hello! bonjour!

Welcome! Thanks for joining me here. I thought it would be fun to share musings and favorites of the moment on a different platform and see where it takes us. But first, a little intro. My name’s Frances and I’m a freshly minted mom of an 8 week old baby girl, married to a professional cyclist. His name is Neilson Powless, and I think he’s pretty much the coolest cyclist I’ve ever met. Which says a lot since he was the first cyclist I ever met.

We just celebrated our third wedding anniversary last week, and if you had told me four and a half years ago that I’d be married to a professional cyclist one day, I would’ve called you crazy.

We got married in the midst of Covid, surrounded by our immediate family, on the side of a cliff in Big Sur, California. Sounds dramatic, but I’ve always been a big dreamer. Read more here or here if you fancy.

I grew up in Houston, and after moving around a bit for dance, ended up in California, where I danced with the Sacramento Ballet for six seasons. I made the sweetest of friends there and had opportunities to dance, choreograph and do a lot of growing up. Sacramento is also where I met Neilson. We matched on a dating app, met at a bakery one Sunday morning in November, and the rest is history.

Shortly after getting married, we moved to Girona, Spain where Neilson had lived since turning pro in 2018. We spent our newlywed year in the throes of post-covid Europe trying to figure out who I was if I wasn’t dancing and what our new life would look like. The following season we moved to Nice, France where we’ve lived since 2022.

This summer, we bought a townhouse in Houston while awaiting our little girl and I spent my third trimester nesting energy dashing from guild shop to antique sales to Target, madly filling our home. Charlotte joined the world on 9.23.23 and we’re more smitten than we ever thought possible.

We now split our time between Texas and the South of France, the latter of which we call home in the midst of the “cycling season”. We are waiting on the tiniest person’s passport, and planning to go back to Nice in the beginning of the new year.

This all leads us to the Tour de Frances. Which is aptly named in honor of the grand tour that takes my husband on the road every summer, and typically finishes on my birthday. As a self-proclaimed resistor of change, the unpredictability of this lifestyle has challenged me. So welcome to the whirlwind that is our lives.

In the upcoming weeks, I’ve got Thanksgiving moodboards, holiday wish lists, and gift ideas on tap. Is there anything you want to see? Any questions you have for me? I’d love to hear where you’re reading from or how you found me here! If you’re here for the cycling, I may even be able to get you some bonus tips from the man himself.

photo by david reeves

loving lately

• lessons in chemistry

• morning coffee runs with Charlotte in the pouch (clarification there is no actual running involved)

• amazon table lamps

• all the light we cannot see

• oysters (see above^ iykyk)

• just finished glossy, a juicy book about glossier founder, Emily Weiss

• tiny cottons croissant onesies…no longer sold but anything tiny cottons is so good

• le naturel-our favorite 8€ wine from Spain that we found at Central Market!!

• this mirth vest and jacket

• all things kd weave for my thanksgiving tablescape

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