Summer Vacation in Toulouse

We spent the first week of our summer vacation at Greg's aunt and uncle's house in Toulouse. We did nothing but play in their pool and eat outside on their patio. It was wonderful!

Morgane and Dyfan's Wedding

Morgane and Dyfan were married on a remarkably sunny day in Brittany.

Dyfan looks stressed and nervous in these photos, but really they both seemed very relaxed and happy

.

 Thanks Bertrand!

 Flower girls fluttering and mostly behaving.

Mr Malo who wore his tie for about 5 min before running off to get into one sort of trouble or another.

Pre-wedding Pig

Once upon a time two brothers decided the best way to celebrate their sister getting married was to cook a pig! I will spare you the gory precooking photos (you can email Greg to see them) and will go straight to the cooking bit.

 

 

From standing in front of the fire since something like 7am, both brothers were practically blind from the smoke, but still extremely happy and proud of themselves.

 

The pig is cooked!

Getting the pig out.

 The joy of serving (and eating) the pig.

 I don't care if you're a veterinarian. You still have to eat some of this pig.

 

The brothers didn't get to participate much in the party, but it was lovely.

  

 The beautiful bride with her witnesses and friends.

 Morgane and her mom

 

And the brothers did even make salads for those pesky vegetarians.

Haircut

This was by no means Malo's first haircut, but it was definitely his most dramatic. It was the first time he actually sat still at the hairdressers and that probably explains what happened. I asked her just to trim it a little...

Before:

After:

 

He doesn't look like the same little boy.

May Vacation in a Yurt

After Toulouse, we went to the Dordogne region of France and spent 5 days in a yurt. From the comfort of my laptop in my dry, warm house, staying in a yurt in May seemed like a great idea!

 We stayed here and honestly, it was incredibly beautiful, peaceful and friendly. The yurt had a double bed and two single beds. There's an outdoor kitchen and an outhouse and a sun shower across the field.

Malo quickly made friends with the broken down tractor.

 

When he wasn't on the tractor, he was jumping on the trampoline.

We don't have many photos of Lucie from the vacation because she befriended the owner's son and basically disappeared running around with him the whole time. Here she's learning all about bunnies. Behind her are the chickens. Both kids had a blast looking for chicken eggs everyday.

We took day trips and visited lots of places around the region. Here's a beautiful, medieval town that Greg is going to have to remind me its name...

 We ate ice cream.

 Staying in a yurt in any normal Spring would have been a great idea, but this past one was the wettest and coldest ever recorded.

 

Here's Greg giving me the are kidding me? You are really going to make us leave this paradise a day early just because you haven't showered in four days and are cold?

 I love it here! No bathes are great!!!

Please mom? Pretty please can we live on a farm in a yurt forever?

Here's the family exploring cave villages on the trip home.

See what can happen to you if you don't agree with your wife when she says she wants to go home early. Don't worry. Since he did let us leave early, I shot the arrow sticking out of the bear and saved him.

On another day, we headed out of Toulouse to the Gers, visiting a few cute villages along the way. All were built as trading towns in the late middle ages/early renaissance with a similar grid street pattern (somewhat rare in France) with a market square (as below) in the center.

 This is foie gras country, boys, so I wouldn't look so proud if I were you...

Malo peering in amazement at some candles in a church (chaud! he screams).

 Lucie walking Polux, Armelle's dog.

 Olivier did his share of Malo-carrying.

Polux did his share of stroller-pulling.

 A half-timbered house in Auch.

 A family portrait, with Malo screaming.