Currently: June 2025

Bonjour from France! We have started our summer travels, though admittedly, I have done A LOT of work while I’ve been gone. It’s the blessing and curse of remote work. On one hand, I have the luxury of being able to work from France. On the other hand, much of my sightseeing is limited to the mornings. Since we started our trip in Mont St Michel, a place where we’ve spent several weeks in previously, I didn’t feel like I was missing out on too much. It’s also been extraordinarily warm this year, which presents its own challenges. We’ve never really needed air conditioning on the northern coast of France, but we needed it this year!

I am hopeful that the first two weeks in July will bring a few more slow days so I can enjoy being where my feet are a little more. It’s hard not to feel a bit of regret since I changed my itinerary to add some new places, but I don’t feel like I’ve been fully present in a lot of ways. That’s okay – there’s still time to change it.

Disclosure:  This post contains affiliate links for tours and products I love at no additional cost to you.  You can read my full disclosure policy here.

Health & Wellness:

Because my work schedule was been so intense, we didn’t spend as much time on the bikes in Mont St Michel as I would have hoped. However, I’ve tried to be deliberate about being active. I’m participating in another 100-day challenge with Peloton. Instead of focusing on meditation this time around, I’ve been doing stretching and conditioning exercises. Peloton just launched a new app (Strength+) that lets you choose your workout time, your available equipment, and your focus area. It’s actually been really good for me on this trip, and I’m excited to keep using it. I’m hoping that it will be transformative this summer and on work travel this fall.

I’ve also started phasing in the Idralia products from Farmacia Santa Maria Novella that I purchased after our last stay at Castiglion del Bosco. I’ve had facials at the CdB spa using the Santa Maria Novella pharmacy products twice, and I didn’t experience any reactions. I brought the face masks and serums to use on this trip, and my skin is definitely appreciating the extra hydration from these products. (French water is much more mineralic and “harder” than water at home.)

Reading:

With higher temperatures and Tom getting an ear infection, I had a bit more time to read over the last few weeks. In an attempt to let work be work, I focused primarily on historical fiction. I’ve started a fourth book, but it’s been slow going this week. My reading ebbs and flows, and I’ve become content with that. However, when I do read, I remember how much I love it. It’s such a luxury to feel like I have the brain space to devour a book.

Winter’s End by Barbara Pronin

Note: I received an advanced reader copy of Winter’s End through Net Galley. All opinions are my own.

While much of my time in Mont St Michel was spent working, I did have an afternoon when I absolutely devoured Winter’s End by Barbara Pronin. This book was captivating, suspenseful, and never mundane. Winter’s End is a novel highlighting the women of the Dutch resistance during World War II. This is a book about the courage of character, rather than the struggle of the human condition. You have 4 women in various stages of their life and different backgrounds and various circumstances, all of whom find ways to aid the Dutch Resistance. The stories of these women embodies the idea that we must all do what we can, where we can, with what we have. Though there were limited physical descriptions of the women, Pronin successfully allows the reader to truly imagine these characters and how they move through the world. Evi is a beautiful young girl who longs to fight in her own way, having watched her mother Lotte find ways to help others, many of whom are in dire circumstances. Mila is a young woman who straddle the line between two worlds – her family of collaborators and her loyalty to the Resistance. And then there is Zoe, the mature veterinarian who is able to convince her cousin, a hospital administrator, to live a life of brave consequence. There are secondary characters but the stories of these women are the strength of this book.

Fortunately and sadly, the abrupt ending left me wanting to know more about the characters’ next chapters. I didn’t love the prologue or epilogue because I feel like both lacked the depth that the rest of the book exhibited. They felt like they were tacked on because an editor said we need to wrap this up with a bow versus letting the book be.

The Righteous by Ronald Balson

Note: I received an advanced reader copy of The Righteous through Net Galley. All opinions are my own.

If I’m being completely honest, the amount of history in The Righteous captivated me more than the story of the characters. This book takes place towards the end of the second World War II, mostly between the US and Hungary (Budapest, specifically).

Without belaboring the information in gruesome detail, Balson is able to help the reader understand how quickly Hitler’s team was eradicating the Jewish population in countries that it conquered, as well as how quickly (and perhaps why) it turned on its allies. While in hindsight it is difficult to understand why the Hungarian population did not expect that Hitler would turn on their Jewish population, I find that Balson is able to answer those questions effectively. It highlights the inaction of certain agencies and individuals within the US, despite knowing the horrors that were occurring. Further, Balson also does a fantastic job explaining the origins of the immigration caps in the United States and how congress tightly controls those, even in time of desperate circumstance. He offers a rarely seen insight into the complexities faced by those wishing to immigrate to the US and how archaic those rules are and continue to be. It shed more light into the neutrality polices that countries like Switzerland had to take and some of the choices that Carl Lutz (and others) made that could be seen as at odds with that stance.

This book humanizes the very real uncertainty that people faced in knowing what was happening to their families, and decisions that people were forced to make about whether to stay or leave (along with what the costs were – tangibly and intangibly). I found Balson’s characters (particularly Theresa’s parents, the Rabbi, and Solomon) to be devastatingly human in many capacities in a way that I think many of us can currently relate to.

As with most historical fiction, I walked away from this book wanting to learn more about some of the real people and events in this book, including the work of the World Refugee Board. (Side note: This book supplemented Winter’s End well because it provides some insight into what was happening in the Netherlands that wasn’t covered in Pronin’s book.)

