Rocking Your World 2021; Week 18

Well it is that time again, when we reflect on the happier moments from last week, but I have little news as it has been a quiet week. We have had all kinds of weather from hot and sunny, to too windy to open the door safely, to dull, warm and overcast, to heavy rain bringing in so much red sand from Africa you would think we lived in a desert.  Chris was using the power washer this morning to try and shift some of it. 

But in between the bad bits we have managed to do a good bit of clearing outside, and I got two loads of washing dry, even if I did have one eye on the clouds until I brought it in again.

The combination of rain and sun have brought all the plants on well. I was so pleased to see these gorgeous orange hibiscus out. The plant was suddenly infested with black-fly earlier this year and I thought it might die. It lost all its first buds, but I sprayed it and slowly it is recovering I think. It certainly managed to produce some beautiful flowers this week.

As I had hoped last week, my lilac mini-daisies are out all over the ground cover plant, and there are also flowers on all the cuttings I took in the autumn now.

As you know I love all the daisy flowers so I was equally happy to see these little gallardias out. They were self-seeded by insects or birds a few years ago and every year they produce so many little sunshine faces. I love them.

One other daisy that is struggling but still going is this shocking pink one. It is a ground cover succulent that can be smothered in these quite large flowers. Mine was swamped by other plants but this one stem is clinging to life so I may be able to rescue it.

I always refer to it as the 'crawling daisy'; a joke between the biology teacher and myself from my days as laboratory assistant at a private girls school. But it actually goes by many names and here are some of them. "Sally-my-handsome, Hottentot fig marigold, Giant pig-face, Sea fig, or Sour fig." In general it is just known as the Pig-face plant, a name I don't think it deserves! Of course it has a proper name too which is Carpobrotus Acinaciformis. I think I'll stick to pink crawling daisy. Its bright colour looks very dramatic when you see it tumbling down a bank with no space between the flowers.

Yesterday was quite sunny all afternoon though rain was threatening, but we both noticed how clear the Cabrera mountains looked from our house. They are often a bit blurry even on a good day, but the air must have been just right and I took this photo of them.

But when I turned around, the sky behind me looked like this!

However, it all cleared away again without shedding any rain on us, and it was so warm that we both sat out on the porch until bed-time, for the first time this year.

On Wednesday, I had my usual evening video call with my youngest son Ben. We often put the world to rights for a couple of hours each week, and it was getting late when he said 'I wish you could see the full moon outside my window. It is beautiful tonight'. Then he went outside to send me a picture of it. So when we had said Good-night, I went outside to look at our moon. This was around mid-night and the moon was covered with patchy clouds, though I could see where it was. I waited patiently as the clouds drifted across it, almost revealing it and then hiding it again, until finally there it was, in all its splendour. And it was indeed a beautiful one. Well worth waiting for. These photos were all taken on my phone. It has a really good camera, though I could do with steadier hands for these zoom shots!

The last bit of this post may be too creepy crawly for some of you, but all the wildlife does fascinate me.

The back wall of our house gets the full sun all afternoon, the hottest part of the day, so it soaks in the heat and you can feel the warmth coming from it right through the evening. This makes it quite attractive to the bugs and this week as I walked past I noticed this lovely little caterpillar walking up it.

I have seen the odd one of these before so I know it is the caterpillar of the Spanish festoon butterfly, a very pretty yellow one with blue and red spots on its wings. I have read on a wildlife in S.Spain group that I follow, that the caterpillars love the plant called Dutchman's pipe, which is an invasive weed that has interesting dark purple pitcher flowers and huge seed pods. It is a bit like bindweed and can be a problem in the garden, but I knew there was some growing just beyond our back railings on the bank of the green zone, so I went to look at it, and sure enough there were at least a dozen of these caterpillars in plain site. We see very few butterflies here, but I am hoping we get one or two this year if the birds don't get them all before they pupate.

I also noticed this lady high up on the same wall so I went in to get my phone to take a photo. But when I got back there, it had gone, and then I saw it had fallen down and was on the ground.

I try not to interfere with the natural order of things, but I knew I had to move it before my cats spotted it so I picked it up and relocated it at the top of a tall plant. It posed beautifully for me before I released it. Just look at that face! It's like something out of a sci-fi movie.

