Hello dear Sparkfriends!

I had an appointment in Poissy, in the North-West of Paris, today. As I had never been there, I decided to take the opportunity to go for a long walk around the little town and by the nearby Seine...

When I got there, I stopped at the Tourism Office first to take a map and some information...



And then I headed for a lovely walk by the Seine...



There is very little left from the old bridge, as it was destroyed by bombings in 1944. Most of it is like this...



But there are a couple of arches on the side which are still standing...





A new bridge has been built in the 50s.



I briefly stopped at the church (‘la collégiale’, 12th century)... Sorry, there is no picture of it seen from outside (it was drizzling and my picture is ugly!), but here is one from it inside. I love its simplicity.



A bit further, I entered Parc Meissonier, which had a very quiet, peaceful atmosphere.





It wasn’t lacking colors... There was some yellow leaves left or some that had just fallen...





And some beautiful yellow flowers...



When I left the park, I took the abbey’s path, although there is actually almost nothing left from the abbey...



The barn on the right is all that is left from what was once a huge abbey with many buildings (built in 1297).



By now, you must be wondering why I mentioned a child’s heart in the title of this blog! Thank you for your patience... :) After this long wonderful walk, I went... here...



Le Musée du Jouet! The Toys’ Museum.



So... here is my Christmas gift to you, a bit early! :) I hope you’ll enjoy it...

The first room was full of old teddy bears! I don’t think I had a teddy bear as a child actually... did you?



The next room was packed with dolls, hundreds of them...





I loved this 19th century doll, which looked so melancholic...



And this 18th century one is one of the treasures of the museum...



As is this one, a late 18th century doll from the South of Italy (Napoli):



The nuns were in the window next to the Barbie dolls!





There were pets too!



The room with puzzles and jigsaws was great, colorful, fun...



... and very unusual! (Imagine a jigsaw like this one, ‘Mary’s heart’, in a chain of toys’ stores today?!!!)



Of course, there were lots of boys’ games too!





Little soldiers for war games...



Those ones are German soldiers from the 19th century:



In the room with all the puppets, I found those ones a bit scary!



In the last few rooms, there was an exhibition about André Hellé (1871-1945), a French designer and creator of toys. I found it wonderful!





André Hellé created a ballet for puppets with Claude Debussy, out of his book ‘Histoire d’une boîte à joujoux’ (Story of a toys’ box). It was playing in the last room at the museum, such a treat!... You can listen to it on the Internet. Here is the first part...
www.youtube.com/watch?v=
0XJx8M8jUXY

I hope you didn’t mind that today’s blog was a bit different. I don’t often take you to a museum!!! Thank you very much for reading!