Rocking Your World 2020: Week 7

Don't these Fridays come around kind of fast?! So here we are again. I hope you have all had things this week that have made you smile and feel grateful for life.  Even though it has been one of those 'ordinary' weeks again, I still have plenty to be grateful for.

My first smile was an unexpected one when, on Saturday afternoon, we heard very loud music in our street. We opened the front door to investigate and found a small procession of folk, mainly parents with children, but some of us oldies as well, all following a troupe of street entertainers. Street entertainment is much loved in the local villages, and we see it happening whenever there is an event on. This weekend it was 1º Jornada Comercial do Invierno 2020, which basically means the first commercial day of Winter 2020. These days happen about four times a year with the purpose of promoting local shops and businesses. For the first ones, local shops put up market stalls on the plaza, but more recently they have involved the shops who are interested in joining it, signing up at the Town Hall. On the day they have a white balloon flying by their door and we can get a sketch map of where they are. You are invited to visit some or all of them, and if you make a purchase you are given a raffle ticket. The draw takes place the following week. Prizes have been things like a weekend break for two, and at Christmas it was a large TV. The afternoon of the event, there is now always some form of street entertainers who visit each shop in turn, led there by the village band. They stop to do their 'show' outside the shop, often encouraging the shop owners to join in. It is all good fun and good for trade too. 

We have a small shoe shop in a house at the bottom of our road, hence the parade passing our house. It was just getting dark by the time they came by us, but I followed them anyway and found their leader was this man in his snazzy pink jacket, driving  a sort of motorised truck, pulling a cart with huge, very loud speakers blaring out their music.

In front of the shop there were four young men on very high stilts, who danced and juggled with boxes of childrens shoes from the shop. 

I have to say I admired their agility on the stilts. They danced and pirouetted on one while waving the other in the air, and seemed to have no trouble staying upright.

After their little performance, they took a bow and moved on to the next shop.

I do enjoy these little quirky things that happen from time to time. I feel they would not be as appreciated in modern Britain, and of course, we do have the advantage of far less traffic, so it is not a problem to perform in the street.

I have been continuing to work on my blanket but I hit a wall early in the week with a section of the pattern that I just couldn't get right. I had completed my circular part and it was time to add four corners to turn it into a square. I counted the stitches and made sure I started in the right place, but when I had finished I still had three or four stitches left at one end and around ten the other end. So I pulled it all out and tried again. After my third failed attempt I was ready to bin it, but I would not be defeated. So I got pencil and paper and made a chart of exactly which stitches I should be working into for each row. I was so grateful that Amazon sent me these little colourful pin-style stitch holders so quickly. I used them in pairs to pin each stitch that I needed along the edge, and voila!, my first corner was complete. I have now done the second one and the third one is pinned up ready to go. Hopefully by next week they will all be done and I'll be able to move on to the bottom panel, which should plain sailing after this.

While driving home last week end I was caught in a heavy shower, and when I switched on the wiper blades, the one on the driver side fell off! Again Amazon came to our rescue and two days later we had the correct ones for our car model and Chris was able to fit them. They actually work better and more smoothly than any I have had before, which I suspect were locally sourced and not quite right for our car. My only complaint  is that one pair of wipers arrived in a  box that was over a metre long, and about 8cm square! They rattled around inside despite a load of crumpled paper padding. Amazon have a way to go to sort out their packaging.

Although some days have been a little overcast this week, it has been warmer and there is a definite feel of Spring in the air. Everywhere I go I see the campo coming to life with wild flowers. One of my favourites that is starting to flower now is the wild chrysanthemum. It makes patches of bright yellow in every field, along the road side and wherever it can find a space. It actually makes a good cut flower too.

The little flowers all around them are also very pretty though the hairs on their leaves can be an irritant. It opens out as a pink flower and gradually changes to violet and then deep blue, and it is common to see all three colours on a plant at the same time.

Another smile is this pot of tulips. I spotted them when I was out shopping and bought a bunch. I doubt they are Spanish. I have tried several times to grow them but conditions are not right for them here. But maybe there are nurseries that can control temperature and water for them. I don't know, but I shall enjoy these for a few days anyway.

