which looked gorgeous in the sunlight as you can see and visited the house of Victor Hugo, whose book the Hunchback of Notre-Dame I am currently reading, and whose former apartment overlooks the square. I am having a Victor Hugo moment at present as I loved his book Les Miserables and of course the recent movie. I then wandered around the Marais district and visited the Hotel Carnavalet which, like the Victor Hugo house, is free and full of period French furniture, pictures and china. Of great interest to me is the revolutionary section with Napoleon memorabilia and rustic china with worker motifs and slogans like liberty, equality and fraternity in such contrast to the delicate Sevres porcelain in the rest of the museum. I was quite tired by the time I reached the bus stop but optimistic that all this walking was burning off a little of last night's creme caramel! We shall see.