She looked quite mature so I am hoping she makes an egg nest (an otheca) somewhere nearby so I can watch it.

And finally something less scarey. This morning I saw this rather unusual ladybird on a plant next door. It was twice as long as the usual lady bird and it looked big when it opened its wing cases and flew away. I hadn't realised how many different varieties of these are out in Spain until I looked it up. I didn't find a specific name for it, but they were all called lady birds.

Now I can link up with Annie's Friday Smiles and Rocking Your World.

I hope everyone is staying safe while enjoying a bit more freedom of movement now. We are looking forward to getting our second injections next week.

Rocking Your World 2021; Week 17

How fast the weeks are flying past. I can't believe it is Friday again already. 

Our weather is still unsettled and we have had rain and even some thunder storms this week, but also some nice periods of sunshine.

Sunday started off lovely so we ate our dinner out on the porch and then went for another walk along the sea front.

It was warm enough to walk in short sleeved T-shirts but a bit windy so the sea was quite 'lively' and I like it like that.

Again we were a bit too early in the afternoon to meet many other walkers, and as you can see the beach was deserted.

I often show photos of the Cabrera mountains as seen from our garden, so here they are from the other side, as seen from the beach. On Sunday they had a layer of clouds gathering at the summit.

We started our walk near the beginning of Mojacar Playa, and all along the water front there are beds of flowers. At this time year you can't miss their vivid colours like these orangey-yellow daisies...

...and the shocking pink pelargoniums. These were in flower everywhere and didn't seem to mind the strong wind or salty air.

Of course the cacti thrive in this environment too. There are a lot of these tall ones along there, and at this time of year, they all produce these nodules. I am not sure whether they are flowers or fruit.

We walked a long way until the path ran out, and as we did not want to go down onto the sand we decided to turn back. We both wanted a drink so we stopped at a bar we have not seen before. It may be new this season or it may have had a 'face-lift', but it looked nice so we went in and found an empty table.

We had the first table inside the gates on the right, and we could look past the couple on the next table to see the sea.

To the right of us there was a long bar and beyond that a long 'plancha' or grill plate. The chef was cooking tapas and full meals to order and he didn't stop once while we were there. We had just eaten our Sunday roast, so we didn't want a meal, but the food looked very nice so maybe we will go back another day to try it. Instead we just ordered our drinks and I had my first tinto verano of the year. Tinto verano means Summer wine and it is red wine mixed with lemonade, ice and a lemon slice. Most commercial bars have it on a pump during the summer, or ready mixed in individual bottles, but if you go in a small rural bar where they mix it for you, you sometimes get a splash of vermouth added. It was very refreshing after our walk, and set us up nicely for the walk back to the car. Soon after we got home the rain started, so we were glad we had gone early.

I was happy to see the warmth and rain had woken up our little mauve daisies. This is a ground-cover plant we bought from the cactus garden in Nijar that we visited back in 2019. I bought a little piece in a pot and the man told us it would cover a square metre in a year. I planted it into a big pot on our top step and sure enough it quickly grew to cover the top of the pot and then tumbled down all around it. This autumn it needed to be cut back and I planted stems of it in various other pots and window boxes and they all seem to have taken. Now the flowers are just opening and soon it will be covered with them. They are a bit smaller and paler than they were the first year, but still very pretty.

Although we don't eat lots of curries, I do make it once or twice a month and we both like poppadoms with mango chutney, but since Brexit I have not been able to buy this anywhere. There are plenty of mangoes out here, but I have never seen the chutney on their salsa shelves. So I did a google search and found a few recipes. I was pleased to find that I already had almost all the ingredients in my cupboard, so I only had to buy the mangoes and a new bottle of distilled vinegar. That is something else the Spanish don't use at all, preferring apple or white wine vinegar, but I did manage to find some yesterday. There were a lot of different spices in the recipe so here are my ingredients all set to go.

Of course the bit that took the time was preparing four large mangoes, but a Sudanese lady who used to work for me in my nursery, taught me the best way to do this, and soon it was bubbling away.

The black specks you can see are Nigella seeds, or black cumin seeds. This was a spice I didn't have already, and it was unfamiliar to me. I know Nigella as pretty little blue flowers called love-in-the-mist, which may be the plant these seeds came from but these were grown in the "fertile plains by the River Nile". I had not heard of them before and have never seen them in our shops, but the recipe said that although they are not essential they do add something special to the chutney, so I went online and sure enough Amazon had them and delivered them the next day. They kept boiling up to the top in the pan, but when it was made they mixed in fine. Apparently they add 'Indian authenticity' to any curry, which is just as well as I have lots of them!

