Eco Blog Posts with a French Theme

Hello - I'm back!!  I've not published a blog on here since January but that doesn't mean I haven't been spreading the green message, I've just been doing it in different ways, which I'll come back to shortly.  But so many things were taking place in my life this year that something had to take a back seat and this blog, A Green and Rosie Life, drew the short straw.

BUT ... it doesn't mean I have not been blogging and I am still been publishing blogs over on our gite (French holiday cottage) blog.  Quite a few of these have an environmental theme so why not make/pour yourself a drink and settle down for a read of them:

My most recent post is the one written about something that has made me so happy - France is banning plastic packaging from all fresh fruit and veg and I smile every time I think about it. Read more about how they should achieve this and any problems they may encounter along the way: 

France to Ban Plastic Packaging on Fresh Fruit and Veg 

 

 

 

And these are the other eco-posts I have written:

Organic and zero-waste shopping in Normandy

 

Trees and Forests of Normandy 

 

Cycling in Normandy

 

Wildlife Watching in Normandy

 

Eco-Friendly Normandy 

 

Eco-Friendly Holidays at Eco-Gites of Lénault 

 

Outside Fun at Eco-Gites of Lénault 

 

Bird Watching in Normandy

 

Where to buy second hand in France

As I said earlier, just because I  have not been blogging I have not been silent.  I have been busy joining in with discussions on various Facebook groups and I have used my Instagram page to promote green issues. The grid pictures are mostly about Normandy but often with an environmental theme and many of my stories focus on all things green. I am gradually adding the most important stories to my highlights.  Oh and I have a long list of draft blog posts and ideas and I just need to find the time to get them written and published.

You can also find me on Twitter and Pinterest. 

What have you been up to this year? I hope you have not been too badly affected by Covid and you are back to some semblance of normality (hopefully even more green than before). Have you got a blog you think I'd like to read? By all means add a link in the comments.

 

Green Bog Round Up - February 2020

Each month I am putting together a post with some of green themed blogs I have come across over the preceding month. Here are my favourites for February 2020 and if you have any interest subjects such as reducing waste, plastic free living, carbon offsetting and green cleaning then you will find at least one blog post here to enjoy.

Helen from Spot of the Earth reviewed her local Zero Waste Shop
You can follow her on Twitter and Facebook

Aaron from The Busy Papa will help us reduce fridge waste with this post.
You can find him on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest

Teja on the Horizon wrote about Carbon Offsetting based on your personality
You can follow her on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Instagram

With Summer on the way Justine from Little Green Duckie talks about how to having wet wipe free festival fun!
You can follow her on Facebook and Twitter

Spring Cleaning must be in the air as two bloggers have written about natural cleaning: 

Trail  of Breadcrumbs wrote about the simplicity of Green Cleaning  
You can follow this Trail of Breadcrumbs (see what I did there?!) on Twitter and Pinterest

and so did Isabel from Sustainable, Responsible Living  - Cleaning with Natural Products

You can follow her on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest.

Whilst we are talking Spring Cleaning I wanted to also highlight this post. I have recently become aware of cleaning influencers on instagram and how they are pushing their followers to use ridiculous amounts of cleaning products. This overuse is a disaster both for anyone who uses this amount of cleaners (something I blogged about before) and for the environment. One of these influencers, a brand ambassador for P&G, has over 3 million followers and in the unregulated world of instagram is able to post stories promoting their excess use whilst also showing unsafe ways to store these dangerous chemicals aka laundry tabs.  I can see no better reason to stop using these commercial cleaning products than the facts that they need child proof lids (that should NEVER be removed) and 7000 cases of ingestion were reported in a one year period and 6 deaths since have been attributed to people eating them. (source).

Finally I wrote a post about making environmental connections:

Find A Green and Rosie Life on Facebook, Instagram (joint page with the gite), Twitter and Pinterest.

... and don't forget you can follow my #DailyGreenTips over on my A Green and Rosie Life Facebook page.

