°°°"°°°"°°°"°°°"°°° Who has created the Weaver's Shed site? °°°"°°°"°°°"°°°"°°°

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something about the people behind this site?

 
We are a 'European family' being half British and half German,
and being proud to have French family members, too.		   We   
live
in 		     north-western France at 3 hrs from
the ferry ports.
We are in our early 50s.

"He" is not working at present due to osteo-necrosis. The garden gets done when the bones allow: 2ha=4acres of lovingly maintained wilderness and wildlife habitat;

      and there are also :

  
 

to look after, and occasionally also farm-sitting and sheep-sitting at his sister's.

Before the O.N. 'he' was a part-time art-craft instructor, in the UK 'he' was an art teacher at a secondary school, a weaving instructor, and always an artist/painter.
"She" is working in a day activity centre for adults with special needs and behavioural problems. In the UK 'she' was a printing workshop manager, a care worker, warden in a sheltered housing scheme, ran the family's art-craft supplies business, and before that were studies to become an art teacher.

"She" has an indoor aviary with 6 adult cockateels all raising one "Babby", and a red-rump parakeet who is learning to imitate some of the wild birds.
Babby at 18 days and this is Reddy

a coffee under march sunshine (nooooooo, we had a mug each ....)

Our children are grown-up. After primary schooling in the UK they found the first 18 months at our local 'collège' a struggle because their "school French" from the UK did not prepare them to live within the fast every-day language, having to use and work with it at school, and the local 'patois' and accent were additional difficulties. But they made friends on day one, had coaching from teachers excited to be able to help in their free time, joined the library and sports groups, integrated fast, progressed incredibly quickly, and as from their second year everything fell into place smoothly.

The 'older' is a qualified car mechanic, became interested in computer systems in cars, did some training and worked with computers for 3 years. He married a French girl in 2000.
But he, like his brother, loves the contact with people and has recently bought a restaurant-pizzeria-bar, where he appreciates chats with customers while serving, and cooking.
He established the first internet café in the area which attracts very many tourists, and teaches people to use the PC.
The 'younger' decided to get a literary-linguistic Baccalaureat. He finished European Business studies at Nantes University in 2002 and is currently working in the south of France for an international company, after training with them in Germany.


We all changed life style and learned completely new skills and comfort levels when we changed country in 1991: we bought a really old no-frills smallholding in France, rented 33ha and bred free-range pigs. Nowadays life has to be quite calm and 'lightweight', no more farming, except for the odd sheep roaming in the 'garden'. When not 'working', and nothing needs to be done in the house or garden, researched on the internet, in the local library, or prepared for work or for an exhibition, we get into one of our hobbies which are all connected with art-craft-creativity (when we don't fancy lazing in the garden, reading, meeting friends and family).
We have wild deer walking across the meadows and sleeping in a brambled shelter in our orchard, wild pheasants wandering across the yard; 3 types of owl and colonies of bats, swallows, housemartins, robins, bluetits, wrens and nightingales live with us. While lacking in what people call "comforts and luxuries off the shop shelf" we have so much more. A simple satisfying life on 'our farm' close to Mother Earth, far from city madness. We are at 12hrs travelling from English and German families and from 'the younger' down south, and well-placed to see closest family and many friends and colleagues for frequent get-togethers. It's simply good to live here.
 

 
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