FINALLY- WALL HANGINGS BUT ONE STEP AT A TIME!

Monday is the one day of the week right now where one of us doesn't have something specific going on between our separate Bible studies and my Chiro appointments.  So, after a leisurely breakfast, we decided to grab a bus to the area near Notre Dame and check out the bouquinistes (book sellers) in their stalls along the Seine.

Notre Dame

We passed this area once earlier on a bus and I noticed all the different picture prints many had and suggested to David that might be the place to find some things for our sad, empty walls.  It was cloudy and cool (but not supposed to rain), but I can shop in cloudy!!!!

This is a beautiful area because Notre Dame is right there.  That also makes it crazy with tourists!     We'd visited Notre Dame on an earlier trip, but I hope we can get back there again now that we're here.  Anyway, many of the sellers were open so we just started strolling and trying to decide just exactly what we were looking for.  It took us a reasonable amount of time to do that, but once we did......jackpot!!!!!

That's me in the center-looking for treasure!!!

Besides books (many very expensive) there are lots of sketches, paintings, magazine covers (many vintage) and trinkets (lots of Eiffel Towers!!!!).  The sellers are very nice,  and we practiced our French with them though many spoke back in English as soon as they realized we spoke English (how did they know????!!!!!).

Across the street from the stalls is Shakespeare and Company, an English-language bookstore that has been around since 1919.  That was the first store that is no longer open.  The second store, where we were, opened in 1951 by American George Whitman and was called "Le Mistral" but was renamed to the current name in 1964 in tribute to the original store and on the anniversary of Shakespeare's 400th  birthday.  Interesting, huh???  Tons of tourists go there,  and it's a small, crowded little shop. I wanted a Julia Child cookbook and walked away with a little paperback I thought would meet our needs better than her original book (both were paperback which I don't really like but, oh, well!!).  They stamp the inside with their logo and I like that!!!

Shakespeare and Company

By this time,  I was ready for a little snack!!!!  It was actually lunch time, but I didn't want to eat that much...just a snack.  If I was really a Parisian woman, I'd get a cafe and let that tide me over till I could eat.  But, hey, I'm a treat kind of girl....I really wanted ice cream!!!!  We went in search of the bus stop to take us home and, lo and behold, there was an ice cream vendor (kind of like in Charade only that one was along the Seine).  In spite of the cool weather, there was a line though short and fast moving.  "One single chocolate, please" (in French, of course).  Just enough.....can't beat it!!!

This is why I'm not skinny like French  women!!!!

Then we were on the bus and on the way home.  It's a little bit of a ride to our apartment so I can just sat and leisurely viewed the city streets and relaxed till we got to our stop.  Once home, we had a little lunch (I was ready for real food!) and laid out our treasures.

Today's treasures!

This is just Step One in the wallhangings because these are prints so we need to get frames and frame them.  But we're already checking that out since neither of us is good at putting off a task that needs to be done.  Plus, once they're all hung,  it will look so good and THEN I can post new pics of the finished (for the most part!!) apartment.

Little by little it's becoming home.....