Our French Village House (Episode 3)

Week 23 in France 1/5-1/12/2026. We are officially into our sixth month of full time living in France.

Welcome to the 51st weekly post of our Baby Boomers Move to France blog. Wishing you have a great week from our place in Chabanais, France.

Things on the agenda this week:

Some important stuff this week:

• Rosie vet appointment
• Contact our US tax guy
• Follow up wood stove contractor
• Follow up on Solar power issues
• This week is regular trash week as opposed to recycling trash which is the following week. We messed this up last week.
• Start our “in person” French lessons
• Follow up issues with my BNP Paribas bank card

Weather forcast:

We do get up to the high of 48^o F on Thursday and lows as far down as 23^oF overnight. That is slightly warmer than this past week. Partly cloudy and some frozen rain mixed in and like last week, slight potential for snow.

More about our house

Along with our regular weekly update, this week we will share more about our home prep progress and a little more detail about this 120-year-old stone village house and its location relative to the village. See below in the “French Lifestyle and Culture” section. This will take a couple of posts so stay tuned. LOTS OF PICTURES.

Why this Blog?

Long story short, we are “Baby Boomers” that have moved from beautiful Venice, Florida to the beautiful French countryside as retirees. After a little over a year of planning and fretting we sold everything in Venice and made the move on 1 August 2025.

We publish a brief update of our adventures every Sunday to share our experiences, tips and mistakes.

If you are thinking about a move to France? We are happy to share our thoughts and answer questions. Just drop a question in the comment section below and we will get back to you.

If you are wondering what got into our head and inspired us to make the move, check out some of our earlier posts. Again, if you have questions about our adventure, drop your questions in the comment section below.

We are learning a lot about the French culture and lifestyle as we make our life here and each week, we include in the blog some thoughts on what we learn. If you have a specific question about France, let us know and we are happy to answer. Other folks probably have the same question. If we don’t know the answer, we will share resource information.

This Week in General

Banjo practice this week (working on Cumberland Gap), and EB is making progress on her latest crochet project. It is a heavy blanket.

Icy Monday

After I scraped ice off of the car windows I went to Super U for groceries. It is a handy grocery store that is roughly a mile away from our house. I’m not the best grocery shopper, but I found just about everything on the list. I count that as victory. I don’t know how EB figures out store geography so quickly. It takes me forever.

Nothing much else going on Monday.

We got a couple of little projects done that deserve a pat on the back.

Snow day Tuesday

We woke up to snow on the ground on Tuesday, but by the time we took Rosie to the vet the snow was gone.

Rosie’s vet appointment and a few hoops to get her “pet passport”.

Her appointment was scheduled for 2:00. As you might remember we want to get her “pet passport” finalized. We are in the planning stages of a trip to Switzerland that we will take this summer with Cindy and Don, so we want to be sure she is totally legal to travel in and out of France. This process started before we left Florida. We had to have a USDA certified vet examine Rosie and prepare paperwork to send to the USDA 10 days prior to our arrival in France. All of this was needed to allow us to move her to France with us.

We walked over to the vet’s office from our house. As usual we were a little early and like so many offices in France they close for lunch from noon to 14:00 (2:00 pm). We patiently waited outside the building. Promptly at 14:00 the door opened and we were admitted for Rosie’s appointment. All went well except they needed proof that we had already paid the 11.00-euro fee to ICAD. They would have to contact the officials at ICAD. Elizabeth remembered that we had a receipt for the fee payment in our Wise account and we could send it to the vet. They agreed that that would be acceptable.

After leaving the vet we decided to stop at the boulangerie for a baguette and croissants. The boulangerie was closed until 15:30 (3:30). We were about 15 minutes early, so we went next door to the sports bar for a beer. Rosie was on her best behavior, and our timing was good. I went into the boulangerie and ask the lady for un baguette traditional and deux croissants. It cost less than 5 euros.

When we got home, I went online to the Wise account and managed to find the ICAD receipt in the Wise account and EB was able to make the email work. The vet told us that the pet passport process takes 2 or 3 weeks. We will need to follow up.

By the way, our vet and staff speak English pretty well.

Solar power and wood stove follow up

I have been contacting various contractors to give us quotes on servicing and extending our solar power panels and battery bank. At the same time, I have been contacting a few potential wood/pellet stove contractors.

I have scheduled a couple of appointments with contractors to visit our house and provide a quote for the solar power system for next week. EB and I discussed the possibility of extending the solar power capacity to include the entire house. As it is now, it covers abut 60%.

In addition, I’m pretty sure that I will have the wood/pellet stove folks over to quote the stove options next week too.

More snow Wednesday morning and it was still on the ground after 2:00 PM.

We talked about walking over to the boulangerie for another baguette but waited until later. Temps remain around 30 degrees F (-1 degree C). If you are dressed properly, it is not too bad for a walk to the boulangerie, but I sure wouldn’t want to work in those conditions. EB took the below picture.

Snow was expected through Wednesday night, but a warming trend is in the forecast. Definitely not good driving weather for a Florida driver.

I bundled up and walked over to the boulangerie and bought a baguette, croissants and a couple of sweets for later. Then I walked over to a local shop that I hope will quote our wood/pellet stove project. They do not speak English, but I think they figured out what I was trying to say. The lady in charge asked me to email our request so they can translate it. Fingers crossed. I will follow up in a couple of days.