Ship of Dreams by Donna Jones Alward

Note: I received an advanced reader copy of Ship of Dreams through Net Galley. All opinions are my own.

Ship of Dreams is the first fiction book I’ve read related to the Titanic. At first, I found it a bit hard to get into. However, I loved Alward’s descriptions of the ship. She did a great job capturing the awe that the passengers must have felt in the first few days of the sailing. I think she did a great job of capturing the setting and those feelings, so I kept reading. The book moved along slowly for the first few days of the sailing, which I suppose would have been the same feelings that Hannah and Lou had, given their personal circumstances surrounding the voyage. You understand the tension between Charles and Hannah, and you can imagine the culminating moment that allows some of that to be stripped away. One can easily imagine the vivaciousness of Lou and how Reid would be drawn to that while keeping up a charade of mystery surrounding their previous relationship. I loved the added intrigue of the jewel thief, though it certainly took an unexpected twist through the middle of the book.

The book really picked up speed with the sinking of the Titanic. I appreciate that Alward didn’t trauma dump on that experience for either character, but used it as a pivot point for the story. The second half of the book was emotional, raw, and beautifully written. It felt as if you were sitting in the room with Hannah and Lou. There are no magical, easy, happy endings for the characters (as well all know), but I appreciate the truth in the trajectory of the character arcs. It’s not a book that will change your life, but it’s a quick read with an enjoyable authenticity and humanity of characters that are extremely well conveyed.

Travel Planning:

I’m obviously trying to be where my feet are as much as possible right now. Because I revised this itinerary so many times, I’ve been doing a little bit more planning on the fly. In a lot of ways, that’s worked out well because of my work schedule. It’s also worked well because of the heat wave. It’s going to get up to 100F/37C this week! And, it’s given Tom a bit more flexibility to focus on healing his ear infection.

The latter part of our trip will center on some of France’s best wine regions. We have some wine tastings scheduled. I booked our favorite restaurant in Beaune for both nights that its open. (They have some of the best escargot!) One of the guys from our wine storage introduced us to a winemaker he knows in Alsace, so we’ll go meet him one evening.

I’m starting to fill in the details for the end of our trip in Paris. I’ll be in another pastry class all week, but I’m excited for our dinners. Right now, we have reservations at one of the restaurants we visited on our honeymoon in Paris (10 years ago!). I expect it will feel completely new to us, given how much we’ve grown. I’ve also added a new restaurant in the 9th arrondissement that I’m excited about trying. From there, we’ll probably fill in with some wine bars and our favorite Paris restaurants so we can see a few more of our friends while we’re there.

As I look towards the rest of the year, I have a quick work trip to Cleveland in August and another one to DC in September. Our anniversary is coming in early September, so hopefully we’ll get to get away for that. (One never knows with work.) We’ve booked preliminary flights for Thanksgiving and December with the intention of visiting some new places. As with everything and our nature, it’s always subject to change. (I’m kind of fantasizing about spending Christmas at the Meneghetti wine hotel where I do nothing but enjoy the spa all day and enjoy fuzi truffle pasta in Motovun every evening,)

Wearing:

After more than a few trips where I feel like I’ve been unable to discern the appropriate wardrobe for the temperatures, I feel like I’ve done well on this trip! I packed an assortment of Oscar de la Renta shorts (wool-blend, cotton, and linen), numerous tops (cotton and jersey), and dresses (cotton and linen). My Daphne dress is on sale this week, and it’s been a lifesaver for comfortable dinners in the heat. You can use code Hill House discount code of HAPPY4TH for 20% off!

For shoes, I packed my trusty Sarah Flint block sandals (save 25% this week using my Sarah Flint discount code: JULY4TH), a pair of Andre Assous Allison wedges, my Chloe scalloped flats (rarely on sale!), and my tennis shoes.

I bought one new pair of shoes for this trip, but other than that, I shopped my closet for this trip.

Photo Editing:

I’ve tried to do a lot more photo editing in real time this year. It’s probably because the photo editing felt like a good balance between ALL THE ZOOM meetings this summer. After our first couple days in Mont St Michel, I realized how sad I was for everyone trying to visit this amazing thing on a day trip from Paris. It’s just not the same experience! So, I wrote a blog post about a few experiences to have when you travel to France. We have been seriously so touched by the kindness we’ve encountered here. (I will be writing a whole blog post about our hotel in the Loire Valley and the receptionist who helped make sure Tom got the best treatment for his ear infection.) The parts of traveling to France that are generally uncomfortable have helped us grow so much as people and travelers.

We spent a week in Brittany this year, which was new to us. We split our time between Dinan and Saint Malo. Both were beautiful and different. We found extraordinary people and delicious food in both places. Tom mentioned that he would like to live in either town. (There *IS* a direct train between Paris and Saint Malo, so maybe, lol.) Both places were beautiful and they felt alive in a way that Mont St Michel is missing. (That said, we still love Mont St Michel for the beauty of it!) I’m excited to share more about our trip to Brittany.

We’re spending a bit of time in the Loire Valley this year. I can already tell that it’s somewhere that we’re going to need to return to during a more mild time. Not only are we navigating Tom’s ear infection, but the heat wave is pretty significant. We’ve definitely enjoyed the kindness of the people here though.

Until next time…