If you have a blog post you would like to be added in the March roundup please do get in touch.  Posts need to be current and on any of these subjects:

• Recipes with seasonal and/or foraged ingredients
• Organic gardening and attracting wildlife to your garden
• The 4 Rs and a U - Reduce, Re-use, Recycle, Repair and Upcycle.
• Natural crafting
• Waste and energy reduction.
• Conservation posts - helping wildlife, wild flowers and their habitats.
• Connecting kids to Nature
• Discussions on green, sustainable, ethical, organic, environmental subjects such as:
• Green hobbies
• Green technology/advances
• Green politics
• Good environmental practice 
• Greenwashing 
• Sustainability and you

.... and lots more besides.  If you have a current post with a theme that is green, sustainable, ethical, organic, fair trade, environmental, seasonal or local please do get in touch and I'll include it in next month's round-up.

My First Blog Post - a one-off linky!

On Sunday I will be celebrating a blogging anniversary with both some changes to this blog and a new one-off linky called My First Blog Post.  I will be linking up the first ever post I wrote and I would love it if you would do the same.  You can also leave a message saying how long you have been blogging for.  A few people have said that their first blog was just a "Hello blog world" sort of post so it you want to link up your first "Proper" blog instead, that is absolutely fine.  

So please do head to the linky which can be found here and link up your first ever blog post.   If you tweet with the hashtag #MyFirstBlogPost, I'll RT you too.

Come on then and let's see who has been blogging the longest and let's see where we all started!

New Year, New Website, New Blog

 Welcome to our New Eco-Gites of Lenault Website and Blog

We have recently launched a new website for Eco-Gites of Lenault so please do head on over and have a look.  Let me know if you see any typing errors please!

The new website also has it's own blog attached so I will now be blogging both on this blog and the website.  The website blog will specialise in posts about the France/Normandy, the gite (including special offers etc) and local events, exhibitions and suchlike.  

It is a very simple blog in terms of functionality but PromoteMyPlace who provide the website templates are working on adding more things over time and have already taken on board one suggestion I gave.  There is no option to add  BlogLovin' or "follow this blog" at the moment but I hope these will arrive in due course.  Please do therefore pop by on  a regular basis to see what new posts I have added.  

If you want to add a comment on any blog post please do. I am currently experimenting with Disqus or if you prefer you can add a comment in the simple blog comments box provided by PromoteMyPlace.  At the moment that does not allow you to leave a link to your website but that will change soon (that was my suggestion) - feel free to leave a link in your comment though or use Disqus.  I'd love a comment on my latest post, a great little video some guests created for us.

I will continue this blog with all other topics I write about and of course Animal Tales.  I may look at taking this one in some new directions over the coming months and I have lots of ideas trundling round my head!  Watch this space!  Just time therefore to say:

Happy New Year/Bonne Année everyone and 

I hope 2016 is a fabulous year for you.  

Looking for Blackberry Recipes

The blackberries in the hedgerows around Eco-Gites of Lenault are fabulous this year and so I was hoping to find some more ideas on how to use them.  I am planning to do a collaborative post with links to your blackberry recipes in the near future ... which you can find here:

10 Brilliant Blackberry Recipes

If you have a recipe using blackberries please do email me here with a link to the post in question.  I am aiming to publish the post by September 11th so if I could have links before then that would be great.   All the blog posts will link back to the original post and if you can add a link back to Eco-Gites of Lenault that would be fabulous.

I'd love a real mix of recipes so I'd love to see recipes using blackberries for:

• Cakes
• Desserts
• Savoury Dishes
• Breakfast dishes
• Preserves
• Drinks
• Wine or other alcoholic drinks
• Anything I've forgotten!

Looking forward to hearing from you very soon with all those blackberry recipes.

My First Blog Post image

365 days - 365 posts

Posted by Rosie

A year ago I set myself a challenge.  A challenge to blog more.  More than what?  Well more than the rather sporadic blogging that had been the case beforehand.  What it turned out to be was a blog a day for a year.  365 days - 365 posts.

It's been great fun and I have found that I have lots I want to write about ... some of which people also want to read about which makes it all the more worthwhile!  So what else can I tell you this year of blogging?

