Pere Noel and other wintery trucs...

Well we've had a whirlwind couple of weeks here in our part of the world, what with a 3 week trip back to the states for Thanksgiving and with me starting french classes at CERN. But I'm determined to get caught up, and this recent heavy snowfall may be just the ticket I need to get the posts a postin'! Today, despite having not slept at all for the last two nights due to a severe case of jet lag (me, not Dan, he's a pro at this), we made it out to the market in time to get a few of our favorite things, see a few of our favorite people, hit up the Thoiry Christmas market, and even catch a glimpse of Pere Noel (seen above)...




Thoiry got dumped on with over a foot of snow just before we flew back this week, and there's still a lot around to make it feel very Christmas-sy on our walks to the Sunday market and elsewhere...(it's also a bit slippery, landing me my first fall two days ago...)



We made it down to the market without any slips on this trip though, and were lucky enough that none of the vendors had begun to close up shop yet...






[I missed green things.]







After the Sunday market was the Thoiry Christmas market! Yeah for festivities!!!


[It's a Hanukkah tree...in a Catholic country! Somehow I don't think this was on purpose...]



Here's our goodies from the marche - marshmallows made on Wednesday (we also now know the life story of the man selling the marshmallows), some Miel de Thoiry, three Christmas ornaments (including one made from a pine cone that is freaking adorable), some Mirabelle confiture (which I've been dying to try!), and a really cool cross stitch that reads "Bon Noel"...in my time here I've found it's difficult to get things actually written in french since they are all into NYC/London/english expressions on deocrative items, so this was a true find in my eyes. Now we just need to purchase a sapine to hang the ornaments on...

More updates and pictures soon, I promise. :)