Toni & Cyril

Travel information

We are currently

Activities we are interested in:

permaculture, eco-construction, straw-bale building, cooking and preserving, self-sufficiency, ukulele/singing/music, children

Description

Hello!
We are a family of 4, Toni (mama, 40yrs) Cyril (papa, 39yrs), Akina (girl, 5 yrs) and Bodhi (boy, 8yrs).

A few details about Toni:

I'm an Australian country girl living in France with my French husband and 2 children.
We have just embarked on our life's travel adventure of going back to my home country to visit after 10 years of living in France. I want to offer my children a real Aussie cultural experience (and practice their English!). We want to make it worth our journey, and really enjoy our travel, so we will be in Australia for 8 months from September 2023 to April 2024.

I am a traveler (11 years back-packing around the world before settling in France), a yoga for kids teacher, permaculture teacher (trained at the Permaculture College of Australia many years ago and have travelled the world working and teaching permaculture in education centers since, but that was all before the kids), passionate gardener (my garden is my revolution), skilled preserver of veg and fruit from the garden, lover of cooking (a bit too much some say), ukulele player with a love of creating shared singing adventures anywhere anytime, and now dedicated mother and teacher in a Montessori school.

I stopped working when my first was born to take full advantage of having the kids at home while they are little. I totally embraced my love of producing enough food for a family and succeeded at producing a year round food supply, fresh and preserved (yup, quite proud of my achievements! haha). I also began cooking for groups and courses occasionally when friend yoga teachers asked. I loved that!

I've been working part-time for the last 2 years in a Montessori/alternative school in which my childen attend. I teach yoga, english, music, garden/permaculture, forest learning and sport to the kids there of ages 3 to 8 years old. Because I intervene for specific activities I don't necessarily work with the traditional Montessori materials in my classes, but I do follow (and deeply believe in) the techniques and ethics in my teaching.



And now about Cyril:

Cyril is an expert 'touche-à-tout' as they say in French (super handyman). He is really able to fix everything (well, that's my/his wife's opinion anyway). His real job is in Eco-construction, specializing in carpentry and 'terre paille' (straw bale and earth building). In France he organizes 'chantier participatif', participatory worksites where volunteer workers come to learn and help build, a common way for an owner-builder to build their home in France. At the moment his other job is building indoor climbing walls, which asks him to be 15 metres above the ground on a cherry-picker type machine doing very specific carpentry.
He is a French mountain man, but now we live in the south of France, castle and river country. Super social, he can talk the ear off anyone who will listen (hehe), loves kids (to a certain extent ;) ) and knows quite a lot about trees and garden maintenance having studied horticulture and also permaculture.



We met in Thailand at a Permaculture education centre where I (Toni) worked as a manager of the site and teacher and Cyril as a carpenter. We moved back to France and have now been living in France (with our 2 children) for 10 years in the beautiful Dordogne region.

Our dream is to live in community, and have been searching in recent years to make or join a 'tribe'. We have both lived long term in community environments, both together and individually and want this experience for our children to grow up in. In our workaway experience, we are especially interested in the community experience of sharing our lives with another family for a few months at a time. We wish to use our gathered skills of permaculture and natural building to make a real difference and really enrich the lives of another family... exactly what we would be searching for if we had land and needed help.

Interests

Languages

Languages spoken
English: Fluent
French: Fluent

More details about my language interests
Toni is able to teach French through her yoga classes if asked. Preference to be paid for this kind of work, as is her job.

Find a language buddy

Skills and knowledge we'd like to share or learn

We're interested in:  

Eco Projects

Creating/ Cooking family meals

Life at a Farmstay

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Some knowledge of:  

Babysitting and creative play

Helping around the house

Hospitality/Tourism

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Able to teach about:  

Languages

Gardening

DIY and building projects

Teaching

General Maintenance

More details about your skills

As detailed in the description, Cyril's skills include carpentry, building/construction (he is able to build a home from the foundations to the finishings and is paid to accompany owner-builders through the whole process), handy-man work, horticulture knowledge (trees and plants, but this area is no longer his passion - Toni is more the expert in this area).
Toni's area is all things permaculture, from design to maintenance including teaching. She is a yoga-for-kids teacher and loves kids, most recently working in a Montessori school. She is skilled at cooking and preserving and passionate about food sustainability.

Age

41 & 40

What else ...

A bit about the kids!
Akina (girl 5 years) is a fun tomboy, and she is quite shy. She loves climbing and running and dressing up as a super-hero. She is intelligent and also has a warrior spirit.
Bodhi (boy 7 yrs) is full of energy for sunrise to sunset. He is a real sportsman and loves swimming, playing soccer etc. He is very sociable and loves playing and meeting new people. He also likes board/card games and anyone who will play them with him. He is sweet, kind and funny, but often very loud and boisterous and loves annoying his sister. A typical boy ;)

Both are bilingual French/English.

Some more information

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  Smoker

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  Driver's licence

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  Allergies
  Allergies of grasses and dust mites (Toni), but under treatment.

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  Special dietary requirements
  We eat everything and love experimenting with new foods! Healthy and home-grown is best, but really we are super happy with anything.