1.  Our life here in Normandy, France has given me plenty of inspiration for posts. If you look in the right hand column at the blog labels you'll see what the more common subjects have been.  Not unsurprisingly perhaps Food/Foraging, France/Life in France, Livestock/Pets and Seasons/Weather (well I am British) have been my top subjects.

2.  Many of my blogs get formulated in my head whilst driving or walking the dogs and as I am a regular taxi service to the boys and walk the dogs most days I do have plenty of time to get things sorted in my head.

3.  Finding out I could schedule blogs was a great discovery enabling me to continue posting even when I was away in the depths of Exmoor with limited Internet access. 

4.  I almost missed a few days managing to just hit the publish button very late in the evening, not least when our modem went pop.  Luckily I had scheduled a post for the next day and we were able to get a replacement livebox the day after.

5.  I have linked to all sorts of blog linkies through which I have discovered many other lovely blogs written by lovely people.  I feel I have travelled the world without ever leaving France, I have cooked some delicious foods I have discovered on blogs and I have ...

6.  ... met some bloggers "for real", namely Phoebe from Lou Messugo and Annie from Mammasuarus.

7.  I have not missed a single Silent Sunday or How Does Your Garden Grow linky.

8.  Through blogging, the gite has been featured as both "Sustainable Blog of the Week" in The Guardian and as "Property of the Month" with Brittany Ferries.  

9.  I have started my own linky - #AnimalTales and discovered (much to my annoyance) that when I type too fast this is what I get: ~ANimalTales.

10.  I am a terrible typist and can never see my own spelling mistakes.

If you are discovering this blog for the first time today, then welcome and I hope you enjoy it.  If you are a regular visitor then I say thank you. Thank you reading and thank you for commenting.  And if you have been inspired to want to come and visit Eco-Gites of Lenault then please do get in touch.  I know many of you have school age children and in that case out next free week in English school holidays is Christmas.  If you are in Scotland, Ireland or Europe who break up earlier then we do still have 2 weeks in July and for those of you with pre-schoolers, no children or from other parts of the world with different holidays, then we have low and mid season dates available for you.  Very soon we will also be releasing prices and dates for 2016.

Once again I say thank you - it's been  a great year and here's looking forwards to the next 365 days ... 
 

The New Year Tag

Posted by Rosie

I have been tagged by Aby over at You Baby Me Mummy in ‘The New Year Tag’.  I get to answer a few questions and then tag some other bloggers.  So here we go:

What was your highlight of 2014?

Growing cauliflowers - well not just cauliflowers but loads of fruit and veg and rearing animals to fill our freezers.  We managed to keep all our animals alive and only lost one turkey before they took the inevitable one way journey to the freezer.  When you realise sheep and turkeys have a terrible habit of dropping dead at will you'll understand how this was our highlight of the year!  Renting out the gite for 22 weeks of the year was pretty good too :)

What are you excited for in 2015?

I think continuing to see the popularity of the gite grow. We have never taken so many bookings before New Year so fingers crossed we will fill many more weeks! Oh and growing more cauliflowers!

Any new year resolutions?

What, besides growing more cauliflowers?  I'm not very good at New Year Resolutions so I think I'll give this one a miss.

Blogging high?

Being featured in The Guardian as Sustainable Blog of the Week - that was pretty good!

Picture of the year?

Oh dear - I've taken loads but I do think this one was a particular favourite.  Friends who we had not seen for several years were visiting from Australia - the weather was fabulous - much vin rouge (and blanc and rosé) was imbibed and we had a brilliant time ... and now they've only gone and moved further away to New Zealand!  Cheers from Eco-Gites of Lenault.

Here are my tags:

Nicky from Colour it Green

Phoebe from Lou Messugo

Jane from Hedgecomers

Emma from Mommy Emu

Let me know if you want to play too as I am basically nosy and I would love to see your answers!
 

We're off on our Holidays ....

Posted by Rosie

It's half term and the boys and I are going to England for a week.  Simon is however staying at Eco-Gites of Lenault to look after guests and the animals although he will get a holiday later with the boys.  He has only just got back from a week in the UK (not a holiday) so we are a bit like ships that pass in the night at the moment.

