Update on the apero scenario. It didn’t happen! Lunchtime I had a phone call from the wife to say that her very elderly mother-in -law had just died. Sounds awful - but relief all round - for them because m-i-l had always been very difficult and these last few months have been a nightmare for them. For us - because we could stop being anxious about our invite.
We will of course reconvene in 2-3 weeks once the funeral is well out the way and they have a chance to find out whether they’ve caught covid from one of their guests. Hopefully not.
We’ve also tried some of the stuff we bought - won’t buy it again. And the rest has gone in the freezer or will be eaten for supper. Fortunately she called before I’d made the mini quiche.
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I was wondering how things went down… and well understand your relief…
(a condoleances card would be a nice touch, if you care to pop one in their letterbox… but not essential)
Will do Stella, and will probably go to the funeral for their sakes, but stay outside.
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yep, just being there (outside) will be sufficient… and appreciated.
it will be this week I reckon … no hanging about in France…
I agree about the timescale - usually about 3 days here!
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Just an update to say we finally got together last night and thanks to everyone for your advice.
Especially …
I erred. 
Crudités with four types of dip, followed by mi-cuit prunes wrapped in poitrine, bite-sized chipolatas (herby ones from Lidls and merguez) plus the “toasts” with paté she brought, followed by my mini quiches and some tiny hot cheesy /filo things I got from Lidls freezer cabinet followed by home-made mince pies (and she asked for the recipe, so I sent her home with the last 4).
She drank just a little of the lovely Tariquet and OH and he went on to a good red wine.
They stayed until gone ten and would have stayed longer but for the fact she had a bad cold and was beginning to flag, so I packed them off home. OH was worried about not understanding but the conversation flowed freely, not least because there is so much we do not know about each other and they can tell us so much about our old house and its surroundings. We learnt (among many other things) , that he leaves a tiny part of his field un-cultivated because the great grandparents of the family who used to own this house are buried there in (unmarked, probably protestant) graves.
Thank you again everyone for helping to make last night a special evening for all of us.
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Families could choose to bury their relations in plots on their own land… (regardless of religion) The choice was removed by Law in recent years…
1804 the cemeteries were removed from the control of “the church” so religion did not play any part in who was buried where…
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This area was a highly divided one - Our local town was/is split between Catholics and Protestants to the extent that the townsfolk were easily overrun because they would not unite in resistance:
"The two [halves of the town} suffered during the Hundred Years War and even more greatly during the religious wars. A refuge for the Protestants in the sixteenth century, they rapidly became an important centre and received Jeanne d’Albret and Henri de Navarre, the future Henri IV.
During the rebellions in the early seventeenth century, the rebellious character of the two [halves] meant that they were razed by the royal armies in 1622."
There are three small Protestant graveyards in our immediate vicinity, so I’m pretty certain that is what the graves are in our neighbour’s field. I’ll see if I can find out more.
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It sounds fascinating… if I were your neighbour I would either fence the family “graves” or perhaps plant some trees… such contacts with past events are worth conserving/marking… but that’s just my enthusiastic view… 
I think there’s an issue with how much he feels he can do himself - he’s quite diffident and the family still live very locally. He told me there used to be a large tree marking the site. I think he feels he is doing enough just by leaving the land uncultivated.
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There is a striking “plot” not far from us… carefully enclosed with iron railings and some sort of sepulchre… we’d noted it when we first arrived.
Just a couple or so years ago, we had the last “private” burial in our area, just after the new law came in to ban 'em…
The family had guarded the permission/right to private burial on family land… and dear old “grandad” was finally laid to rest there. We wave and nod hello each time we pass… he was a lovely man.
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