Tonight is the last day of the Chinese lunar calendar. We are entering the year of the dog, particularly auspicious as we have so many dogs in the family (my father, my husband, my son), from an astrology perspective and also because many are actually… dogs. I’ve been in the best of moods all week, […]

The Fruits of fall and vegetables of winter A few weeks ago, on a Sunday, the girls were playing rough in their room and broke an old chair they used for their desk. A pity as it was a nice chair … but these things happen. Fortunately, about the easiest thing to replace in our […]

Mr McDonnell’s way “Happy wife, happy life!” said Mr McDonnell as we drove (incredibly fast) in his Mercedes from Dublin to Limerick on a very grey but green afternoon in late October. It was his way of explaining why he had been prepared, on a Saturday, to drive 3 hours to Dublin airport and then […]

“On days like these when skies are blue and fields are green” it’s hard to imagine that we were ever in winter or in early Spring. That there were ever days when the trees were bare, the vineyards grey and empty. The cherries in our garden have come and gone, the strawberries are retreating, the […]

Last year Oddur and I had great fun with a little post we did sometime in January, looking back at the year behind us, remembering some of the things that stuck in our memory. Not necessarily the most important things or the highlights but the things we thought might be amusing or useful for you […]

This week the kids started school again*. Again. Strangely enough they were happy about it and so was I. Not because the house is quieter (and besides it’s not really that quiet with a 2-year-old and a newborn and loads of dogs), not because I’ve grown tired of summer and am now longing for autumn […]

Around two years ago I was walking the streets of Toulouse after a wonderful meal: the local Cassoulet and some heavenly desserts. We had invited my aunt, Francine, who more than anyone inspired me to start cooking and I was in high spirits as I walked the streets of the “pink” city in the beautiful […]

This is my husband’s annual blogpost, enjoy! Mimi x On a typical night in our house, Mimi will leave the kitchen after dinner and not return. She will ask me when I’m coming to bed and though I have every intention of coming early I usually come late. My duties in this house start earlier, […]

Sometime last summer I (hopefully – delusionally) announced that from autumn onwards we would launch a redesigned blog with more frequent posts and contributions from my friends. What happened instead was that posts became less frequent, there was no redesign. It’s not a cancellation though, it is simply a postponement. When I started this blog […]

September 10th 2015 Early in the morning, at Bordeaux (Mérignac) airport our one big group splits into two smaller ones. In my group I have four girls: Mia 12, Louise 7, Gaïa 4 and Audrey 1. Oddur has: Gunnhildur 19 and Hudson 9 + two dogs, Humfri and his 10-month old son Dick (for all […]