Arriba! Flamenco, and more Flamenco!

What a wonderful way to celebrate a 60th birthday; Moley, Marmaduke, Pannie and Roods Flamenco dancing our way through the week and Compas ey Palmasing to Tango beats in to the evening.

Back to Northampton- the birth place of RoodyToots. Preparations for the design show case in the Centre of Northampton in 'Are You Being Served' the boutique cafe in St Giles Street. With live music and a generous serving of home made mince pies, bread pudding and mould wine, the lovely ladies of the cafe created the perfect setting for RoodyToots customers to enjoy viewing the designs along with other Designers and Artists displaying their work for festive customers.


The new Vintage Paris range being show cased for the first time was a hit with the christmas shoppers. Surprisingly most people were buying the designs for themselves, therefore not needing the christmas wrapping service.


The collection of vintage antiques selected from Parisian markets after being reworked with Swarovski Crystals and made in to necklaces, pins and brooches.


The Ostrich feather hat pins/brooches were snapped up with their semi precious gem stones, vintage button and Swarovski Crystal clusters.

Aurevoir France, Hola Spain!

A memorable farewell to our Kingdom in the gorge after a very fresh bit of freshmaking in the rather baltic waters of a nearby river (solar shower has failed us with a pretty critical leak). On the last night before leaving belle France we had the pleasure of being invited to dinner by a lovely couple we met at the local cat festival! Solange and Bob, thank you for a memorable evening of intriging tales of fashion design in Paris, Bob playing for Gene Vincent and Jerry Lee Lewis, totally rocking sixties couple, Scotty loved the jamming in Bob's music room and I enjoyed looking through Solanges vast collection of beautiful beads and buttons and jewels and was blown away by the generosity that we received. Definite soul mates. I would really like to recommend Solange and Saunders Chambre d'hotes - Les Pavillions, bed and breakfast, vegetarian/vegan Chambres d'Hotes, 66000 Perpignan, France. web- lespavillons.com
You are bound to be in for the most warm company and fascinating stories of their rock and roll past of the 60s, beautiful chateaux style bedrooms and delicious vegetarian and vegan food too! A must if you find yourself in Perpignan!

Driving down the Costa Brava over the border, we were welcomed by shimmering turqoise waters and steep cliffs plunging down to white sand coves. Meandering our way along the hairpin bends we found ourselves in beautiful series of bays and coves at Cadaques, the former residence of Dali. Greeted by strategically placed cats like ornaments on every corner, we peddeled up and down narrow winding roads until we found the former retreat where Dali lived his last creative days with his Gala in their haven that evolved from a modest seaside dwelling to a grand expression of their fantastical minds.



















Arriving in Barcelona after stopping in Tossa to take in the out of season stillness of the coves which resonate with local/Barcelona tourists in the summer months. LB pulled in to Park Montjuic as the sun was setting in time for us to take our climbing shoes to the derelict tunnel of Fruixarda. Covered in climbing holds it has attracted a fantastic climbing scene with a great vibe. Keen climbers sessioning traverses and sport routes until the late hours of the night, great vibes always with guitar music, dogs, and picnickers. We really emersed ourselves in to the scene becoming part of the ferrelness of 'the tribe' and making it our home for the 2-3 weeks we were there.
Annie arrives!
Climbing, RoodyToots photoshoot, La Boheim, Pirate ship, puppies and lots and lots of cava was to follow! I have a feeling Barcelona will always play a role for the Clarke sisters! Currently restocking of RoodyToots for the shelves of La Boheim is taking place!

One of the most memorable meals so far, pulling in to a
green meadow flooded with evening sun over the rolling hills. 
Something very luxurious
about chosing your dining spot with the option of the best seat
in the house everytime! Whipped up some gnocchi
with red wine, Paul Simon playing loud- a memorable
spontanious alfresco dining moment in the Dordogne.















