So finally this summer (after a challenging couple of months health-wise) I managed to relax and kick back.....in France. My parents bought a property in south-west France in the late eighties to celebrate their 25th wedding anniversary and their love of all things French. When I say 'a property' it was more like a stone cattle shed with a new roof. There were no stairs or sanitary wear but there was running water and electricity, what more could you want?! My father was a structural engineer and my mother fluent in French (having lived and worked there in her early twenties) a perfect combination for the job in hand. With 3 children in their twenties, they were looking for something that was both inexpensive and easy to maintain - a project that they could put their energies into and be used by friends and family alike. Now, some thirty years later, the 'cottage' as we refer to it (I'm really not sure why) has 2 flushing toilets, a shower, kitchen...