Thursday: In person French lesson today

Rain off and on all day, but the temperature warmed up a little.

Our tub for the sous vide arrived today. To make the set up complete we need a grill. EB went to St. Junien for a few more household items and picture frames and noticed that the Mr. Bricolage (Home Depot type of store) has moved the grills up to the front of the store display area. Maybe we pick one up next week.

We finally have our map of France displayed. EB had to trim the map to fit a frame, but it looks good.

Our French lesson was scheduled for 5:30 PM (17h30m). We “took the scenic route” and arrived a bit late. There was one other student already there, but it seems the protocol is really loose, so we didn’t get any demerits for being late. LOL

The class is a bit confusing at first, but I will reserve judgement until we have attended a few lessons. By the way, the cost is 10 euros per person for a 1-hour lesson. I think EB impressed the lady with her French. We both did pretty well so the Duolingo practice has helped. Our teacher said it was obvious that we have been working hard at it as our vocabulary was pretty extensive. Of course, we still have a long way to go to fluency.

I need to get new hearing aids. I was in the boulangerie and bought more stuff than usual. The lady said dix (10) and I thought she said six (6). So, I put six euros on the plate. The lady was very nice and explained the cost is dix. I will eventually get it right.

Friday

Another rainy day.

We moved our luggage to a storage space above the stair well. It is a little tricky but there is quite a bit of space there.

EB walked over to the vet office to clear up questions about Rosie’s pet passport.

Saturday: Lunch in St. Junien

We went to St. Junien and had lunch at the “Italian” restaurant that is attached to the E.Leclerc store. Lunch was a really good salad with chicken and a glass of an Italian red wine. We did the grocery shopping at E.Leclerc and also bought some wine there. We are trying different wines in order to find our local favorite. We still like the Duras wine that we got to know while living there. We might take a drive to Duras to get a case of the wine as we have not been able to find it in the Chabanais area. We are stocking up on wine for Cindy and Don’s upcoming trip!

While we were at the market, we got a call from the furniture store. They were alerting us that the final piece of the bed frame will be delivered on Tuesday next week. That is great news.

That is the week. A little snow, a little rain, slowly getting furnishings arranged and we are settling into the French life and our village.

French Lifestyle and Culture

More About Our House (installment 3)

This week we will describe the Guest bedroom and ensuite bathroom of our house. Before we get to that, a brief update on the living room. I took one of the shutter doors off of the front of the living room entrance just to see what it takes. No problem just lifted it off of the hinge. It is heavy, but manageable. I will remove the other one eventually.

You might remember from last week’s description, the guest bedroom is off of the living room.

You step up 2 steps into the room. There is a door there that can be closed for privacy. This room includes a Murphy bed on the wall to your left as you enter. Elizabeth and I have been sleeping on this bed since we moved into the house. It is comfortable although it is really low to the floor. On the bed we have a duvet with cover which keeps us nice and cozy.

If I was any kind of an artist I would paint something on the wall there. It is a perfect space for something. I think it would be kind of cool to paint one of those 3D perspective paintings. Maybe like you are walking onto a south Pacific beach or the deck of a sailboat sailing along the California coastline, or maybe walking through a vineyard at St. Emilion, or floating over the farmland along the Loire river in a hot air balloon. You would only see the painting when you open up the Murphy bed like a secret passage. I haven’t talked to Elizabeth about it yet. What do you think?

There is one window with shutters that looks out over the street on the east wall. By the way, the street is very quiet.

Straight ahead as you walk into the guest room is the bathroom and shower. The little sink is common for old village houses remodeled to include a guest bathroom, I think. That is not a dirty soap ring in the sink it is a shadow. Not a good picture. The room has a few warts, notice the ripple in the wallpaper. I’m not a fan of the wallpaper install. Not sure why they didn’t paint. That will have to be a future project when it is a bit warmer.

I mentioned that the house is quirky. You might notice that you have to a slight step up to the toilet. The cabinet was modified to have shorter legs on the right side so it would fit over the step and be level. LOL

That’s the brief tour of the guest bedroom and bathroom of our little 120-year-old village house. We will hold off on the master bedroom tour until the bed is delivered next week. We will show you the summer kitchen when the weather is a little nicer and we can show it off. I’m looking forward to the tour of the yard in spring.

Next Week (la Semaine Prochaine)

• Meeting with Solar power guys for quotes
• Meeting with wood/pellet stove contractors for quotes
• Having trouble contacting our US investment advisor so follow up needed
• Second French lesson
• Bed complete with Tuesday delivery!
• Try again to contact BNP Paribas regarding my bank card

Weather forecast for next week

Weather for the week is forecast to warm up. We do get up to the high of 55^o F on Tuesday and as lows as 39^oF overnight on Saturday. That is a definite warming trend. Partly cloudy and some rain is expected.

Signing off for the week

As always, we sign off wishing you all a good week and remind you to take care of yourselves and your family.

Keep in touch and leave questions, suggestions and comments below. We really enjoy hearing from you. Your kind and encouraging words remind us that we can do this.

Wishing you a good week (Bonne Semaine) Stay warm.

Mark and Elizabeth Beiley

Babyboomersmovetofrance.com