Driving through the Dordogne rolling hills, we approached a
dramatic valley with the fat moon casting reflections on La
Tarne a huge slow flowing river carving through steeply rising
cliffs. A supernatural energy force really resonated from Saint
Antoine Noble Val.  
The meeting of two strong natural
forces rock and water. This was
destinedto be our stop for the night.

Pulled up next to la Salle du fête
where an alternative country music
band was featuring, had planned to
gate
crash but fell asleep under
the stars in our blankets instead.
Saint Antoine Noble Val; enchanting narrow, winding
cobble streets with charming medieval architecture a cote de
la grande stone bridge mirrored in the vast waters ebbing below.
Something auspicious about this place, maybe we will be back one
day.
In the morning after a 2 hour conversation in French with a
curious monk (Frere Michel) about various pilgimages around
France and Spain.
After a curbside cafe au lait brother micheal signed la creperie
visitors book and we set south in the mid morning light.
Stunning winding roads through vineyard clad rolling hills. 
Finally we have found the sun! Had to stop at a friendly
crossroads where wesaw a sign for vin a vendre!
Since our cellar was running low we
investigated la cave where we were greeted by freindly
vinyard owner and left a little tipsy with a 5ltr box of
vin rouge.

Albi; a red brick town constructed from dredged materiel
from the Tarn river on the banks of which it sits with the
largest brick built cathedral in the world at it's heart. 
The austentacious bishop of the town in the 13th century
built it along with his own brick defensive palace where he
lived in fear of attack from the towns people. Cruising around
on the hogs after parking up little lb with the campervans in
the free parking beneath the cathedral, we cycled about the
stone clad streets.  After sussing out the gigs for the night
in music shops, we found a possible Friday night venue for our
soirée at the albi university.  We definitly found the right
place; a circus big top with music stage, a gigantic fire with
2 large beasts on spits and a bar which also sold home
made soups and whole roasted pigeons!  The two bands were ace
the first a very cool Tarantino soundtrack sound
and the second a rocking band with cool front woman in a 
bloodstained wedding dress- my hero! A great party
and free too.  Our first wild showers followed in the woodland
south of albi, rather fresh but quite a beautiful experience as
you look up through the golden leaves above
through the falling water from the shower rigged up In the branches.

Now we head south with Ali and claire who we met at Mont Roc in the
middle of a cursing orage with horizontal rain,  black clouds and
biting winds....this was not the plan, especially that all camping
spots are closed - so on with the wild camping (camping savage).
Camping next to a derelict chateaux there was plenty of exploring to
be had in the morning. However sunshine is still missing ingredient
so yet again we hit the road to head further south, this time sand
dunes near Perpignan.

A crazy winding hair pin thread road through the black mountain led us
to our evening spot a very french setting at the end of a farmers
track to a small mound of trees surrounded on all sides by mature
vinyards in full autumn colour.




With plenty of wood for our fire we
sat under bright moonlight and ate Claires delicious Thai curry and
rice noodles. The wind picked up over night with more than gale force
winds LB shook for most of the
night as the wind hurled through the vinyards and bent the island of
trees sideways where the tent and Lb trembled all night long.














In the morning, glad to have not been totally blown away, we shared
a bunch of black grapes left on a vine at the end of a row and set
off for some breakfast wine tasting.

Vingrau has been the perfect spot for all of our climbing needs.
Camping out at the foot of Gouleryous Gorge where the clear waters
swirl and pool at the base of the rock providing us with a perfect
bathing pool teeming with fish.
























A big fire of drift wood provided
light and warmth for the creperie party in honor of claire's birthday.
The baby pumpkin was lit and the French climbers joined us for games
of 'The cardboard box game' and offered birthday
gifts of shots of absynth and the multiple layered birthday pancake
with a plathora of chocolate ingredients with banana and honey.

Life has been easy in the gorge again a vinyards setting that has
providedample grapes for grape juice pressing (gringo berry presse),
and fresh water for bathing and washing.  The weather has been
blissful most days with blue skies, and early morning sun which 
we have made the most of since the clocks fell back.  Feeling very
self sustainable in this landscape we have only needed a couple of
visits to perpignan for groceries in the three weeks that we have been here.



























