Christmas Morning.

No stockings this year. We either left them behind in Vancouver or they're in one of the innumerable boxes still waiting to be unpacked. 

We also left it a little late--late on Christmas Eve in fact--to buy a Christmas tree. "Desolée," they said at Bricomarché. All gone. So we roamed around the outdoor section, currently filled with heather, pansies and dispirited-looking plants left over from the summer and eventually bought a very small tree, about a foot high, in a pot. Once we'd adorned it with a single string of lights and our littlest decorations, it looked very sweet.

Christmas morning dawned bright and frosty. Down at the boulangerie, the mood was cheerful. The other madame there pointing out that this was not a good day for a swim in the lake. Croissants and pains aux raisins were another break with tradition but we knew we were in for a feast of Rabelaisian proportions later in the day.