When it was cooked until the fruit was soft, I pureed half of it to thicken the mixture, and quickly reduced the remaining syrup to give a good consistency and I now have two jars of chutney and two boxes to freeze away. This was recommended to prolong its keeping ability. It tastes really good but is a bit 'hotter' than I am used to. I think if I make it again I will halve the chilli I put in it!

I had a very pungent kitchen last night but I left the extractor fan on for a while and it has mostly gone now.

This week did include our 42nd wedding anniversary on Tuesday. We had a quiet day. We have never made a 'big thing' of anniversaries though we do acknowledge them to one another, so we just enjoyed a peaceful day in one another's company. This year it got a bit more public notice than usual, as our 40th anniversary, (which was a bit special) came up as a 'memory' on my Facebook page so I shared it again. 

As well as my usual video call with Ben and Tom, earlier in the week, we had a zoom chat with Jonathan and Ella last night and a very sleepy baby Aisling. She is settling down now. On Wednesday she had her 'tongue-tie' cut so she should be able to feed more easily now. I didn't see Jonathan as a particularly 'baby' person, but he has proved me wrong and is taking his turn at night feeding and nappy changing and is obviously thrilled with her. He goes back to work next week, and Ella will miss him, but I am sure she will soon have a routine worked out.

Chris has just left to collect our weekly treat from Miraflores camp site - a fish and chip takeaway dinner, so I had better go and put the kettle on for our cuppa. I will just link up with Rocking Your World and Annie's Friday Smiles before I go.

Rocking Your World 2021; Week 16

Well my first 'grateful' for this week is that I will have to stop writing in a few minutes to go and have my first Covid vaccination. Chris had his on Wednesday (They are going in strict order of year of birth, and refused to do mine with his). We both have appointments for our second dose in the first week of May, so in just three weeks time. Finally we have caught up with our sons who have all had their first dose in UK.

But my week started with a lovely walk on Sunday. The forecast was for grey, colder and sometimes wetter weather, so as Sunday was bright and sunny it seemed like a good day to get out for a bit. We drove to the Laguna in Vera. The water level was quite low but there was still a good expanse of water, then sand and then the sea with a queue of big ships waiting their turn to go in to the port at Garrucha.

The board walk around the lake had gone - I presume it will return for the summer season - but we walked around anyway. Looking across the lake you can see a lot of white flats and houses that are part of the next urbanisation along the coast. It was early afternoon when we were there, and as you can see, there were very few people about.

The dark spit of sand on the left is often covered in water and the ducks come to the edge to be fed by the visitors, but this time it was just wet sand, or so I thought. In fact it was sand mixed with a fair amount of duck excrement that turned it to a slippery clay. I saw two ducks on the water's edge that were bigger than the others and different colouring, so I wanted to get closer for a photo so I could identify them when I got home. This was the best I could get before they flew away.

Needless to say, on the way back I slipped in the mud and fell over, not very gracefully I suspect. Chris hauled me back up and nothing was hurt except a small dent in my pride and a tiny bruise now coming out across my big toe, but I had to continue our walk coated in mud! It all came out in the wash, and I am not afraid to laugh at myself when I do something silly. It could have been a lot worse.

The wind was getting up and in such an exposed area I soon learned that though I am quite happy with my long hair, it has its disadvantages. Fortunately I had a hair tie in my pocket so I was able to keep it under control.

I decided to keep away from the water after that, and the birds weren't in the mood for photo posing, as every time I got anywhere near them they all took off, flew a few meters and settled back down on the water again!

From the far side of the laguna I looked back and took this photo. You can see from the bending palm trees, how windy it was.

When we got back to the car we decided we still wanted to walk a bit further so we drove back as far as Garrucha promenade and walked along the sea-front to the port and back. I took this photo of the palm trees there, that actually grow on the beach. They were also being tossed by the wind.You can see their orange flowers coming and these will eventually become bunches of dates. I wonder why the dates taste so sweet and not salty.

