Postcard from Antwerp: Pots and Plants

Bons baisers d'Anvers!

Great Pots and Plants store ( by De Groen Droom Florists) that we enjoyed visiting last June in Antwerp.

Mode Academie students' show.

2012: on the starting blocks!

Et voilà! Nous sommes rentrés de notre petit périple de fin d'année. Après un mois de festivités en France, les bagages sont maintenant défaits et rangés au sous-sol.

Lola, Marco et moi avons bien remis nos horloges biologiques à l'heure torontoise. Toute la famille a pu bien profiter des vacances de Noël en famille et entre amis sur le vieux continent; il faut dire qu'entre la campagne iséroise, Lyon, Paris et Genève, le dépaysement a été garanti.

Il est aujourd'hui temps de dire : Bonjour 2012! Eh oui, le mois de janvier est arrivé avec sa ribambelle de bonnes résolutions et autres 'goooood vibrations'. Après 6 mois d'interruption pour congé maternité, la reprise au travail s'est faite sans trop de heurts hier pour la nouvelle maman que je suis. Bébé Lola est restée à la casa avec papa, et tous deux ont passé une journée fantastique, à rire, manger et dormir. Ah, la belle vie!

Photo Cédric Roulliat

 J'ai hâte de découvrir ce que 2012 nous réserve... Happy New Year to you all!

Falling for Edwards Gardens in the Fall

The light in September is my favourite! Less crude, more gentle - it seems to adorn and enliven everything it caresses with a golden touch.

 Now, suffice it to say that I basked in this lovely September sun yesterday, how I rejoiced! I spent my Sunday afternoon strolling the picturesque lanes of Edwards Gardens and humming like a butterfly in the adjoining Botanical Gardens.

 

Fountain Grass

Purple Beautyberry

 Believe it or not, it had been a year since I first wanted to discover the Gardens, but without a car, it is quite a hassle to go all the way up there, all the more so with a baby... My father-in-law wanted to spend some quality time with us so I suggested we go to the Gardens to celebrate the glorious sun and Lola's 12 weeks. He was clearly happy with the idea and drove the three of us there, reminiscing all the while the last time he had visited the gardens in 1985.

À bientôt, Edwards Gardens! We spent a blissful time taking in the surrounding beauty of these gardens in the fall.




PS: Don't be surprised if while you are sitting at the Gardens Café, you sea a furry silhouette passing by you...There is a very special guest at the café...Apparently this raccoon is family there. I thought he really behaved like a "begging" dog... Smart little masked scoundrel!

France-Italy, Summer 2010: through the arcades of my memories!

Last summer, my husband and I travelled in France (Lyon-Paris) and Italy (Torino, Milano, Verona, Venezia) to celebrate our 1st wedding anniversary.
For your viewing pleasure, here are a few vistas that we contemplated.
Do you recognize any of them?

L'été dernier, mon mari et moi avons voyagé en France ( Lyon-Paris) et en Italie (Turin, Milan, Vérone, Venise) pour y célébrer notre première anniversaire de mariage.
Voici un petit pêle-mêle de souvenirs en images.

Voyage, voyage!

Wonderful! Vacation time!
One week off. No trips to any exotic places but a lot of "voyages immobiles"...
I am now in a very good place.

Toronto-Lyon: Let there be light!

The Newborn. c. 1645. Oil on canvas. Georges de La Tour. Musée des Beaux-Arts, Rennes.

While Toronto is greeting the winter cold with the Cavalcade of Lights, Lyon (France) does so with another ritual of multicoloured Lights that is celebrated on December the 8th; it is called the Festival of Lights -or Les Illuminations du 8 décembre.

Several stories explain the origins of this festival, but most commonly it is agreed on that the tradition started in 1852 to express gratitude toward the Virgin Mary for sparing Lyon from the plague (back then in 1643). Since then, tradition has had it that the citizens of Lyon, and of the nearby towns, place little candles on their windowsills to celebrate the Lights on December 8th. Simple, sobre, and luminously warm! Today's festival also includes other activities based on light, and usually lasts 4 days, with the peak of activity occurring on the 8th.

