Are any of you feeling like we have Advent Calendar overload? I find it so strange that something non-secular with a Christianity basis has now become a part of the retail seasonal products. But I shouldn’t be surprised. We live in a commercialized world and if businesses think they can make money off a product, they will make it and sell it. Black Friday sales are now a worldwide event… even in Paris!

Before I ever fell in love with Paris, I was an anglophile and frankly, I still am. What would Sunday nights be without the great British mysteries?

I have a comfort level with Britain that I may never have with France. It might be the language, but I also think as Americans, we view ourselves as sharing with Great Britain, the commonality of foods, architecture, writers, clothing, and even laws. And even though there would be no America without the financial and military support of France, and we were fighting the Brits … we seem more than a bit obsessed with the royal family, Downton Abbey, and British gardens!

Some of my favorite books and please do share yours!

I purchased my Paris apartment just 6 months before the start of Covid. I purchased my Boston condo the first spring after covid receded. One was a new neighborhood, the other a new culture.

Walking through my little Paris neighborhood, purchasing items for my dînatoire with a good friend, I realized I was feeling at home.

Hello everyone. I just returned from 6 days in Avignon, which is in the Provence region of France. I’ll share more about that trip in the January issue of the Extraordinary Women Magazine, but what I found so interesting is how different the various regions of France are. It isn’t just the terroir, as the French call it, that is different. The foods are different, the accents are different, the greetings are different (three kisses versus two!), and the people even look different.