Rocking Your World 2017: Week 42

I'm starting off today with a little gem that keeps cropping up on my Facebook page. It creases me up, because if they have reached the 'age of reason' I am sure this is what a child would be thinking.

We are all a bit obsessed with our cameras these days, and I am one of the worst culprits, so I can relate to this.

And so to my week. Virginia says the weeks seem to be passing ever more faster, and I was think exactly the same thing. But once again mine got off to a good start with a birthday party for a friend from church who had reached a 'significant number'. We were invited to a restaurant out on the campo near Huércal-Overa. It was a good thing she gave us all clear directions or we would never have found it. It was a very pleasant setting. I started off sitting indoors, because our friends Sue and Andy were playing piano and clarinet to entertain us.

It was quite warm, so  lots of folk chose to stay outside, where everywhere was lit up by green lights, giving it an interesting atmosphere.

Later in the evening, everyone was called indoors and we were given a glass of cava (sparkling wine).

Jasmine's sister and brother-in-law had travelled all the way over from Nova Scotia to celebrate her birthday with her, so Terry got up to propose a toast.

Our wonderful cake-baking friend Pat had again made a beautiful cake which Jasmine cut, and we all enjoyed a slice, despite being full from the lovely  buffet that had been provided earlier.

When I went outside to chat with friends I had to take a quick picture of this beautiful sunset that blessed the proceedings.

Although all three cats have got used to using the cat flap now, Tango doesn't like it and whenever possible he waits for me to open the other door to the porch, and goes out through the much larger dog flap. But he is happy to share some space with the dogs, who by and large ignore him, and the other morning when I went out, I found him posing by the water feature. He goes there to drink from it even though there are always bowls of fresh water in the kitchen and hall. But he looked so cute sitting there among the flowers. The kalanchoes we planted on either side have flowered continuously, and they are a bright shocking pink.

Also bright pink is the small bougainvillea that we bought for a couple of euros, several years ago, because it was little more than a dead stick. But gradually it has grown and is now getting established. The mauve one is the common type that grows like a weed everywhere, but I love this deep magenta version and am so pleased to see it finally taking off. We planted it just beyond our railings because the path is very narrow there, but we will soon be able to tie it in all the way along.

A few weeks ago I showed our mauve bougainvillea that grows all along the side of house. Chris had 'pruned it' to withing an inch of its life, and just the bare bones were left. Well I told you it was a vigorous grower, and just look at it now.

All that growth in just three weeks. Think what it can do in three months!

As well as our friend Jasmine, Chris and I are both celebrating our birthdays in the next few days. Chris is seventy tomorrow, but we are keeping it very low key as the real celebration will be at the end of next week when we meet up with all our sons and their partners. And Saturday is not the best day to go out so we decided to go for a quiet lunch out today instead. And look what we had! Good old fish and chips. How very British of us! Though you may note that it is October and we are still sitting outside to eat, and there is a glass of wine on the table, so not quite so British after all! It was very nice too.

Just as I started to write this I heard Arwen just outside the door making an odd noise, so I went out to investigate and found her playing with this little chap. Isn't he just so cute. He is only an inch or so long. I had to rescue him. He was a bit sleepy, maybe geckos hibernate. I have no idea. Or maybe he was just shocked after his encounter with Arwen. But he seemed unharmed, and was certainly very much alive, so I put him in our bedroom near the window, where I have seen him before, and left him to his own devices.

We have had some very unsettled weather this week and there is a definite Autumnal chill in the air early on, when we go out with the dogs. There has been a lot of cloud which has given us some very colourful skies.

I am going to show you some more in a minute because they will be the last for a couple of weeks. Yes I am going AWOL. For almost a year we have had a holiday booked for the half-term week, 23rd-30th October. We have rented a large house in Southern Ireland, where Chris' mum was born, and where he was taken for summer holidays with his grandma when he was a boy. All five of our sons are joining us with their partners, and we are going to have a lovely family week to celebrate Chris' seventieth. We were unable to book flights on the day we wanted, so we were going to fly to our son in Birmingham on Sunday night, and then on to Ireland the next morning.

Three weeks ago I said we had heard of another death in the family, but I expected the funeral to be quite soon so I didn't think I would be able to get to it so close to our holiday. But for various reasons the funeral was delayed and is actually going to be next Thursday, so I am now going to fly to UK on Wednesday and stay with my sister Jean for a few days, and then I can get the train up to our son's house on Sunday and be there when my husband flies in. So I am grateful for the way things have worked out, and happy that I will be seeing some of my sisters again, albeit for a sad occasion.

This does mean that I will not be able to write a post next Friday, and the following one will also not be possible. So I will be back on 5th November, hopefully with lots of photos of Ireland. You have been warned!!

I love taking photos, but after some hard thinking I realise that at this stage in my life, I have neither the time not inclination to learn the intricacies of my big camera. Also I am finding it too heavy to carry around on days out. My shoulders soon start to protest if I hang anything on them for too long. I get very acceptable pictures with the camera on my phone, but that is getting a little tired, and sometimes refuses to focus, or the pictures are very dark. So I have just ordered a very good (I hope) compact digital camera. Hopefully it will be light to carry, and easy to use. It is going to arrive on Monday which is my birthday, so that is a happy coincidence, and I will have a holiday to play around with it.

So now here are the rest of this weeks sky photos, all taken on one evening. The black clouds were rolling in and it looks quite menacing. I can see all sorts of things in these pictures, but I won't point them out. I'll leave it to your imagination to spot things for yourself. The sky continued to darken and the next morning we woke up to heavy rain, which then settled into a steady rain for most of the morning. It was actually rather nice to smell the damp earth, and seeing some of the ever-present dust being damped down. Goodness knows we needed it, so it really is another thing to be grateful for this week.

Now I shall try to publish this post. Blogger is behaving very oddly tonight so I hope it co-operates. Maybe we have another storm on the way. Anyway, I shall do my best to link up with Annie's Friday Smiles, and Rocking Your World, and I shall try to visit you all before I go away.