• Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Patricia Sands

Author

  • Home
  • Blog
  • About
    • Can I visit your Book Club on Zoom?
  • Books
    • The Bridge Club
    • Love in Provence Series
      • The Promise of Provence
      • About Promises to Keep
      • I Promise You This
    • Drawing Lessons
    • Les Villa des Viollettes series
      • The First Noël at the Villa des Violettes
      • A Season of Surprises at the Villa des Violettes
      • Lavender, Loss & Love at the Villa des Violettes
    • The Secrets We Hide
  • Travel
    • Photography, France & d’Ailleurs
  • Instagram
  • If it’s Friday, it must be France…
  • Contact me

Carrie Spencer

Van Gogh in Arles

October 15, 2011 by Patricia Sands 14 Comments

If it’s Friday, it must be France …

I know … I’m sneaking in under the wire to still post this on Friday. On top of that, I’m kind of taking the easy way out today  – but by accident. Honest! I didn’t know these incredible websites existed until a few hours ago.

First I wanted to explain how to pronounce Arles correctly. The most common mistake that North Americans make is they pronounce the “s” and that is just SO not cool. Don’t pronounce the “s” at the end of any French towns ( um, except for a few exceptions … in fact, hardly ever on any French words but then you run into more exceptions and that’s a whole other story  … we don’t even want to get into that now …  ).

So one day our fabulous friends Christian, Lucille and Hubert (with whom we spent such lovely times in France last summer), gave us a pronunciation lesson for Arles. I was going to explain it to you and then I found this website. Click here! Ha! Just place the mouse on the word “Arles” and you will hear the correct way to say it! Amazing! What’s better is you won’t have to put up with me blathering on, attempting to explain it.

Today I wanted to share with you some more of Vincent Van Gogh’s history in Arles and that’s exactly what I’m going to do. BUT … I can hardly accept any credit for compiling this information. As I began my research, I came across a most impressive website about that very topic. The Web is just SO amazing, n’est-ce pas?

If you are in a hurry right now, wait until you have a few minutes and come back to this page. In fact, wait until you have time to bring along a glass of wine or a pastis or a cup of tea or whatever your beverage of choice, so you can just relax and enjoy this. Honest … you’ll love it …

First click on the video here, take a long sip, relax and enjoy … mmmmm …

Wasn’t that beautiful?

Now when you have more time, check out this site below. I’ve already sent them an e-mail thanking them for doing all my work!

Please click here and visit the VanGoghGallery.com to see a finer selection of photographs of Arles than I could ever provide. A painting of Van Gogh is shown alongside a photo of how that same scene looks today. It’s surprising how much of this beautiful town and area has not changed. As you can see, there is a load of fantastic information on this website. I hope you enjoy it as much as I have today. I did spend a lot of time on this when I should have been writing but … c’est la vie! It was worth it and I will catch up tomorrow.

Thanks to Carrie Spencer, our resident WordPress expert from our Wana blogging group, I do know how to set up a slideshow now. Oh, was I excited to receive her simple instructions! I’ll save my Arles slideshow for next Friday as I’ve taken up enough of your time today.

When we visit Arles, we always have a drink or a meal at the Van Gogh café and toast to Vincent and the beauty he left the world in spite of his tormented soul. RIP.

In fact, as I’m typing this, my DH just brought us a glass of wine and we are toasting Vincent again and listening to the Don McLean song for the umpteenth time today. Santé!

Have you visited Arles? If you are planning a trip to France, be sure to include this town. Are you a Van Gogh fan and do you have a favourite amongst his paintings? I love to hear from you so feel free to leave a comment!

Share this:

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn
  • Reddit
  • Pinterest
  • Tumblr
  • More
  • Pocket
  • Print
  • Email

Filed Under: Blog, France, If it is France... Tagged With: 2011 Next Generation Indie Book Awards Finalist, Arles, Carrie Spencer, Don McLean, follow your dreams, ForeWord 2010 Book Of The Year Finalist, lifelong friendship, living in the south of France, Patricia Sands, Starry Starry Night, The Bridge Club, the power of friendship, VanGoghGallery, Vincent Van Gogh

Post-Thanksgiving Thankfulness

October 11, 2011 by Patricia Sands Leave a Comment

The Thanksgiving weekend weather in southern Ontario could not have been more perfect.  This holiday is my favourite.  I love it no matter what the weather but it’s even more fun counting your blessings when the sun is shining!

Taking time to be thankful every day is a habit I have long cultivated and the … ahem … older I get the more I think about it. We all have days when issues drag us down into negative territory. That’s life! I like to recognize each day for the gift it is, grab on to it and make it the best I can.

Before  I do anything more with this fine day, there are some friends I need to thank … in fact, I should have done this some time ago.

