Day Dreams

It has looked like this out my window for the past couple of days.

So I am dreaming of this. 

Amboise

And this.

Le Manoir les Minimes

And hoping for an upgrade to this. 

The day dream is the Loire Valley.  We are driving down there at the end of the month and I am counting down the days.   Half the fun of any trip is in the planning if you ask me.  Dreaming of this lovely place on this rainy day.  One of my absolute favorite past times.

Anyway. Back in reality... I am working full speed ahead to get our place ready for company.   Including blog land.  The goal was to have a finished product before we left for the wine country trip...

However, I've had a little set back (or a major life breakthrough?).....  I've started painting. And not the apartment.  Think canvases, acrylic paint, color palette, lots of little brushes.... you know, painting like an artist paints.  And I am totally in love with it.

If you know me at all you are probably laughing right now.  I know.  And I agree.  I have always thought of myself as being as far from artistic as one can humanly be.  I went to law school for heaven's sake! But I am just going to say it. As absolutely ridiculous cliche as it is going to sound, I am going to say.  I think the city is rubbing off on me.  That's right.  Paris has inspired me to paint. (Although I must admit, it is also all of these design blogs that I read! You can only look at so many beautiful things before you just have to start having a go at it yourself). So maybe a more accurate statement is that beautiful things have inspired me to find a creative outlet.  

Anyway, I am in love with my new hobby and taking my first painting class tomorrow.  Abstract is my game.  Colors, lines and textures.  If nothing else, it is a much more fun and less expensive way to get some art up on these blank walls.

So now I am also dreaming of this.

Monet, of course.

And this...

Giverny - Monet's country home.

And stopping by here on the way home.

Mont Saint Michele - a beautiful island in Normandy with an old monastery that looks like this at night.

I don't know who these people are that made up the live in the moment catch phrase, but if you ask me, I would say they have never had a good day dream.