The intimacy of a chiaroscuro by Geoges de la Tour

On the first weekend of December, my friends then walked the streets of Lyon to see the Illuminations. Obviously, I could not partake in the event this year as I now live in Canada. But, if I delve well into my memories, I still have clear images coming back to the surface. To me, the most poetic representation of Lyon celebrating the Lights will remain the lumignons, these little colourful candles, forming lines of light defying the dark of the night. The visual beauty of such sobre ornaments is just magical! With the windowsills all decked out, new shadows would be projected, thus reshaping the contours of the buildings, and I would gape at the rediscovered beauty of these facades.

Another memory was when I ventured into the old town (Quartier du Vieux Lyon - St Jean) with my college friends while studying in Lyon. Believe me it was dangerous back then! One had to dare the crowd of well hidden enemies, waiting for the ideal candid targets to drop a load of flour and eggs from their windows...It has now been forbidden, I must admit that the stains were hard to remove and some people could easily get hurt in the process of receiving an egg dropped like a bullet...Today, many tourists come for the occasion and enjoy walking in the heart of the old town without being hit by any projectiles of the sort. Little do they know how lucky they are! A sign of the times..Lyon's Festival of Lights used to be a local, regional festival, and now it has become an international event, with many (too many) installations on a bigger scale. The light spectacles produced these days are a far cry from the original candles and flare...

I was not in Lyon, but my good friend Cécile was! An artist herself, she enjoys the festival every year. Here is her impressions for this year's enlightening festival:

Faite des lumières (Made of Lights)... On the dance floor, Cécile Cornu, our special reporter for the Festival of Lights- 2009, in Lyon.
(Photo by Cédric Roulliat)

"Des tableaux sur une roue, des Fiat 500 qui se draguent sous les draps qui sèchent au son de "Ti Amo", des mecs lumineux qui parlent, des bâtisseurs de cathédrale sur la cathédrale, des lutins en quête de lumière : magnifique et poétique nourriture pour les yeux! Le vendeur de vin chaud et de crêpes du coin de la rue, lui, s'est bien occupé de nos estomacs. Moi, je l'aime mon 8 décembre à Lyon!" Cécile Cornu

Fête des Lumières : La Grande Roue, Place Bellecour - Lyon 2009 (Photo: Cécile Cornu)

Fête des Lumières : La Préfecture- Lyon 2009 (Photo: Cécile Cornu)

Fête des Lumières : La Préfecture - Lyon 2009 (Photo: Cécile Cornu)

Reading suggestion :
Illuminations, poems by Arthur Rimbaud

Rebirth in Venice!

To conclude on our pre-wedding trip, I'd like to share the last drops of my Venetian impressions with you. Here is a link that will take you to an article: "Renaissance à Venise" (pardon my French!) that got published in this week's L'Express de Toronto, the French-speaking newspaper.
Have a good trip! I'll see you there ;0)

Wedding Season - Part 2 : Christine & Marco, BOOM!

A cloche-pied en jouant à la marelle! / Playing hopscotch !
Photo: Cédric Roulliat

That's it, we did it! It was an easy step, and a long-expected one! Our wedding was celebrated at my childhood village's town hall, in France, on Saturday, September 19th, 2009. After the civil wedding, we invited all our guests to join us for a reception at the Château de Césarges. It was wonderful to be able to gather all the people that really matter to us in one place and on such a pleasant occasion. We celebrated all afternoon long in the park, enjoying the sun, and even a few raindrops that made us hurry the last photo shoot! A double rainbow then spread its fire across the sky, was it a sign of double chances of ever-lasting love and happiness or a sort of mirror effect of my marrying a twin? I don't know-but the thing I am sure of is the love that we share, both obvious and complex. Let me immerse you a bit more in the atmosphere of our big day.

At 7 PM, our guests were led to the Chapel where an impromptu concert took place. Some friends or family members performed and shared their talent gracefully, and therefore made it our solemn and religious moment, all shared with our friends and families; emotional.