Thanks to Social Media Goddess and Mighty Fine Lady, Kristen Lamb, whose blogging course a number of people took a few months ago, a group of bloggers came together in quite an extraordinary way. A unique cyberbond was formed. (I need to interject here that Kristen is running the course again so if you haven’t signed up … do it! Go! Right now! I’ll wait for you to come back. Click here for the link.)

Now for the overdue thanks. Recently, Tameri Etherton(A Cup Of Tea and Sorcery) , Kate MacNicol (Hanging by A Moment), Carrie Spencer (Smartass Romance) and Natalie Hartford (Life Out Loud), talented bloggers all, on separate occasions honoured me with the Liebster Blog Award. I was thrilled. It’s always fun to receive awards. Thanks to all of you! For you readers, when you have time, click on those links. You will be glad you did!

However with everything else that’s been going on in the past few weeks I am only now getting around to passing on the award. The whole point of this is to pay it forward and build community. Liebster, by the way, is a German term of affection. Very sweet.

Ok, then, these are the *rules*: this award is meant to highlight newer blogs. So the blogger receiving the award links back to the blogger who awarded him/her, and tags 3-5 people. For those I am about to award, I should also point out there is no obligation to continue this award. If this is not your cup of tea, don’t worry.

Naomi Bulger, Messages In A Bottle, author of Airmail, a wonderful quick read that is quirky, magical and thought-inspiring … just like her unique blog. Don’t miss it!

Linn B. Halton, author of Touched By The Light and founder of the fabulous loveahappyending.com website which brings together writers, readers, reviewers and literati in general around the world.

Barbara Conelli, author of Chique Secrets of Dolce Vita, who writes about Italy in a way that makes you feel you are there!

Patricia Caviglia, author of Masks, and a young woman who speaks to the reality of juggling the demands of parenting, the day job, and being an author.

Congratulations ladies! Pick up the award and put it on your website. This award means you deserve to be recognized.
Do with it what you will!

Then – tadaaaaaa – last week this award arrived from my friend and fellow blogger, Angela Orlowski-Peart, who writes from the heart and has the best smile ever!

Here are the rules for this award:

1. Thank and link to the person who nominated me.
2. Share seven random facts about myself – which I did here.
3. Pass the award along to deserving blogging buddies.
4. Contact those buddies to congratulate them.
I’m passing this award on to Amy at Everything But The Kid, who puts more energy into every single thing she does than anyone else I know … and always with the cheeriest attitude.
Thanks again all of you, for your thoughtfulness, support, and enthusiasm. Blog on, my friends!

Share this:

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn
  • Reddit
  • Pinterest
  • Tumblr
  • More
  • Pocket
  • Print
  • Email

Filed Under: Blog, France, If it is France... Tagged With: 2011 Next Generation Indie Book Awards Finalist, Angela Orlowski-Peart, BarbaraConelli, Carrie Spencer, ForeWord 2010 Book Of The Year Finalist, Kate MacNicol, Kristen Lamb, Liebster Award, Linn B. Halton, Naomi Bulger, Natalie Hartford, Non-mom, Patricia Caviglia, Patricia Sands, Tameri Etherton, The Bridge Club, the power of friendship

Primary Sidebar

Join Me Here!

RSS
Facebook
Facebook
fb-share-icon
Twitter
Visit Us
Tweet
YouTube
Pinterest
Pinterest
fb-share-icon
LinkedIn
LinkedIn
Share
Instagram

Follow Me on BookBub

Follow Me on BookBub

Follow me on Amazon

Follow me on Amazon

Available from Amazon!

Available from Amazon!

Available Now!

Available Now!

Available from Amazon

Available from Amazon

Join me and 9 of your favourite women’s fiction authors

Join me and 9 of your favourite women’s fiction authors

The Good Life France Magazine

The Good Life France Magazine

Categories

Archives

Footer

Copyright Disclaimer

© 2020 by Patricia Sands. All rights reserved. Permission is granted to use short quotes provided a link back to this page and proper attribution is given to me as the original author. All photographs on this site are copyright of Patricia Sands

Follow Me!

RSS
Facebook
Facebook
fb-share-icon
Twitter
Visit Us
Tweet
YouTube
Pinterest
Pinterest
fb-share-icon
LinkedIn
LinkedIn
Share
Instagram
  • Privacy Policy

FTC DISCLOSURE

The Federal Trade Commission requires that I disclose any relationship I have between a product manufacturer or service provider when I write about a product or service. I may receive a small commission for purchases made via affiliate links on this site such as Amazon. The above does not affect my opinion of those products and services. I am committed to sharing the work of other authors with my friends and readers.

Copyright © 2023 By Patricia Sands · Theme created and maintained by Bakerview Consulting