We took a different route home using what we call 'the back way', which goes through the Pueblo of Turre. It is a while since we went there to shop and we were surprised to see all the new road works. A very difficult and cramped corner had been cleared forming a new wider entrance into a much-used side road which is now one way, and also providing some proper paved and marked out parking spaces. We got out to have a good look and I had to take a quick photo of these beautiful hollyhocks in someone's garden. By the time we got home my fitbit said I had done over 8000 steps which is a record for me.

Yesterday it rained steadily all day and was quite chilly so I chose to have a kitchen day, and once again I made bread. When I was finally able to get to the better stocked supermarkets I was able to buy some wholemeal spelt flour so I started by making a brown loaf for me. I find spelt flour makes a lovely even dough and as long as I don't rush it, it rises very well. (It has a crack in the photo because it stuck to the side of the tin in one place, but that didn't spoil the eating of it. Chris prefers white bread so I also made a batch of little white rolls that I set fairly close to each other on a baking tray. The idea was that they would rise up together into little mounds, but actually they rose every which way and the end result reminded me of a tortoise shell. But they tasted good.

As it was such a wet day, the animals were very unimpressed. They are used to heavy showers but not a continuous downpour. Of course the garden was delighted and everything was sparkly and fresh when the sun decided to show its face today. But both dogs came inside and stayed on the settee in the sitting room all day, and for a while Luna curled up on the back of it too. But Tolly, Tango and Paco soon realised that with an oven on, the kitchen was the best place to be. They ran circles round me for a while, but then got bored and they all went to sleep. Peace reigned and I got my work finished.

We have had four parcels today. Some weren't expected until early May, so we were pleased to get them so early. One came while we were out at the vaccination centre, and they left it on the doorstep, but they did ring me later to confirm I had found it. Two others were deliveries of loose tea leaves which I can't buy out here, and have to look for online. Fortunately we have found a supplier in Ireland so can still get it as needed, though at a higher price than it was. 

But the last parcel was the one that made us smile. We had finally ordered a new mattress, after talking about it for ages. It took us a while to choose one but it arrived today, folded and rolled, and vacuum packed so when we opened it it didn't even look big enough for a single bed, let alone our king-size one. But we opened it up as per instructions and within minutes it was full size. So we are looking forward to a comfy night's sleep tonight. But it was the box that amused me. The mattress is called Emma, and it was in a box with this message on the side.

So I hope we do.

And on that note I will link up with Annie's Friday Smiles and Rocking Your World, and I'll see you all next week. But before I go, here is a little picture that was posted on our church Facebook page this week. It expresses what a lot of folk are starting to feel now. Keep hoping folk. Things are getting better.

HOPE.

Rocking Your World 2021: Week 15

 We woke up to rain again today. We have had quite a lot off and on this week, and though I know the ground is gratefully sucking it up, I am happier when the clouds part and we get an hour or two of sunshine and blue skies. The forecast is for more of the same  next week too, so we will grab our chances to sit outside when we can, and keep busy in the house the rest of the time.

But last weekend the days did start sunny so on Saturday I went for a walk around the village. As I walk out of the top left side of the village there is a stretch of campo before the main road around is reached and it looked so pretty. Every inch was covered in wild flowers of all colours and sizes.

Although many folk would call them weeds, I love all the trumpet flowers on the various forms of bindweed. This one has opened up everywhere. It is the ground bindweed, and it spreads over rough ground and up railings with its pretty little pink flowers.

On Easter Sunday morning, as I opened the window in the sitting room, I saw our first rose bud opening. Hopefully it is the first of many, but it was so perfect I had to take a photo.

Also our Easter Lily had a flower on the right day for once. These are water plants so in a pot they require a lot of attention and I have nearly lost this several times. It really needs to move to a bigger pot now. You can just see the last of the blue squills lost under its leaves. I guess they should have their own pot too.

The pot of pinks are starting to flower too. They grew from a small stem cutting I took a few years ago, and every year they come back and flower for months. So pretty. One of my succulents that has long stems of trailing yellow daisies is photo-bombing this picture too.

As I have not yet returned to our church, I watched the service from my son's church in Sydenham. I do watch it online most weeks, but this week they planned a service in the church grounds and they were so lucky. The sun shone for them and it was not too cold. They had to spread out and observe social distancing, but because they were outside, they were able to sing some of the lovely traditional Easter hymns and I sang along with them. The churchyard is full of tall trees and the birds joined in the singing too.

