Our puncture saga continues. I had another flat tyre yesterday. Chris got the tyre irons out again and got busy and found the culprit that he’d missed last time. A tiny thorn. But … that’s all it takes.

So he put a patch on, put everything back together, pumped up the tyre and boom! It exploded.

What's left of the inner tube

If you’ve never heard it, when an inner tube blows up, it’s loud! Certainly makes you jump. Chris once left his bike in the hot sun after pumping up the tyres a bit too enthusiastically. That made an incredible bang when it blew up. I jumped out of my skin and was a nervous wreck for days afterwards! So I’m still without my mountain bike until I get to Leclerc in Gueret for some more inner tubes. Luckily I have the indestructible, clanky-geared purple bike as a standby so I can keep cycling.

I’ve been craftily creative – at last. A little bit anyway. I rustled up some very quick and simple pot pourri sachets to go into the chest of drawers and cupboards in the gite.

I noticed the other day that they had that old wood smell about them. Not unpleasant, but I thought that a spot of pot pourri would be lift it. I originally intended to put dried lavender in my sachets. I have quite a large bag of it. Somewhere. Could I find it today? Sadly no – this is why I need to get more organised! I’ve used pot pourri instead, but having bought some nice bars of budget chevrefeuille (honeysuckle) Marseilles soap this morning, I’m hatching an idea involving them and some of the dozens of linen baby bonnets we inherited here at Les Fragnes. I desperately want to do something with all the old clothes we found. They’re sitting in sacks in the barn at the moment, which they don’t deserve. I have used some of the embroidered bibs I found. They had been nibbled by rats or mice and spoiled but I was able to salvage some of the material. I used it to make keyrings and fridge magnets, which I’ve very pleased with.

Isn't the embroidery beautiful! I wonder who did it.

The meal planning hasn’t been going that well. The drawing up the meals schedule is fine – but not the sticking to it. Too many unexpected things got in the way last week. So I’m going to concentrate on breakfasts only for the rest of this week. Now that we’re cycling to school, we have an extra twenty minutes in the morning before we need to leave, which gives time to cook something. Since I need comfort food at the moment, breakfasts are going to be special the rest of this week.

Wednesday: Welsh pancakes. My kids LOVE these. They’re basically a fried scone. I serve them yogurt and they don’t last long. I don’t bother sieving my flour and use granulated sugar. And definitely a free-range egg.

Thursday: eggy bread. I have a lot of bread to use up, and even more eggs. I have nine hens and at least seven of them are laying every day (not necessarily the same seven), so the egg pile is getting big. I’m giving them away left, right and centre, but still have loads left. So for good eggy bread,beat 3 eggs into a wide, flattish bowl. Add a little milk, salt and pepper. Then dip slices of slightly stale bread into the mix. Prod it around with a fork so the egg soaks in well. Turn the slice over and soak the other side. Now fry in a hot pan for a minute or so until the bread goes golden brown. My kids like it with ketchup but I prefer mine plain. Or with lardons (diced pieces of bacon – you don’t get bacon rashers over here). This recipe is very like French pain perdu which I’ll return to in my blog very soon.

This is just a few days' worth of eggs!

Friday: pumpkin and blackberry muffins, since I have way loads of frozen pumpkin puree and blackberries in the freezer that need using up. I like [Our puncture saga continues. I had another flat tyre yesterday. Chris got the tyre irons out again and got busy and found the culprit that he’d missed last time. A tiny thorn. But … that’s all it takes.

So he put a patch on, put everything back together, pumped up the tyre and boom! It exploded.

What's left of the inner tube

If you’ve never heard it, when an inner tube blows up, it’s loud! Certainly makes you jump. Chris once left his bike in the hot sun after pumping up the tyres a bit too enthusiastically. That made an incredible bang when it blew up. I jumped out of my skin and was a nervous wreck for days afterwards! So I’m still without my mountain bike until I get to Leclerc in Gueret for some more inner tubes. Luckily I have the indestructible, clanky-geared purple bike as a standby so I can keep cycling.

I’ve been craftily creative – at last. A little bit anyway. I rustled up some very quick and simple pot pourri sachets to go into the chest of drawers and cupboards in the gite.

I noticed the other day that they had that old wood smell about them. Not unpleasant, but I thought that a spot of pot pourri would be lift it. I originally intended to put dried lavender in my sachets. I have quite a large bag of it. Somewhere. Could I find it today? Sadly no – this is why I need to get more organised! I’ve used pot pourri instead, but having bought some nice bars of budget chevrefeuille (honeysuckle) Marseilles soap this morning, I’m hatching an idea involving them and some of the dozens of linen baby bonnets we inherited here at Les Fragnes. I desperately want to do something with all the old clothes we found. They’re sitting in sacks in the barn at the moment, which they don’t deserve. I have used some of the embroidered bibs I found. They had been nibbled by rats or mice and spoiled but I was able to salvage some of the material. I used it to make keyrings and fridge magnets, which I’ve very pleased with.

Isn't the embroidery beautiful! I wonder who did it.

The meal planning hasn’t been going that well. The drawing up the meals schedule is fine – but not the sticking to it. Too many unexpected things got in the way last week. So I’m going to concentrate on breakfasts only for the rest of this week. Now that we’re cycling to school, we have an extra twenty minutes in the morning before we need to leave, which gives time to cook something. Since I need comfort food at the moment, breakfasts are going to be special the rest of this week.

Wednesday: Welsh pancakes. My kids LOVE these. They’re basically a fried scone. I serve them yogurt and they don’t last long. I don’t bother sieving my flour and use granulated sugar. And definitely a free-range egg.

Thursday: eggy bread. I have a lot of bread to use up, and even more eggs. I have nine hens and at least seven of them are laying every day (not necessarily the same seven), so the egg pile is getting big. I’m giving them away left, right and centre, but still have loads left. So for good eggy bread,beat 3 eggs into a wide, flattish bowl. Add a little milk, salt and pepper. Then dip slices of slightly stale bread into the mix. Prod it around with a fork so the egg soaks in well. Turn the slice over and soak the other side. Now fry in a hot pan for a minute or so until the bread goes golden brown. My kids like it with ketchup but I prefer mine plain. Or with lardons (diced pieces of bacon – you don’t get bacon rashers over here). This recipe is very like French pain perdu which I’ll return to in my blog very soon.

This is just a few days' worth of eggs!

Friday: pumpkin and blackberry muffins, since I have way loads of frozen pumpkin puree and blackberries in the freezer that need using up. I like]4 but will be using my own puree rather than canned pumpkin, and blackberries rather than blueberries. We’ll be having these with fromage blanc to add a French, low-fat touch.

I’m looking forward to the next three breakfasts!