For months, we’ve been keeping a secret.
While you’ve been reading these letters, we’ve also been carrying cameras everywhere we go.
Every muddy boot, every impossible renovation, every chicken-related emergency, every dinner around the table, every tiny victory that has somehow made all the difficult parts worthwhile.
And amongst all the dreams and chaos, we’ve been filming it all.
It felt wrong to keep such a big part of our lives from the people who have been reading this story all along, so I’m especially happy to finally share it with you here!
If you have been reading this publication for a while, you already know about the château. You know how long we searched for it, how unlikely the whole thing felt, and how strange it was to finally walk through the doors of a place we had spent years dreaming about.
For the past few months, our computers have been groaning and perspiring beneath the weight of approximately 9 million video clips: château tours, moving boxes, muddy children, cranky chickens, building projects, family dinners, and Sean attempting jobs for which neither of us possesses any formal qualifications.
And now, finally, we can show you what we’ve been making.
Once Upon a Castle is officially a YouTube series. Squeee!!
It follows our family as we restore this 17th-century château in the French countryside and slowly make it our home. You’ll see us restore rooms, plant gardens, make spectacular mistakes, celebrate small victories, raise two children in rural France, make music in old stone rooms, and slowly learn what it means to care for a place that has been standing for centuries.
The first episode starts at the very beginning of our journey: moving into the château.
If you’re new here, welcome. My husband Sean and I moved our family from Southern California to rural France, where we’re restoring a 17th-century château one room (and one story) at a time. This publication is where I write the chapters that don’t fit anywhere else: life in France, the history behind what we’re restoring, the comedy of learning a new culture, and the smaller moments that are often my favorite part of the adventure. If that sounds like your sort of story, I’d love to have you along.
Chapter One: Moving Into the Château
We had imagined this day for years. In those imaginings, the weather was lovely, everyone was healthy, the boxes were neatly labeled, and we moved serenely into the château while charming French music played somewhere in the distance and we sipped a glass of wine.
In reality, it rained. The power went out. Sean and I were both very sick, there were more boxes than any family could reasonably explain (the amount that makes you feel self-conscious once the movers arrive), and we had to navigate how to get some extremely tricky pieces into a property that wasn’t exactly made for oversized armoires and little fragile greenhouses.
So yes - there were chickens to relocate, enormous pieces of furniture to maneuver and a château that was not especially concerned with being ready for us. It was chaotic, exhausting and not remotely how we had pictured it.
But by the end of it, we were home.
And because we have taken an unconventionally long time to announce our own YouTube channel (well, a week), you don’t even have to wait for Episode Two.
Chapter Two: Our First Christmas at the Château
Five family members were coming for Christmas, which meant we had only a handful of days to hang the decorations, assemble the furniture, disguise a bathroom we were emphatically not ready to renovate, and install a shamefully large American-sized refrigerator.
Then, on Christmas morning, we woke up to snow.
This new series does not mean that the letters are going away. This will still be the place where I can tell the parts of the story that need more room, such as the history behind what you see, the decisions we are making, the things that go wrong off camera, the ongoing awe and comedy of being Americans in France, and the more personal reflections that do not always belong in a video.
The videos will let you come along with us, whereas these letters will let us sit down afterward and talk about what really happened. All the goss.
If you enjoy the first two episodes, the most helpful thing you can do is watch them, subscribe to the channel, and leave us a comment. YouTube is a mysterious little kingdom ruled by algorithms, and those early signals help it understand that real human beings might actually want to see what happens next.
If you do leave a comment on the videos, tell us that you came from Substack, tell us what made you laugh, or simply introduce yourself. It is truly strange and wonderful to imagine people who have been reading these stories for over a year now stepping through the doors and seeing them come to life.
We have so much to show you!
I have a feeling this is going to be one of the great adventures of our lives.
With love from the château,
Kamille & Sean
New here?
Once Upon a Castle is the story of our American family restoring a centuries-old château in rural France, one room (and one chapter) at a time. If you’d like to follow the adventure, I’d love to send the next letter straight to your inbox.
Fabulous transforming the narrative from text to video. Keep at it. Innovative.
Squee indeed! How exciting! I can’t wait to dig into the episodes.