Happy Easter to everyone who celebrates it! We’re in the fading hours of a three-day long Easter Weekend here in France. Surprisingly Monday is a holiday here and not Good Friday when the kids had to go to school and all the stores were open. H. coloured this “Joyeuses Pâques” chick at school on Friday and brought it home much to our delight and wee surprise. We’ve long grown used to our schools at home taking non-denminational approach to holidays.
On Saturday the girls and I attended an Easter Egg decorating workshop at the home of a local artist. There were about 15 kids and a handful of mums from the village. Agathe, the artist, had an amazing array of paint, dyes, and sparkly things to add to the eggs. In my french class last week we had an interesting discussion about how at home in Canada we decorate white eggs while my European classmates and french teacher were comedically insistent that only “real” eggs could be brown. The kids also decorated cartons and baskets to hold their colourful creations.
Creativity is certainly abundant here at Easter. I had no idea, before coming, how much fun the Easter chocolate would be in France. I assumed it would be delicious and can report indeed it is. When mes beaux-parents were visiting in December we all took a food tour of Aix where I learned about how, in France, pastry chefs learn how to make pastry, bread, chocolate and ice cream. If you haven’t yet seen it I recommend “The Kings of Pastry” to highlight the intensity and creativity these chefs possess. Our tour guide introduced us to Brunet Chocolate which is now my favourite chocolate shop in Aix (4 rue Laurent Fauchier, Aix-en-Provence).
When buying the chocolate owl for Chris last week I happened to be in the shop when M. Brunet was carrying out a lion made out of chocolate. It stood about 75cm high and it was magnificent! I was kicking myself that I didn’t have a camera with me but you’ll have to trust me that his creation was whimsical and edible. The terrific fish and owl shown above are M. Brunet’s chocolate creations. The fish is being held together with a ribbon because it’s full of something delicious!
The Easter Bunny brought our girls the chickens, the white “chocolate” duck and the sheep. The big bunny heads are from Walkers Chocolates in Burlington ON (thanks to Grandma and Grandpa Gore) and if we were home they would have been hidden under napkins at Easter Dinner. It feels a bit like we’ve been observing the chocolate devouring part of Easter for while now thanks to the early arrival of some Easter treats from Nana Beth which have served as our amuses bouches this last week.
Today is April Fools Day. In France, April Fool’s day is observed by funny efforts to slap paper fishes on the backs of your friends and yelling “Poisson D’Avril!”. We instead ate the delicious chocolate shaped sardines shown above.
If we’d been home for Easter we likely would have done of our twice-annual Lake Ontario end-to-end drives from Kingston to Burlington to allow for visits with three sets of grandparents in one weekend. R. remarked on Saturday night this was the first Easter in a very long time where the Easter Bunny would hide eggs at “home” for the girls instead of the hotel where we are often staying. The girls were also surprised on Saturday night when they found out that I brought their baskets from home. So, as with the Christmas stockings, we have some well travelled ornaments in our household!
Our clocks changed here at 2am on the 31st. I expected our girls to wake us very early on Easter Morning but they let us sleep until a bit past 8am. While her sister watched a tv show, H. kept herself busy making us Easter cards. The inside of mine had this great rainbow bunny which I thought was an excellent celebration of spring, Easter and, little did she know, the growing terrific and inclusive political efforts in the United States to extend marriage rights.
This Easter weekend ends with an odd week for our girls. Much to their chagrin, they have to go to school on Wednesday. At the last minute in the fall the Toussaint break was extended from 10 to 12 school days so the government decided to make up the 2 extra days later in the year. The first “make up” Wednesday is this week. It’s been a good long time since our girls had 4 days of school in a row. Our reminders that it is good practice for when we go home are not persuasive. We also keep reminding them that they only have 9 more school days until friends from Toronto come and they, once again, have two weeks of holidays to enjoy!
Bon courage to everyone at home tonight as you pack snacks and lunches. Just like the week after Halloween, I’m always reminded of how astute the rascals’ negotiation efforts are with the goal of adding a few eggs to boost their learning power. Happy spring everyone!
Nous allons en France 
The ONLY time I buy white eggs is at Easter so we can colour them. You’re saying I don’t have to resort to factory-farm white eggs? The brown ones work too??
Leah – yes, the brown ones are dyeable but their base colour changes the end colour. So the palate of colour is more fall than spring. One cool thing Agathe (the artist/host) had was a dremmel tool so you can engrave onto the brown eggs – the colour underneath is a lovely cream so you get a simple and elegant contrast. She also had boat-loads of acrylic paint and glitter. The kids did tonnes of painting on top of the eggs – more painting than dyeing. These colours were super vibrant and fun.
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