New features to LB's kitchen menu have been added including 
falafel with salad and flat breads (all handmade and cooked on
the open fire).   Bonfire night was pizza night.  Three cheese
with spinach onion, olives and
chillis - was delicious, baked in the small oven made by the two
chapati pans placed together on the fire.  Early morning
starts to our climbing sessions has given us long evenings
to devote time in the roodytoots studio.  Preparations for the 
'vintage Paris' winter range
photo shoot are taking shape.  Lb will be making it's way to Barcelona
to meet annie on the 16th -looking forward to it pannie! Re stocking
of the boutique la boheme and arrangements for the shoot will take
place as well as the obligatory fun nights in the city, look out
Barcelona here we come!

RoodyToots hits the glossy mags!

Leaving Fontainbleau

    Living in the forest of
Fontainebleau over the past month
 has been  blissful. The autumn golds and
oranges, theblue skiesand low sun has 
illuminated the fern, moss and toadstalls of
forest floor and highlighted the sandy tones of
the boulders.
A magical setting for  
climbing.    Each ascent leading to a breathtaking elevated
view of  the forest. Lb's belly has kept us cozy as temperatures are reaching 0  degrees
at night with stunning clear skies twinkling with a blanket of stars. Over the past two weeks we have enjoyed staying in the forest  
at Isatis with Lewis and Miriam doing some of the classic circuits and  
off circuit climbs.  There is quite a sense of community with the  
other groups of climbers, most of whom sleep on their boulder mats in  
the open, they must have super warm sleeping bags!  One crisp morning  
we were awoken by a Bizzare riot of horses, hounds, bugles and a rather  
well-bred selection of locals in velvet waist coats.  After talking to  
them it became clear that there was a "chasse coeur" (a hunt), in this  
case for deer.  They later returned with the prize stag; a beautiful  
magestic creature with huge antlers.  A tension was built up in the  
forest as ceremonial bugels played which worked up an anticipation  
from the blood thirsty hounds, then as the signal was given a frenzy  
of sqirming and writhing as thirty plus blood hounds gorged on the  
carcass, a scene that is hard to forget. Having felt part of the  
forest for over the month, admiring its beautiful rhythm it felt sad  
that such a stunning creature was snapped from its magical world in  
such a brutal flurry of fear and adrenaline to then be publically  
mawled.  A tradition that has taken place in the forest between october  
and december for centuries.
 
 
La creperie has continued to serve at Roches aux Sabots and Grez sur  
Loin campsite at the weekends where we have had roaring fires for the  
hungry guests.  New crepe fillings are making it to the specials  
board: Friday night we saw the debut of 'la whiskey flambe'. On  
Saturday night as the temperature plummitted we had requests from  
campers for a 'winter warmer' crepe: honey, lemon and Ginger to heal  
the chills.
It really is time to move on now though. In zero degree temperatures  
it is a challenge to get washing dry and soon even big fires and  
delicious crepes won't be enough to keep campers outside.  Today we  
head south to perpignon for some sport climbing and to meet claire and  
Ali for some special birthday celebrations! Font has been great and  
has physically prepared us for the next stage of the trip. We  
announced to our regular customers at roches aux sabots including the  
shoe repair guy that the creperie will be back in full force next  
spring.  So after our final baguette rustique we drive south. good  
luck lewis
  and miriam with your van repair and aurevoir beautiful fontainbleue  
xx ....well we actually left the day after as there was a national  
shortage of diesel due to French lorry drivers striking. After queuing  
up 'en velo' with petrol cans we now have a full tank so southern skies  
here we come! X
 

Autumn in the Forest

Autumn in the Forest The forest is in full mushroom bloom.....
Autumn in Paris...

Bonjour Fontainbleau!

101004

Farewell fair shores of Blighty and the stunning white cliffs of Dover as we set sail over La Manche to Calais where the adventures of La Creperie and LB commence.