I have managed to schedule a series of blogs for when I am away.  There's limited Internet at Mum's so I won't be online too much (except when I can cadge some time on the computer at friends).  Do please still write your comments and I'll add them and reply when I can .... I might even risk turning off moderation and hope the spammers stay away for a while, we'll see.

Until next week then - au revoir mes amis :)

Some links you might like

Posted by Rosie

I had a blog planned for today but have not had the time to write it. Rather than rush out something I am not happy with I will save it for later and instead give you a few links back to some of my previous blogs that perhaps you might have missed.  Put the kettle on, click on them (they are all links) and enjoy a bit of a read.

4 blogs relating to our life here in the Calvados Region of Normandy in Northern France:

• Normandy Markets
• Bringing up Bilingual Children
• Bird Watching in Normandy
• No More Nutella

4 blogs I hope might tempt you to come and visit Eco-Gites of Lenault:

• 25% off with Brittany Ferries
• Free things to do in Calvados
• 15% off for couples
• October availability

And something totally different - 2 blogs top help you save money:

• 12 ways to save money when food shopping
• 10 tips to help you cook more efficiently

 

To contact us for further information or to make a booking please email us here or visit out website here.

Eco-Gites of Lenault has won an award!

Posted by Rosie

After a slight panic of wondering if I would need to buy a new outfit and prepare an acceptance speech I realised this was a virtual award and I would not have to go shopping!  Liebster comes from German and means lovely and the idea is you answer some questions given to you by the person who awards you (in this case the lovely Phoebe who lives down in the south of France and blogs at Lou Messugo) and then you nominate more blogs to receive the Award and give them your 7 questions.

Here are my answers to the questions Phoebe set:

1. What was the inspiration for your blog name?

Nothing fancy or interesting here I am afraid - it is simply the name of our gite!  The reason there is an "s" on gites is that we had planned to make 2 gites. As yet that has not happened but we felt it was better to have it on our URLs for the web page and blog rather than having to change it later.

2. When you read other blogs what is the first thing you look at?

I look for blogs that are on subjects that I actually want to read about and inspire me.  I read quite a range then - travel, parenting, gardening, green issues, France, farming and smallholdings plus a few just because I like them or I know the author.

3. What is your earliest travel memory?

Not a huge expedition to the other side of the world but my first ever memory is in fact a travel memory.  My hard-working farming parents (think "no time for holidays") took my sister and I on a day trip to Hayling  Island and I remember going on a little fairground ride there.  My mum thought I had made up this memory until I told her in detail the colours of the trains and lay out of the ride.

4. Where did you experience your most memorable meal and what was it?

Possibly actually at home on our farm in The Cotswolds but cooked for us by a group of Argentinian polo grooms.  They were cooking for a large fund raising BBQ my parents were organising and cooked Asado - whole lambs marinated in a secret sauce and cooked very slowly round the embers of a hot fire until the meat falls off the bone.  It was simply delicious.  As for a meal NOT cooked at home I would say the fresh fish and potatoes cooked in seawater I had in Fueteventura.  We watched the restaurant owner go down to the harbour to buy the fish that had just been landed so it could not have been fresher.  And for potatoes cooked in salt water, I am drooling just thinking about them - little salty mouthfuls of absolute deliciousness :)

5. 1 month all expenses paid, where would you go?

How about a stop in one country from every continent.  Can I please have New Zealand, Botswana, Croatia, India, Peru and Canada?  I'd quite like to get off the tourist track if possible, maybe stay with a local family at each stop.

6. Name one thing about yourself that others find surprising.

I asked and the most frequent answer was that I have time to do everything ... ah well, you see, there are a lot of things I also DON'T do ;)

7. What advice would you give to someone starting out in blogging?

Go for it!  Write what you believe in  and write as if no-one was reading.  If however you want to create a large following you will have to work hard at it!

And I nominate JustME, Lost In Finistere, Colour It Green, Tales from Toriello, Casalinho and Worthing Wanderer.

