What a weekend of vide grenier-ing and exotic dancing!

    We were desolés that the friends from Vancouver who stayed with us for the latter part of the week before last had to leave on the Saturday afternoon, thereby missing the flood of attic-emptying that would find its way on to local stalls on Sunday (more of that later).
    So, we were all chuffed to see that the Lavelanet vide grenier was scheduled for Saturday, starting at 6 a.m. We didn't make it that early but we were there around 9 a.m. Not a huge number of participants as the day was grey and chilly. But we did find finds.
    A stack of very old documents covered all over in brown spidery writing were only available as "le lot"--and that was 100 euros. Vintage postcards, on the other hand, were a reasonable 50 centimes. Don't you love this flapper from 1922? Fur stole, feather in her hat, flagrantly red lips, come-hither eyes: she's got the lot.

  

 I also left with a tiny hand-embroidered pin-cushion...

....and a Princess Grace and Prince Rainier tea-cup. Having second thoughts about this one already...

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    A further wealth of possibilities faced us on Sunday, starting right under our noses in Léran. The sun shone, stalls were laden and, rooting through a box of postcards, I chose these--details below each one.

Feel free to contribute guesses as to what's going on here. All I can tell you is that the card is addressed to a Monsieur Joseph Joulin who lived in Narbonne, and the message simply reads: "Paris. 4/2/1914" and a question mark.

This one's more for family consumption, but it was never sent to anyone. A stamp on the back advertises Maison Labau, a clothing store for "hommes et garçonnets", Isn't "garçonnet" a sweet word? It's old French for "a little boy."

I bought this one because of the vintage car and its occupants. 

Barcelona--in the old days. Apologies but I can't make out the date on the postmark.

Turin at night. This is almost my favourite one of the bunch because of its cinéma noir-ish feel.

 
  I also nabbed an enormous piece of red checked fabric, fibres unknown to me to the stall lady (who also sold me these postcards). A picnic blanket?
    Purchases went back to the house before we jumped in the car and drove to Manses, a little village just north of Mirepoix.

Books, DVDs and videocassettes, chinaware, glasses, a lamp, vases, pictures...

Lunch first. Hot dogs on  baguette, cheese on baguette or ham on baguette. And frites.

Inside the village hall, you could buy wine, pastis, beer, soft drinks or coffee.

    The buy of the day that had me jumping up and down was a copper watering can. I wasn't even going to bother to ask the price, reckoning it would be in the 40 to 50 euro range. Then, the man selling it told me I should buy it because it went with my outfit (only in France!), said the price was five euros (yes, yes) and threw in"un petit Jésus"(one of those tiny china models that hide in French Christmas cakes) for free.

    On my second trawl of the market,  I spotted a magnificent jug shaped like a bunch of grapes, two euros for this, another gift, and then a third one later of a pre-Euro-era Italian coin. I gave him a 100 baht coin from Thailand that had wiggled its way to the bottom of my handbag.
    Later, the same day: our homeward route took us through Mirepoix anyway so we parked on a side street, and walked into the square to watch a promised exhibit of South American dancing. I'd envisaged live musicians, frilly frocks and tight trousers. Got none of those but the shoes definitely made up for it.

Paris--Day 3: Sunday Morning Flea Market

The only marché des puces we've been to in Paris is the humungous one at Clignancourt. To be honest, we didn't like it very much. Size isn't everything. 

   I'd read about another, less tourist-y market, in the southwest of the city so, after coffee and tartines, off we set on the Metro, a 45 minute trip to Porte de Vanves which promised 350 dealers. Enormous. Reeeeally, reeeeeally, REEEEEEEEEEEALLY big. It started off unpromisingly (for bargain hunters) with 40 euro café au lait bowls but, as we made our way along under the plane trees, prices dropped. 