Yesterday started rainy like today and when I let the dogs through the gate to the back for their food, I got a shower from the pink bougainvillea which is looking amazing again now. When I looked at it, I found the pink bracts seem to hold on to the water droplets that would just roll off most plants, so again I fetched my camera to catch a picture. They look lovely.

The week has passed quickly despite not doing very much. I am working on a craft project for later in the year so I have made the most of the chance to get on with that. 

On Sunday I enjoyed a chat with all five of our sons together using jit-si. I've not used it before but Jim sent me a link so I just had to log in, It was clear pictures, and fun  to chat to them all together. Mike had his daughter and grandsons with him and they had built a water slide in the garden and were having lots of fun. Ben relaxed in the garden and was getting quite pink in the sun. The next day they sent me videos of a snow blizzard! I don't know what is happening to the weather. It all seems very confused. 

I can't resist adding one more photo of our newest grand-daughter, having a cuddle with her 'besotted' daddy. Her name is Asiling Rose, which is very pretty and reflects our Irish heritage. They are learning the delights of sleepless nights at the minute but she will settle down soon I am sure. It doesn't seem any time since he was that size!

And on that note I will link up with Annie's Friday Smiles and Rocking Your World. See you all next week.

 

Rocking Your World 2021:Week 14

I have a big smile on my face this week and here's why. You may remember that exactly two years ago on Good Friday, I posted a picture of the rainbow cotton baby blanket I had just finished. 

I made it in the hope it would one day be needed. And my hope was not in vain. Here it is wrapped snugly around our new Grand-daughter, just three hours after she was born at 5.30 last night. Her mum had a bit of a tough time, but she is here now and both are doing fine.

She will help to address the balance in our very male-oriented family -- five sons, six grandsons and two step grandsons, two great grandsons, and just one other grand-daughter! (And three lovely daughters-in-law).

I have been waiting for this news all week, and the rest of the time has passed at home, doing a bit of crafting, cooking, local shopping and sitting on the porch relaxing. For what is usually a very big week here in Spain, the village is very quiet. There will be a special mass at the village church today and on Easter Sunday, but none of the usual processions can take place.

Yesterday I had a busy day in the kitchen. Our little tree is heavy with lemons and I really want to use some of them so I made some lemon curd. It is so nice, but it has a very short shelf life so I cut the ingredients right down and just made two little jars of it, which hopefully we can use before it goes off. It is actually very easy to do so I can more at any time.

While I was making that, my dough was rising ready to make hot-cross buns. I do these every year because we really like them, and they are very yummy!

I was a bit disappointed in my Tarta de Santiago last week so I found another recipe and decided to have another go. The ingredients were similar but in different proportions and the method was different. This time I am really pleased with it. It is light and tasty, and looks how it should.

Finally I mixed up a container of muesli. Occasionally I treat myself to a rather expensive box of 'really nutty' muesli which I love, but not only is it expensive, but also I doubt whether I will even get it again as it is imported from UK. (Most shops that sell 'English' style food seem to be importing from Ireland since Brexit).

So I have an old recipe for muesli which I like and I added chopped dates in place of sultanas, and quite a generous amount of sunflower seeds and mixed, chopped nuts. So that's my breakfast sorted for a while. Sometimes I add a few blueberries or raspberries if I have them, and a natural yoghurt, and it sets me up well for the day.

So that was a good day well spent.

At this time of year I need to water the citrus trees quite often and start to fertilize them, and I noticed that our little orange tree is covered with blossom. Much of this will be blown away in the high winds we always get in April, but the tree couldn't carry that much fruit anyway. It is a late orange, usually ready around March the next year, and it is a large very well flavoured fruit, so we are pleased if it manages to keep about a dozen right through the summer and autumn. Here's hoping...

When I go out at night to call the cats in, the air is full of the scent of orange blossom.

I went out to look for Tolly one day and found him up on top of a high storage cupboard outside the kitchen, and he was sitting across Tango. They looked so cute together and they both seemed quite relaxed, but needless to say it didn't last.

And now I will link up with Annie's Friday Smiles and 

Rocking Your World. 

Wishing you all every blessing for Easter, and leaving you with this little Easter Bunny. Isn't nature wonderful!