My Questions:

1. How many blog posts have you published?
2. Where do you get your blogging inspiration from?
3. If you could only visit one more place where would it be and why?
4. Excluding your travel documents, some clean underwear and some sort of finances, what one item would you never be without when travelling?
5. If I say FRANCE to you what are the first 5 things that come into your mind?
6. Where was your first holiday?
7. Through your blog has anything unusual or surprising happened to you?

Blogs and A Belated Happy Christmas

One of my New Year Resolutions was to make sure I regularly posted on the blog in 2013. And 26 days on I'm not doing very well! So I thought I'd better do something about it.  Also our Christmas was all a bit rushed and had taken second place to other events.

Unfortunately, late last November Rosie's Mum (Di) had a mini stroke, although she seemed to recovering well from it, things did not quite go as hoped. Rosie had already planned to go and see her Mum plus some other friends so she extended the trip to stay a bit longer with her Mum.  I then went to the UK for a few days to work and just after I returned we were called to say Di was being taken to hospital as she was not very well.  This was mid December. The Doctors had found a number of things wrong but the main cause of concern was pneumonia, but they said to Rosie not to rush over until they knew how things were. So, having packed a bag ready to go we got on with things here.  Then Di got worse and we had a call, just before Christmas, that she was in intensive care with breathing problems. Rosie obviously rushed across to the UK see her mum.  A "well done" to Brittany ferries here, as not only did they get her on the ferry at the last minute but they also left a lane clear to load her at the front of the ferry, so she could be first off in Portsmouth.

Di made good progress so Rosie came back home for Christmas and New Year before going back to the UK in the New Year.  This time Rosie said her Mum had made a huge improvement and things were being put in place for her going home. Between Rosie and her sister, Jane, they sorted a lot of things out (carers, meals, etc) and although Di is not fully recovered she came home this week (slightly delayed due to the weather). So wishing her all the best for a full recovery.

Ben and his helicopter

In between all our trips to the UK we did manage a very pleasant but quiet Christmas. Sally, my sister, came and stayed for a few days, which was a great help. Once again we moved into the gite for Christmas Day. The boys had a lovely time and got some great presents and one of their favourites are the remote controlled helicopters.  For New Year we headed west.  Our friends, Tim and Sue, have a 'holiday' cottage in Brittany, and invited as down to see in 2013.  We arranged an animal sitter (thanks Nicola) and had a lovely evening and New Year's day with Tim and Sue, Richard and Sue and Colin and Janet.  It was great to catch up as we don't see so much of each other this days.  It was just a pity that the windscreen wipers failed on the way home so we had to stop every time it rained: a journey that should have taken just over 2 hours in fact took 3½!

So please accept our apologises for not sending out any Christmas wishes - time just seemed to rush pass and here we are now, almost at the end of January.  We therefore hope you all had a good Christmas and wish you all the best for 2013.

Happy New Year!

Blog Catch Up

Still Here - even after this ride!

Well my last post on here was 'Oh for a Rest!' and I have definitely had a rest from writing posts on our blog.  As I have a few things I want to blog about I'm going to try and have a Lenault Blog Week (or two) to catch up.

I have been quite busy helping a few friends out with work, working on starting a business up (more about that at a later date) and as it has been the summer holidays, I've done a few things with the boys and, of course,  got hooked on some London sporting event.

Yes quite often I'd turn on the TV to see what was going on at the Olympics/Para-Olympics and that was that for the rest of the day and evening.  Thoroughly enjoyed it all.  We have had many French friends say how good it was and how much they enjoyed it, especially the opening ceremonies. Rosie was even stopped at the market by someone asking if she was English and than told her how good they thought the Olympics was.  The French press was not that complimentary but that was a case of 'sour grapes' I would think. 

The gite was constantly booked the whole summer. In fact it was pretty well booked from April right through to the middle of September.  We then have October half term booked and three bookings already for next year.  The beginning of the summer was not the best for weather but everyone who stayed seemed to enjoy themselves.

Now, that autumn is rapidly approaching and the days getting shorter, I will post blogs on a camping trip, a cycle ride, a museum talk on the re-construction of Vire after WW2 and our day at the races, plus some other bits and pieces.  So over the next few days please dip into the blog and catch up with me (now I've committed myself). And I believe Rosie has few posts to catch with too.