More visitors and... a new kitchen....

Somehow another couple of weeks have drifted by.  Well, I say drifted by... but we've had visitors and there's always plenty to keep me occupied before visitors arrive (cleaning, meal planning, shopping etc), then while they're here and even after they've gone!

Our visitors were our very good friends Caroline and Paul and their children, Cara and Reuben.  They live in Staffordshire and we met them nearly 11 years ago when we were all on holiday in Fuerteventura.  Cara was only 2 years old and Reuben wasn't even a twinkle in his dad's eye yet!  It's always easy to remember how and when we met because Danny and I were in Fuerteventura to celebrate my 50th birthday!

Here are a few photos from their visit.....

Liam loves Cara (and I think she loved him too!)

Everyone loves our swing seat and Cara & Reuben are no exceptions!

Oops... a ball needed retrieving!

Mmmm.... Cara likes her chocolate mousse!

Danny and Reuben enjoy their 'jellies'





While Caroline, Paul, Cara and Reuben were here, we took the opportunity to show them the beautiful village of Coulon, situated in the Marais Poitevin (or 'Green Venice').  I've mentioned this area before on my blog and this time, we found a part of it we hadn't seen before.  This is a collage of a few of the photos we took there ....

 

 

We still have two lots of visitors during this year's summer season so look out for pictures of their visits!

 

Now, did you spot in this post's title those magic words "new kitchen"?  Well, to be fair that's a bit of an exaggeration but maybe it got your attention! Anyway, the situation with the kitchen is that although I can't have the window changed to a door just yet because the artisan who is now going to do the job is fully booked up until February, he has told us that there is nothing to stop us going ahead with refitting it!  I can't tell you how brilliant that is!  A friend of ours here is fitting the kitchen for us and he told us he could start today!  So, no sooner than our guests had left, Danny and I got stuck into packing up the contents of some of the old units, removing those units then stripping the walls ready for repairing and painting.  Having a friend to fit the kitchen means that he will tackle the job in sections so that any inconvenience is minimised.  For those of you who haven't seen it, here is what the "old" kitchen looked like...

 

 



....and here are some pictures of the first section "going"

 

Danny even managed to get two coats of new paint on this part of the walls before Les started this morning...

 



..... and this is how it looks after Day One...

Obviously, I'll keep you posted as things progress!  It's so exciting to be able to tell you about this progress after all the various disappointments (which I refuse to dwell on because I do believe that everything happens for a reason - even if that reason isn't always immediately obvious!).  But at last I feel Danny and I are starting to put our stamp on this house.

I'm going to leave you with a picture that I think is not just amusing, it epitomes our life here!  Naturally, we always stock up the fridges when guests are due.  But this picture is one of our fridge, having been replenished AFTER our last guests left!!

Now isn't that a happy fridge?!

Until next time...à bientôt tous!