Preparing for Christmas!

Although today (Wednesday) we had rain all day, yesterday was beautiful and we took advantage of that!

Rick and I walked about a mile up the street to see the Canal St Martin.  The canal runs from the Seine further into Paris.  At the Bastille it goes underground, and below the metro, for a mile to the Place de la Republique.  Apparently on nice Sundays it is a great place to wander and have brunch.  Yesterday there were not too many people enjoying it.

There are nine locks, two swing bridges, and eight bridges crossing the canal.

Here is one of the locks that allow barges to travel up the canal.

And walkways on either side........

Then we took the metro to the Place de la Madeleine to do a little shopping at the many gorgeous, and expensive, food stores there....Fauchon and Hediard, and La Maison du la Truffe.

Truffles, foie gras ..............

And chocolates..............
We stopped for a champagne at a cafe' and Rick was really surprised when I said, There's my friend, Susan!"  Quite fun to be sitting on the Rue Rivoli and see someone you know..............

Today we had to get serious!  I had shopping to do for the Christmas Eve dinner.  Courtney Greer and Chris arrive on Friday evening, and Chris' cousin, Dana, is coming in from Denmark to join us for Christmas.

We bought the foie gras, fig confit, and eyed the crates of oysters, but decided to pick those up on Saturday so they are at their freshest. And we plan on buying huge gambas at the marche'.  This afternoon, while Rick did some  Christmas shopping, I made Beef Bourguignon. This time I stepped it up a bit and used truffle oil (it's Christmas afterall!)

I purchased sun-dried tomatoes at my little vegetable market for a different dish.  I asked for roasted tomatoes, but the salesman just didn't get it.  Luckily there were several women in line with me and they all discussed what it was I wanted. When I finally got the "dried" tomatoes, produced in Italy, everyone was very happy! Even though it was raining..."it's the season, after all."

Rick is in charge of the wine purchases and I predict by the end of the holiday, he and Pascal, at our neighborhood Nicholas store, will be good friends.

And even though, it's a totally different Christmas than we usually have at home in Oak Harbor, it is quite nice to be in Paris this year.