Rocking Your World 2015: Week 16

Hello friends. I´ve not much to tell you this week, but here is my Friday Smile.

The first rose of summer has bloomed in my garden. We could be forgiven for thinking that Summer is cancelled this year as the weather we have been having is just not what we expect for mid-April. In fact this is the second rose for us. The first one opened beautifully on Tuesday but it was battered by the rain on Wednesday and no longer looks it´s best, but as it fades, this one is ready to take its place.

Wednesday being my day to rush around from one place to another, it would have been nice to have had some sunshine. Instead it was the wettest day of the year (so far!) with torrential rain all day, and just as I moved on from my sewing group to my house group, there was a cloud burst and I couldn´t risk driving through it, so I parked at the side of the road and ate my sandwich, until it had settled down again. But I am grateful that I arrived at my destination safely with no puddles too deep to cross. And although it was still cloudy and damp when I came out of choir practice some hours later, and I expected it to be quite dark, it stayed just light until I got home. I really don´t like driving after dark these days but my choir practice doesn´t end until 8.30-9.00 and I am just grateful if I can do the first complicated bit of driving, and get down to the autovia before the dark sets in. But every week it is a little bit lighter. Another sign that summer really is on the way.

Yesterday and today have been better, with some sun shine from late morning until tea time. And when it does show it´s face, it is really warm. Yesterday we were sitting out at the back of the house, drinking our tea. The patio at the back is a real suntrap, and later in the year it will be too hot to sit there, but right now it is perfect. Under the benches we have two rolls of wire mesh that used to run along the fence when the dogs were smaller and could get between the railings, but it is no longer needed for that, and we just rolled it up to store it. Between the layers of mesh I saw that we had a little visitor.

He is known as a humbug lizard, presumabley because of the stripes that run down his body. He is actually bigger than the ones we usually see. Luna is good at catching them and brings them in to me. How kind!!

But when I scroll back, look who is sleeping underneath him.

Paco is enjoying the warmth and is snoozing in the sun, quite oblivious to the little friend above him. I wasn´t sure whether the lizard was caught on the wire so I decided to release him - warily I might add because these can bite, and if they get their teeth into your finger, they don´t let go very willingly. The voice of experience! But as soon as I parted the layers of wire, he shot off too fast for me to keep tracks on him.

I had to smile when I looked in the second roll of wire at the other end of the bench, because there was Luna, just waking up from her siesta.

The lizard would have had to move even faster if she had seen him. She doesn´t let much escape from her.

Today I took my friend to the hospital for some lazer treatment to her eye. I was happy to be able to help her. I didn´t really need to do much translating for her, but she did need me to be the driver on the way home.

Because the weather was so poor earlier in the week, I spent a bit more time than usual in my craft room, and I actually made a start on a scrapbook about our holiday in Ireland - October 2012!! Every time I see the photo files on my computer, I think I must do it before I forget what it was all about. It was a significant holiday for us for several reasons. It was our first holiday when we weren´t seeking the sun. We get our share of that now so we can afford to go somewhere cooler, and wetter, for our holiday. We were searching for family though we had no idea whether we would find any, but we did, and quite a few of them too. We also wanted to see some of the landmarks that are so familiar to us through the words of the Irish songs we both like to listen to, and we saw lots of them too. Fortunately I nearly always keep a diary when we are away, partly so that I can make sense of the photos when I get back home, and I do have one for these two weeks, so I think our Irish journey of discovery really deserves its own scrapbook. So here is page one.

Hopefully I will be able to show you others in the coming weeks. It will be a hybrid book which means that most of it will be done on the computer, but I will be adding other elements and bits of memorabilia to some of the pages. I have sorted the photos and made a plan - I actually like to be quite methodical when I scrap - and there will be around 42 pages. That´s for now anyway. There could be more. I always have such trouble deciding which pictures to leave out. I want to use them all.

Since the holiday I have bought several digi scrapbook kits with an Irish theme, often released around Saint Patrick´s Day. I visit several digi sites regularly and am often tempted by the pretty kits I see. Yesterday I bought a couple of Christmas kits and I used one of them to make a Christmas card. You can see the details of how it was done on my other blog.

I was pleased to receive the second part of my order from America this week, and I didn´t get charged any import tax on either part. I have been stung a couple of times which is why I don´t order from USA very often, but this time I was lucky.

So now I am off to play with my new purchases, or to start the next scrapbook page. I´m not sure which it will be.

But first I will pop over to link up at Virginia´s blog, Celtic House, and at Annie´s Friday Smiles on A Stitch in Time.