I came home from shopping today to find Chris clearing the little square of garden at the front of the house, and that makes me really happy.  It had got very overgrown, but my hands are not able to manage the loppers any more; even secateurs are a struggle, so I was glad he has had a go at it. It is our only piece of plantable land, and there is little space left in it, even when all the weeds etc are taken down. Along one edge is a wall covered in our lovely pink jasmine which is already in bud, so that couldn't be cut back much, but it does catch onto my Bird of Paradise tree and smother it a bit. The whole area had also been invaded by a lantana plant. It is very pretty when in flower, but its berries are poisonous for the animals, and it is a very strong grower, so it needed to be cut right down.

And around the edge we have half a dozen roses which did not do so well this year as they did not get enough light or water, but they have now been pruned back hard, and I am sure they will do better again this year. We left one tall stem because it has this beautiful flower at the top.

We couldn't bear to cut that off so we will let it have its moment of glory, and then cut it down to match the others.

I have promised to help Chris collect up all the rubbish and bag it up after lunch, so we can put it in the bin. There is rather a lot of it!

And that's about it for this week, so I shall link up with Rocking Your World and Annie's Friday Smiles, and then, before I go, I shall add one more success story.

I am sure we all like a success story. Well, some of you may remember that around nine years ago I started a group to knit tiny jumpers and beanie hats for what were known as 'Fish and Chip babies'. Family member, and friends from my church and sewing group, all contributed yarn or knitted garment. When this charity folded and I was desperately trying to find an outlet for my remaining stash of knitting, I was finally introduced to Brian and Barbara Hatton who started a charity called Greenfields Africa. For several years we continued to knit for them sending sack after sack of clothes and blankets to their warehouse in UK. More recently the cost of shipping these items to Kenya became untenable and we had to stop, but the charity continued to work with the people of the Kakamega rain-forest area of Kenya, building up the hospital they had founded, using local workers and resouces to make sanitary protection for girls so they could attend school, setting up workshops and providing reconditioned tools to teach local young people useful trades, and their most important work of treating children affected by Jiggers, (the larva of sand flies that burrow into hands and feet causing pain, deformity and sometimes amputation). This year, Brian and Barbara, who are both well into their eighties, have decided that it is time to stop. They have spent the passed couple of years making sure each of their projects are self-sustaining, and they have now achieved this.

Because I have continued to support them after the knitting project ended, they sent me a copy of their final report which was so uplifting - a real success story. My church have also supported them over the years so I prepared a copy of the report for their notice boards and added this page of photos highlighting some of their achievements, so I thought I would share it here. This is mainly for my family who have helped me over time, but I hope you all are happy to see what a wonderful legacy these two lovely people are leaving.

Rocking Your World 2020; Week 6

My week got off to a good start with a lovely church service on Sunday morning celebrating Candlemas (when the infant Jesus was presented at the temple and Simeon recognised who he was, and also when the new church candles are blessed for the new year). We were each given a little candle as we arrived, with a cardboard circle around it to catch any wax drips. These were lit during the first hymn, and we were then invited to bring them to the front and press them into two trays of wet sand prepared for them.

They burned happily throughout the service. It was intended that we would collect them again on the way out, but sadly one or two folk had accidentally left their cardboard circles at an angle, and during the closing hymn one caught fire, and a quick thinking gentleman grabbed the trays and took them outside to burn themselves out!

It was out first time trying this so I guess it is a lesson learned and we will do things a little differently next year!

On Tuesday we went round to the camp site at the edge of the village for a meeting with officers from the British Consul, and the organisation "Brits in Spain", who were talking about how we can expect Brexit to affect those of us who have migrated to Spain. It was a super sunny day and there was a good crowd already there when we arrived.

We joined the queue at the front to collect some handouts, and then found ourselves seats around the swimming pool as the patio was a bit crowded.

I can't say we heard anything really new, but it was reassuring to have some of the rumours confirmed in our favour. Those of us who live here permanently and have our residencia and Spanish drivers licenses already, really have nothing to worry about. There will be some changes for those who 'to and fro' throughout the year, but not until after the transitional year.