   Everything was for sale. Paris had tipped its grandmothers' attics on to the pavement. Paintings galore, stuffed animal heads, china, lots and lots of silver and silverplate. "Oh, those knives are two hundred and eighty euros? Sorry, I thought they were twenty-eight." He would have dropped the price to 250 but a little out of our range. 

   Still we did leave with a decent haul: three books (art, food and fiction), a sparkly parrot-shaped brooch (thanks, Peter) and an enormous lace curtain which will find a home somewhere in our new house. We bought it from a woman as she was packing up her stock. Ten euros, she said. A little less, I asked? Eight euros, she snapped. Done. It needs a good wash and a few stitches but is otherwise quite impressive. The lower section is a creamy-coffee colour, the top part is white. With the aid of a tea bath or sunshine, it'll end up being one shade or the other. 

   The sun blazed down. Everyone (apart from the lace lady) seemed in a holiday mood, the stalls went on and on till they reached a bridge that spanned the periphérique (the ring road that, for Parisians, defines the limits of Paris). A man played jazz classics on a piano that was just that bit out of tune enough to sound poignant. We had the time of our lives. 

   We sat outside for a very late lunch--a south-west salad for Peter with confited gésiers (duck gizzards) while the street cleaners in their neon-green vests hosed and swept and made everything clean and tidy, and then went home on the metro.

Breaking buying resolutions at the Pamiers flea market.

Because the shelf over the sink is jammed with them from one end to the other. Because the kitchen cupboards and the sideboard are crammed with tottering piles of mismatched crockery. Because I really should know when to stop. I've placed an embargo on buying any more quaint old tins or one-of-a-kind plates or saucers. However attractive they are.

    But...we are on the lookout for plenty of other stuff. A carved something-or-other for the post at the bottom of the staircase (an oversized hazelnut or walnut would be ideal). Vintage bedside tables. Something to stand in the bathroom to hold bottles and jars. And, as they say in the advertising business, "much, much more."

   All of which was a reasonable excuse to head off to Pamiers on a glorious Sunday morning when the frost lay on the fields and the Pyrenees looked sculpted out of solid ice. 

    Once, some months ago, we found that the usual flea market had been pre-empted by a troupe of majorettes. But not today. By ten o'clock, when we arrived, the main square was already packed with buyers, sellers, dogs and an inquisitive ferret on a leash. Good karma flowed. You just knew this was going to be a successful rooting through the cast-offs of others. 

    Our first find was an old wooden shuttle (that's the thing that looks like a miniature canoe), a remnant of the textile industry that used to flourish in this region. The woman who sold it to us said some people use them to hold pens and pencils. In a moment of lunacy, I'd envisaged it holding a row of tea-lights until Peter pointed out that, being made of wood, the shuttle might go up in flames. 

    In a box under the same stall, I came on a rolling pin. Not sure if you can make out the words inscribed on it but they translate as "reserved for domestic quarrels." What I initially thought were red wine stains may be blood. I couldn't resist two small plates with a stencilled pattern of oranges. Only a euro each. 

    Major finds often hide in the cartons under each stall. Seeing me dithering over a pile of saucers, their owner smartly picked out the ones I'd been looking at--one with blue flowers, six with red daisies--and offered them to me for a euro the lot. This was after she'd sold me a tin of buttons for the same price. 

    In yet another box, this time filled with books, I came on Middleton's All the Year Round Gardening Guide (another one euro purchase). Reading through it later, I've discovered it was written during the war as an aid to digging for victory.

    Meanwhile Peter picked up a rather splendid vase, a souvenir of Mirepoix, a steal at 1.20 euros. And that was it. Apart from two pairs of gloves and a kilo of walnuts.

    

A Summery Find at the Depot-Vente

On our very long list of "things we need" are classic French folding bistro chairs. I've been hankering after ones that are a bit battered, their paint faded by the sun. 

Depot-ventes, as I may have mentioned before, are where French people take their unwanted goods. You can find anything. At different times, I've seen grand pianos, a motorcycle made entirely of wood and a mummy case. At least two-thirds of the furnishings in our current house are depot-vente finds.

