Life in the dome!

With freezing temperatures (down to -18 at one point!) and winds blowing flurries of snow crystals from the roofs, sparkling as they swirled in the air, it felt as if we were living in a snow dome.

La Jovienne remained snug despite me not closing the library window properly and freezing my computer! (I didn't know that they could freeze but I'm glad it did, apparently it prevents the hard drive from being damaged by condensation!)
And my window was open because.................? I was too hot! I am used to being hotter than everyone else so it took several days of feeling decidedly iffy andwanting to sleep all the time for me to realise that I had a fever & needed some rest.
I did manage to unpack some more boxes from the old house though and found these;

All collected at different times they work really well together for now. The box is English Tonbridge ware from the 19th Century but the rest are French.

The washboard has developed a wonderful sculptural texture. I think the small carved square is a clay tile stamp.

As they came down from the loft I popped them on this chest of drawers on the first landing of the old staircase (as opposed to the new staircase at the other end of the house) and they looked just right there so I have decided to leave them. They look perfect in that space.

The old staircase is wonderful, 

The polished treads wind all the way up to the loft around a central column that was obviously carved from an entire tree.

It has lovely panelling too.

You can see the lovely hollow curve of the central post in the top lefthand corner of the photo above.
The bottom steps are granite. The door leads to the room known as the mi-étage that currently serves as my stock room but will eventually become a private sitting room.

And the handrail is iron. It has a beautiful rustic elegance that I didn't want to spoil with heavy handed decoration. Normally I love using colour, but it didn't need further embellishment. The panelling was painted a pale but warm grey that sits quietly alongside the granite.  I would always rather leave a space empty than put something in there that 'will do' It drives me mad so I would much rather have bare walls than average pictures for example. As soon as I found the three sepia photographs of a curving staircase I knew they would work perfectly in this space.

When the time came to put a new wall in the kitchen I couldn't bear to lose the view of the staircase so Eric the Menuisier made me this glass and oak wall he called a 'Claustra'. 

This is the claustra from the other side with the steps leading down to the jardin d'hiver. The house has all sorts of bizarre levels and spaces. One of the many reasons I love it.

This is the kitchen seen through the claustra as you go upstairs. It is quite handy for checking things that are in the oven, especially if you are busy.
The kitchen was designed to scale on paper following the traditional wisdom about working triangles etc. The whole thing was torn up and a new plan devised to incorporate the view of the staircase and the medieval doorway that was revealed when the plaster was removed from what was going to be the alcove for the stove. It is now very unconventional and lifts my spirits every time I go in there.