A little something extra for the holidays.

Christmas village for the kids!

Maybe it's because I'm feeling generous because it's the Christmas season, or maybe it's because I'm feeling lonely without my wonderful roommate and desperately need to kill time before my 10:30PM train to Paris (and Brussels!), but here's another blog post coming only two days after the last!

Yesterday I went to St. Andrew's for morning service and then after a little Christmas shopping returned at 4pm for their Christmas carols service. I haven't talked much about its appearance, but with crucifixes everywhere and the grid iron separation between the congregation and the altar the church has more of a Catholic than Protestant feel. Regardless, it's a beautiful little church and decarations of holly and ivy really set it off yesterday evening. The lights were turned off and they passed out candles to everyone. (Because of Pau's gray, disgusting weather it didn't matter that we were having a candlelight service at four in the afternoon.) The tiny church was absolutely packed, with English speakers as well as French attendees, which was cool for me. In between traditional religious carols different speakers read Bible passages (in French and in English!). Even though St. Andrew's leads their regular services in English, it was neat for me to see how they made the effort to make French speakers feel welcome as well. One of my favorite songs that we sang during the service was the French carol "Dans une étable obscure," (Lo, How a Rose E'er Blooming).

Christmas cookies in our tiny toaster oven!

After the service members of the parish followed a British Christmas tradition and served everyone mulled wine and mince pies. Oh my goodness. Mince pies are absolutely delicious! I think next year when I'm back in the States I'm going to try my hand at making them for the holidays. Furthermore, I enjoy a glass of eggnog (preferably soynog) every holiday season, but really, this mulled wine can't be beat! This is another tradition I wouldn't mind bringing back with me to the States. I enjoyed my mulled wine and mince pie with a kind, middle-aged French woman named Claude. It was great chatting with her in "franglais" (she's also fluent in English!) about all kinds of topics. I enjoyed hearing about her son who married a Sénégalaise and hearing about the volunteer opportunities she is pursuing now that she is retired. I'm so glad that I ended up speaking with her, because she gave me the name and address of a social community center where I should be able to find an organization to volunteer with. The best connections I've made in Pau have been through meeting kind, random people like Claude (and first Fouzia) and I'm so grateful for them.

St. Nicholas Day surprise!

To close out this random post I'll leave you with a few pictures. I've forgotten to keep you all updated on pastry excursions with my friends, but just to sum it up, it's been going very well. The last pâtisserie we went to was Saint-André for a millefeuille, a tarte with grapefruit and pear and a vanilla macaroon with caramel and mango. Mmm this is the life.

Ohhh yes.

And in case you didn't believe me a few posts back, I really did cook a raw turkey, and here is the photo to prove it.

Yep, stuck my hand right up in there. No fear! (Okay, maybe just a little.)

                                 

 Joyeux Noël à tous et à toutes!

The inside of the goodie bag my roomie left me for St. Nicholas Day!