I made good use of the oranges I was given last week with one more batch of bitter orange marmalade and one of a darker one with thick cut peel. So now my shelves are full. I will be given some grapefruit soon from a friend, so I shall be making one or two lots with them, and I hope to get some of my hot ginger and chilli jam made too, but I need to sell some of this lot first so I have space on my shelves. Last week Annie asked me about my jars. Most of my customers do bring them back when they are empty, and also add some from jam they have bought in the supermarkets. I can't use all of them, but any that are too big, or too small etc I recycle at the glass bank. The lids do wear out over time, but I can sometimes buy replacements in one of the todo shops. Even when they come to me looking really clean, I put them all through the dishwasher, store them without lids to prevent them from smelling musty, and immediately before I use them, I sterilize them in the oven.

The weather has picked up again but it is very unstable with some days being warm and sunny and some still quite cold. I have said before how green everything is looking, because we have had several spells of rain with enough coming down to do some good. It is hard to decided what to wear each day. On Tuesday this week it peaked at 25º in the afternoon and the next day it was 15º. Even the wild life is confused. We have had a tortoise in our yard this week and one night, Chris got up to investigate because the dogs were yelping in an unusual way, and found they had spotted a hedgehog walking across the patio. The dogs are enclosed in the fly free porch at night and were frustrated because they couldn't get out to the intruder. Hedgehogs are quite rare here, and we have not seen one on our land before. I am sure both of these should still be hibernating. At least there is plenty of green vegetation for the tortoise to break his fast on.

The combination of wet and warm encourages everything to grow and I have been watching what many would call a weed, growing outside the kitchen door. It is in fact a herb called fumitory, and according to the internet, it can be bought dried, and burnt, and the smoke is supposed to clear a space of bad spirits! This one was a tiny shoot in a square of soil where we used to have a shrub growing. I had placed an old plastic seat over this square and sometimes I sit on it while the dogs are eating their food near it. Anyway, in just a few weeks the fumitory grew up the legs of the chair, across the seat, and right to the top of the fence behind it. The fence is covered in a type of artificial grass bought by the roll here and used mainly for privacy. You can see the bright green of the plant climbing up it though. It is incredible how quickly it has grown to the top. It now has flowers all over it, and I think they are really pretty.

Probably my biggest smile of the week came yesterday. The Christmas before last, you may remember that Chris bought me some hand-made shoes at a Christmas Fair. (See here). They were made of red and orange leather and had a picture of cacti on them. My friends called them my 'hippy shoes', but everyone who has seen them has loved them.

This Christmas I returned to the same fair hoping to buy a blue pair and was very disappointed because the lady who makes them was not there. They are the most comfortable shoes I have ever worn, but I do wear a lot of blue, and the orange ones just don't 'go' with them. Anyway, I asked around and although lots of folk know about 'The lady who makes shoes', no-one could tell me how to contact her. I did learn that she lives just outside Bédar, the little white village up behind our's, but that is all. I have spent a lot of time searching for her online, but without a name I was not having much success, but then I discovered a travel page with a link to a Facebook group called  'People who live in the Village of Bédar'. I sent them a message and someone sent me the email for Beth's shoes, and that was it. I had found my lady. I wrote to her and explained what I was looking for and yesterday she came to my house, and brought about a dozen pairs of shoes for me to try! How is that for personal service?

She was so nice, and we had a lovely chat about the area, markets she sometimes attends, and the problems involved in small scale selling within the bounds of the law in Spain. She didn't have any blue one with a painted design on them, but I settled on a plainer pair made from three shades of blue leather, dark at the side, paler at the back, and a bright turquoise on the toes.

Then my lovely husband Chris said he would buy me one more pair so I have these gorgeous black and green ones with a hummingbird sipping from a flower on them.

So now I can have comfortable feet whatever colour I am wearing, and that is something to be really grateful for.

So now it is time to link up with Annie's Friday Smiles and Rocking Your World, and see what is making you smile too.