A POstcard A Day - Friday 29 June 2018 - Friday Smiles

Hello lovely people, 

I'm back home again! It's always nice to come home again after a long absence, and good to sleep in your own bed again too.

We've had a wonderful trip. I will be posting photos as soon as I have transferred them to my computer. As you know, blogging from my iPad was not a success as Blogger could not find my photos on my appliance. 

I'm joining Virginia at Rocking your World Friday and Annie at A Stitch In Time and today is all about what has made us smile, so let's start with my postcards. This first one is from Germany. From Bremen to be precise. It features the bronze statue of the Bremen Town Musicians from a fairy tale by the Brothers Grimm. The statue was made by Gerhard Marcks and was erected in 1953. 

Do you know the story? In the story, a donkey, a dog, a cat, and a rooster (or hen), all past their prime years in life and usefulness on their respective farms, were soon to be discarded or mistreated by their masters. One by one, they leave their homes and set out together. They decide to go to Bremen, known for its freedom, to live without owners and become musicians there ("Something better than death we can find anywhere"). Contrary to the story's title the characters never arrive in Bremen, as they succeed in tricking and scaring off a band of robbers, capturing their spoils, and moving into their house.

 The other card I received this week is this:

It is an ornate mantle piece from the Villa Ephrussi de Rothshield in Cap Ferrar on the Cote d'Azur. 

Wikipedia writes this:

The villa was designed by the French architect Aaron Messiah, and constructed between 1905 and 1912 by Baroness Béatrice de Rothschild (1864–1934) .

A member of the Rothschild banking family and the wife of the banker Baron Maurice de Ephrussi, Béatrice de Rothschild built her rose-colored villa on a promontory on the isthmus of Cap Ferrat overlooking the Mediterranean Sea. The Baroness filled the mansion with antique furniture, Old Master paintings, sculptures, objets d'art, and assembled an extensive collection of rare porcelain. The gardens are classified by the French Ministry of Culture as one of the Notable Gardens of France.

On her death in 1934, the Baroness donated the property and its collections to the Académie des Beaux Arts division of the Institut de France and it is now open to the public.

On the home front, we have moved to the ground floor flat. Our house is built on 4 floors and we live on the 3rd floor because of the spectacular views. But it is very hot in the summer as we have large panorama windows. So hubby has spent the last two years turning the ground floor into a purpose built, wheel chair friendly flat where we can live when we no longer are able to manage those stairs. We noticed it was much cooler, so we decided to move there for the summer. The flat has no terrace but is has a delightful patio:

 The sun has not yet arrived there in the morning so we have breakfast outside. The two plants on either side of the window are jasmins and they smell divine! Tomorrow we might go to the garden centre and buy some more plants. I'm smiling from ear to ear!

That's it from me. Let me finish with some funnies:
You know how much I love street art. Here are some 'Before and after' street decorations. (I have not been able to discover who the artist is.)

Have a giggle, keep smiling,
Lisca

A Postcard A Day - Tuesday 26 June 2018 - T for home again!

Hello lovely people, I'm back! How are you all?
I am happy to be home again after a long road journey through Europe. My last post was in May! How time flies.  

I have many nice places to share with you. I had my iPad with me on my trip but Blogger doesn't go into 'photos' when I ask it to insert an image. So I haven't been able to blog while we were travelling. I'm really sorry. Now that I'm back I shall ask Blogger how to do that. This item will go on my to-do list but there are other things to do. 

We are in the process of moving from the 4th floor to the ground floor (it's much cooler downstairs). We have built a self contained, wheelchair friendly flat for when we are old and grey and won't be able to cope with all those stairs. But why wait until we are disabled? Lets move now, just for the summer so we can stay cool. 

While I was away I have put my Postcrossing on 'non-active', so I have not received many postcards. Just these two:

This one is from the south of Russia. From Krasnodar to be precise. On the back of the card is written where and what it is but I can't read Russian. Whatever it is, it is beautiful architecture and colours. I love it.

The other card is from Taiwan:

It is a horse drawn with ink on paper with the title ' A War Horse' 1941. The artist is HSU Pei-Hong 1895-1953 and it is kept in the Taipei Art Museum Collection in Taiwan. I like that one very much too.

Now for some photos of our journey and a beverage because I can't wait to join the T-gang at Elizabeth and Bluebeard's T-party.

One of the villages we stopped for coffee was called Ainhoa. It is a village in the French Basque country in the foothills of the Pyrenees.

It consists of one long street really but it is very pretty.

I found this information about it:

The quaint little village of Ainhoa has just 650 inhabitants and is located in the interior of the French Basque province of Labourd, less than 3 km away from the Spanish border. It was built during the 13th century for use by the nearby Urdazubi-Urdax Monastery and over the centuries has served as a place of shelter for pilgrims on the way to Santiago de Compostela in Spain.

The village is formed by a main street full of incredibly beautiful Basque style houses. However, most of the original houses were destroyed during the Thirty Years’ War and the ones that we see today were rebuilt in the 16th and 17th centuries 

 The largest part of Basque country is in northern Spain, but there is this little bit in France too. The people feel their distinct Basque identity and speak a totally different language.

The names and words on the houses look really weird to me and I don't understand a word of their language. (Luckily they speak English in the coffee shop)

 I love the architecture.

 I found this stone dated 1643:

 So we found the cafe and ordered our coffee. This is inside the cafe:

But we sat outside as it was lovely weather:

As you can see I had a cold glass of beer and we also ordered a Spanish Tortilla (tortilla de patate).(We were only a minute from The Spanish border).

Next week I will show more lovely places we visited. 
So Happy T-Day everyone!
Until next week,
Lisca