I think the gods are smiling at the moment. Saturday, I picked up a splendid old wood box with a hinged lid, a very handsome basket and a large biscuit tin for a total of 10.50 euros. When the gods are smiling, you keep going... However, Saturday, our favourite depot-vente in Mirepoix had shut its gates because of the power cut and Monday, when we passed by, it was just on noon. Lunch-time. Today, we were lucky.

Here's what we found outside near the large flower-pots, stone sinks and other outdoor necessities. Attractively banged-up and repainted at least four times, this little chair is only one of the three we bought, the fourth really was too beaten up even for our shabby chic taste. Total bill for the trio: 24 euros.

Some months from now, I can picture us sitting under the apricot tree sipping chilled rosé to the murmur of bees and the scent of lavender. 

A Brocante in Mirepoix

Quelle contrast in the weather. Yesterday was warm enough for us to eat baguette and tomatoes (strewn with the last of the basil) in the garden. Today, we woke to sombre grey skies. Not a problem as we were off to Mirepoix to search for a dining table large enough to seat eight. 

The square was filled with people selling plants, onion sets and fruit trees. The arcades were lined with brocanteurs. 

Stalls displayed old kitchen utensils: molds for madeleines; moulis for making soups and purées; this box of heavy iron weight for measuring out meat, flour and vegetables.

As always, at these antiques sales, I was struck by the big snowy heaps of monogrammed linens. Many would have been embroidered as part of a trousseau, then stored away for decades, never used, when the 1914-1918 war destroyed so many of the young male population of France. Something to think about on this day of remembrance. 

Embroidery (and What to Do With a Dead Pig)

Another vide grenier (attic emptying) to take up most of a sunny Sunday morning. Today's was in La Bastide-de-Boussignac. It's not that large a village so we only expected a small event. Wrong. Streets, side streets... hundreds of people buying and selling.

It's not just the bargains that are the draw. It's just as much the opportunity to get an inside look at how life was in these parts in the past. Monogrammed linen is everywhere, evidence of the hard (needle) work put in by most young women in the early decades of the 20th century. Skills like these haven't disappeared. They've just been re-routed. The lady busily stitching away is responsible for all the work on display. 

The Ariège has always been a farming region, so you can often pick up old wood collars that once held bells for cattle and sheep. Something else easy to find are ox yokes, often riddled with woodworm. 

What on earth was the use for a length of baguette-shaped wood about 70 cm (27 inches) long with a piece of sturdy chain at its midpoint and a notch at either end? Turns out it was used to hang a newly slaughtered pig by its trotters. Its technical name is a porte-cochon.  I bought it, of course, and am picturing saucepans hanging from it instead.

Today was probably in the low thirties but winters can be icy in the Pyrenees.  Doug, a friend we ran into, asked about the long curved wood frames you often see for sale at vides-greniers. Inside is a little box and that, said the woman at the stall, held coals, and the curved frame kept the linen away from the heat. Yup, an ancient bed-warmer.  

A Vide Grenier in Chalabre

The term literally means "attic emptying". Call it the French version of a swap meet, car-boot sale or community yard sale...

This one kicked off at 7 a.m. but it was well past 9:30 by the time we arrived in Chalabre, a large village about 15 minutes away. One of the main streets was clogged with traffic, the other closed off and lined with stalls with more stalls shoehorned into the narrow side streets. 

A kit for slicing and serving foie gras. Monogrammed linen sheets, never used. Enough plastic toys and kids clothes to delight and outfit half the smaller residents of southern France. Paperbacks, record albums, posters, plates...

  Some of our home furnishings were finds at vide greniers but this time, no luck.We looked longingly at a 1940s sideboard, all curves and carved flowers and only 50 euros. No space for it at the moment. A green-painted art nouveau stove, the same. Both are now in other people's homes or, possibly, have moved up the secondhand social scale to a brocante where they will sell for double the price.