It's so hard to get the right kind of Christmas wreath in Paris that I took this photo out of the L.L. Bean catalog and loaded it onto my phone so that I could show the florist what I was talking about.
Most of the wreaths, called couronnes or crowns in French, are covered with red or gold Christmas-tree balls, white pinecones, or golden leaves or other sprayed ornaments.
Last week H bought two wreaths for the front door (which like many Paris apartments is really two doors, one of which basically never opens except when you need to move in a piano or sofa). In spite of my strict instructions he came home with two unadorned wreaths and a two-meter length of ribbon to hang them. "But where are the bows?"
"Can't you just tie them?"
So today I went back to the garden shop and asked for two bows. For good measure I also bought an Advent wreath for the table. You are supposed to burn one candle the first Sunday in Advent (December 2nd this year) and then two candles the next, and so on till it's Christmas. It was always a part of Christmas I appreciated as a kid, when Christmas seems as if it will never arrive, but the wreath showed that you were making some progress.
While the gardener was warming up the glue gun to make the bows, I asked him if he knew anywhere to buy a cat carrier in the neighborhood. The concierge is taking care of our cat over Christmas and has asked if she can bring him to the country to rid her country house of mice. He's a very good mouser, and he got a good scare from a mountain lion or something big once in Colorado and doesn't try to escape outside any more (I say, crossing my fingers).
"I would never let my cat go to the country. She'd escape and would not know what to do," said the gardener. "I love her and I would be very sad if I lost her. She's nine years old and very loving. I give her crème fraîche out of a spoon every morning." He added that the cat knew when he was going on a trip. "I have to shut the doors and pack my suitcases secretly. If I leave them out, she drags everything out of the suitcase into another room!"
He made a pretty, simple Advent wreath for me and wrapped it up in cellophane, with the new bows in the middle.