After 2 days of driving along the most obscure route along single-lane dirt tracks across rural France (what does the sat-nav lady understand by ‘quickest route’!???). We approach La Peripherique which skirts Paris. La Bouchant did not agree with LB who started to smoke profusely from the bonnet, so that we had to stop and let the engine cool. Waiting on the edge of La Peripherique during rush hour over the course of 4 hours leaving us with stinging eyes and clogged lungs we were glad to finally head to Melun where in the morning we managed to get hold of some coolant fluid from some mechanics and exchanged it ourselves in a car park- total cow boys!. All is well now!

It was a joy to arrive in the lush forests of Fontainbleau and establish ourselves in the Musardiers camping site and go straight to the rocks at Roches Sabots. We were shocked by the weather being wet and cold, really cold…And started having thoughts of following the sun south and had to send messages to friends who were planning to meet us here…’weather too crap’. We decided to stay for a week to get La Creperie running and give the weather a bit of a chance. Several days have been rained off but we have managed to have 5 days of climbing and then running La Creperie at night or early evening in the campsite and Rocher Sabots, Bas Couvier and Potetes.

1^st October - Birthday celebrations in Paris at ‘La Feline’…street party pub, squat party in the 20^th arrondissamont-3 naked guys with guitars, wailing and attacking the audience with their guitars…strange but memorable way to spend a birthday! Cycling around Paris with Roods is definitely one of my favourite things…

Creperie is swinging, now over 200 crepes and 50 cups of masala chai and we are ready to move on from Font, today rain rain rain and more rain.

Yesteday was sweltering a one off day this week, a good session of climbing until 3pm then to the creperie to feed the hungry climbers as they amble back to their cars.

Smashing the records flipping 50 crepes and selling out of chai! That has really sorted us out for the week but now that LB’s kitchen has recovered.

Power is low as solar panel is not receiving the light it needs to keep LB’s electrics (LED lights, sound system etc from running).

Its time for La Creperie to move on to sunnier climes, before leaving we will be running a creperie party in honor of Lewis and Miriams arrival at the weekend! Looking forward to seeing you guys!

Thanks to our loyal customers of La Creperie days in Fontainbleau:

The English boys: Aliatair and Anthony, most commited chai drinkers ever!

The shoe repair guy in the bus at Roche Sabots…keep up the good work, hope you don’t miss your double nutella crepe order too much, dont worry we will be back!

Thanks for all the great beta on good European climbing spots and exotic crepe fillings!See you for a climbing and Crepe extravaganza next easter!

The sweet smell of aromatic masala chai and fresh crepes could be detected from a large radius emanating from beneath the canopy of two majestic horse chestnut trees at the Western edge of Blackheath Common on Sunday afternoon. Friends, family and followers gathered on blankets outside La Creperie to celebrate the launch of the escapades of La Creperie and mobile RoodyToots studio in ‘LB’ (Little brother) the VW as it sets off to begin its European tour before heading from Dover to Calais then Fontainbleu outside of Paris.

Kids and big kids were on the slackline as rocking tunes from LB’s speakers set the atmosphere for the party. Some interesting Creperie flavours were tested out with the aim to make it to La Creperie menu board. Jen experimented with a winning combination of crepe filling: ‘Cheese duo of Brie and Chedder, with Apple puree, rocket and pepper’. This one will go down on the creperie chalk board as a future special Jen, well done!
We hope that we will see most of you at some point along the Crepe paved road, keep following the blog to find out where LB will be!
Bon voyage!

Count down

Count down is on.....Surrounded by sewing machines, paint, screws and crepe batter, organised chaos is steering us closer to the departure of LB the travelling jewellery and Creperie/chai walla from these shores....first destination Paris!

Solar panel is fixed to the roof of LB- phew it works and we now have an endless supplies of electricity....(as long as the sun shines!).

Getting RoodyToots stock ready to send to the Barcelona boutique 'La Boheme'.
Box frames with samples of designs are ready to be delivered to boutiques and cafes in Northampton and dates being put in the diary for christmas events.