The bride and groom feeling the impact of the wedding's BOOMING effect!
Photo: Cédric Roulliat

At 8.30PM, dinner was being served in the reception rooms of the castle and Le Grand Bal could start at 9.30PM. Every guest beamed with joy, either enjoying the extravagant quantities of food and wine (catered by my extremely generous elder brother, Philippe Rochet and his business!), or dancing their heads off on Max Fueris & Jean-Yves Serve's music; or doing both at the same time...

The groom wears a Ralph Lauren striped suit, a Brooks Brothers tie and shoes by Grenson; the bride wears a Nina Ricci silk suit, Pink shoes, and her something old: jewels from her mother.

In the castle, we stayed in a bedroom, called the Comtesse de Meffray suite, after the 18th century elegant châtelaine whose oval portrait was on the wall. She turned out to be of pleasant company! Well, just for your to know, she supposedly had an affair with Jean-Jacques Rousseau (the great philosopher of the Enlightenment in France) when he stayed at Césarges to rest and work on the second part of his Confessions in 1769. Ah, if the walls of the castle could talk...

But no, this is not the spooky ghost of the Countess (who incidentally was poisoned by her husband, hum hum...). Just Marco and I, the newly-weds, taking the pause in the hallway.

Soneto XVII

No te amo como si fueras rosa de sal, topacio
o flecha de claveles que propagan el fuego:
te amo como se aman ciertas cosas oscuras,
secretamente, entre la sombra y el alma.

Te amo como la planta que no florece y lleva
dentro de sí, escondida, la luz de aquellas flores,
y gracias a tu amor vive oscuro en mi cuerpo
el apretado aroma que ascendió de la tierra.

Te amo sin saber cómo, ni cuándo, ni de dónde,
te amo directamente sin problemas ni orgullo:
así te amo porque no sé amar de otra manera,

sino así de este modo en que no soy ni eres,
tan cerca que tu mano sobre mi pecho es mía,
tan cerca que se cierran tus ojos con mi sueño.

(Cien sonetos de amor, de Pablo Neruda)

Groom: vintage Pierre Cardin tuxedo, Holt Renfrew bowtie, Polo Ralph Lauren dress shirt, and Ralph Lauren Purple Label pump shoes. Bride: vintage 1950s silk chiffon evening gown, found in the incredible Ian Drummond's Collection, and altered by Toronto-based seamstress, Loreen Lighfoot. The feathers were designed by my fashion designer friend, Julien Leydis, and made by Maison Février, Paris. As Tess, a good friend of ours, here in Toronto, who could not attend the wedding, said: "I think that what made it so special is that many of your friends and family members did their part (singing, catering, photographing, designing...) to make this day unforgettable...", and she is absolutely right, I could not agree with her more!

Sonnet XVII

I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love, a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way

than this: where I does not exist, or you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.

(100 Love Sonnets, by Pablo Neruda
Translated by Stephen Tapscott)

All photos by Cédric Roulliat

Since we came back home to Toronto, we have been over-the-moon, finally wearing our wedding bands, calling each other husband and wife (at long last, I am now officially Christine Rochet-Jacob), and nurturing family projects. In a nutshell, we are loving every minute of it! Currently reveling in the delights of our honeymoon, you know this lunar month of fruitful bliss, friends invite us to raise glasses of that bubbly beverage to our health and prosperity; and it is divine ! Oops, sorry, no honey and propolis for us, as the Pharaohs and their tradition would have it - this is the slight little change that we dared to introduce...

To conclude, I will leave you with another happy-ever-after version of pastoral love. A castle, two lovebirds frolicking in the fields (watch it at 2'37''), an open-air banquet, all the staple ingredients are there. In unison, Marco and I could sing the song with Catherine Deneuve and Jacques Perrin: 'Nous vivrons ensemble un conte de fées charmant'/'We will live a charming fairy tale together'...To be continued.

P.S: Our Lyon-based photographer friend, Cédric Roulliat, gracefully accepted to cover the event... Thank you, Cédric !

To see the online PHOTO ALBUM of our wedding, click HERE.