Really looking forward to seeing folk for La Creperie launch on Blackheath Common on Sunday for some tasty crepes and masala chai...mmmmmm

RoodyToots hits the road!

Website Launch!!!!!!

We have lift off! Please check out the new website which has just been made live. It features a gallery of photos of recent designs including photos taken from the recent Barcelona shoot in Casteldafells with beautiful models Annie and Vic. More photos will be uploaded soon including images of the recently showcased hair brooches which were show cased at the Northampton Market Square on Sunday and were an instant hit with the style mongers of the town.

Now waiting for the launch feature in the style magazine neon ..... will keep you posted and publish it when it is distributed.

Good news after Barcelona trip.... stylish boutique Boheim in the central street to the Barrier Gothik Carrrer du Ferran is the newest Boutique to sell RoodyToots designs! RoodyToots is currently sending over designs glass 'red apple' and glass 'tangerine' sterling silver earrings, 'Objet Trouve' bangles and rings with retro buttons and charms.

RoodyToots is now gearing up to hit the road in LB the VW mobile studio, creperie, chai stall.

The oil is currently being changed and the curtains being hemmed. RoodyToots is going on tour....Europe look out here we come!

RoodyToots Northampton Art Market

The sunshine finally graced us around 3pm when the semi precious stone range reflecting back the late summer light drew RoodyToots followers to the stand. The Irish band accompanied the display with ditties of old Rover and 'youre drunk , your drunk you silly old fool...' the French Oboe sounded a bit more like a dying snake charmer or a toy backpipe, but as always it is the crowds that make the occasion and the Northampton Market square crowd expressed their love for the RoodyToots range on display. Annie's Oat crunchies went down a treat with the punters- You must share that recipe around!

Check out the new 'Objet Trouve Hair Brooches' as worn in new red hair at Art Market....

Thanks to the RoodyToots team of helpers including the RoodyToots Barcelona shoot models with Vic from Casteldafells!

Now anticipating the long awaited RoodyToots website and NEON magazine article due out this week.....we will keep you posted! Watch this space! xx

RoodyToots launch Party!

Thanks to everyone for making the RoodyToots launch party such a great success!

RoodyToots Market Square debut!

The Market Square, Northampton was literally swinging from noon til 5pm this afternoon. As part of Blink festival. The mahogony dance floor was pummled to the beats of the Jive/swing DJ by dancing sailors, WI's and funky bees all snowballing to rocking 1940s/50s jive numbers.

RoodyToots Art to Wear went down a treat featuring the 'Objet Trouve' range along with the Semi precious gem stone range. Many stylish folk of Northampton are now new proud owners of RoodyToots Art to wear. Congratulations to the guy who bought his wife the Amathyst and clear quartz silver earrings, you are RoodyToots' first male customer...good move! The afternoon teapots, polkadot pinnie, cup cakes and bunting fitted in seamlessly with the tea dance afternoon for which the curators requested RoodyToots move to the centre of the market due to its cool 'look'.

The whole day was enjoyed immensly, and the sneaky bottle of afternoon Pape Neuf was the icing on the cake!

Launch Invitation

The launch party begins at 7.30pm on the 6th of August at The Limes. Please contact the RoodyToots studio at ellie_clarke@hotmail.com to be included in the guest list. All new exciting designs will be showcased and on sale at the launch party.

RoodyToots launch!

Preparations for the RoodyToots launch party have begun. Jewellery design is continuing in the Northampton studio as well as Barcelona where Annie is preparing designs for small innercity boutiques of Barcelona. At the same time 'LB' the travelling VW studio/creperie/chai shop is having its interior sanded and varnished and the chequered floor lino is being layed down. The only issue at the moment is.....where are those darn keys!? Its a mystery, even after Poirot's efforts at the Limes inquisition, they still remain at large.
The show must roll on....invitations have been sent out and confirmation given that neon magazine will be covering the launch and including it in their September issue! Preparations must be well timed in order to showcase new jewellery designs at both The Northampton Market Square Art Market on the 1st of August followed by the RoodyToots launch party on the 6th of August!
All hands on deck!