Friday Smiles 2022: Week 19

It is hard to believe I have been home for over a week already, and yet my holiday already seems a long time ago.

It has been a week of ups and downs and I haven't managed to do much sorting out yet, so I will stick with photos from this week. This is my favourite time of year temperature wise, and it has been lovely to sit, each afternoon, out on the porch enjoying the gentle sunshine. Another few weeks and I'll be complaining that I am too hot.

On Monday we decided to go out around teatime for a walk along the sea front at Garrucha. It is not really the tourist season yet, but there were a few early holiday makers out for an evening stroll. The local walkers would be arriving an hour or two later, just as we were going home! Not all the bars have reopened yet, but we found one that was, just by the marina and sat for a while so Chris could enjoy a glass of wine and me my first 'tinto verano' or 'summer wine' of the season.

Then we walked along the beach front at Garrucha and when we came to a new boardwalk, we went down to the sea and dipped our toes in. It was not as cold as I was expecting, but the walking was quite heavy going as we were sinking into soft gravel with each step. It gave our feet a good massage!

At one point we heard a lot of noise and looking up we found a patch of sky was filled with seagulls. We couldn't see what they were after and we were a distance from the fishing port by then, so maybe one of the restaurants put their fish scraps up on the roof terrace for them. They were certainly making quite a din about something.

On our way back to the car we walked on the lower road which runs alongside the harbour. The fishing boats come in early each morning  and when their catch has been auctioned, the men spread their nets on the docks to dry. The man in red, sitting down is hand mending holes in his nets. There is a timelessness to the scene, which has changed very little over the last few decades.

On our way home we stopped off at the campsite for a plate of chips to share. It was a good ending to a nice little outing.

This part of Spain actually had more rain than I had in UK while I was away, and the garden is very grateful. This orange hibiscus usually only manages one poor flower at a time, and this week it had four beautiful blooms on it.

And this bright pink kalenchoe was all but dead and had been discarded at the end of last year, but the rain has given it a new lease of life, and just look at all those flowers on it.

One of my great successes is this pretty little purple daisy. I bought one very small piece in a little pot when I visited the catus garden in Nijar about three years ago. At the time the man stopped me buying two pots as he said this little one would cover a square metre in a year, and he was not wrong. The original piece soon filled a big container and spilled all down the sides and on down the front porch steps. Since then I have broken off pieces and planted them around the climbing rose tower, in the window boxes and in another pot on the ground, and all have grown really well. This week they are all in flower. Here are just some of them making a curtain of flowers in the front garden. I had to grab this photo just as the sun moved off them as their colour shows better in light shade, but soon after the sun has moved away, the flowers close up and sleep until the sun shines again the next day.

Some of the lows this week have been the health of our two lovely dogs. It is sad that although there is four years between them, they both have serious issues at the same time. We think Kim is a German Shepherd/Mastine cross, and his problem is very common in dogs of his size and breed; He has severe arthritis in his back legs. Some days, today being one of them, he has real difficulty getting to his feet, and it doesn't help that we have fairly smooth tiles on the porch so he can't get much grip. But we lay mats and blankets down to help him, but he doesn't actually like us to try and lift him and it is hard to watch him struggle. It doesn't help that he is overweight, partly due to his inability to exercise, so he is on a fairly strict diet, and I am hoping that if we can get some weight off him, then we can take him on short walks again. Today he went to the groomers and he came home looking all fluffy like a big bear, and smelling sweeter too. We had asked her to clip his claws but she didn't think they needed much off, but they have all the hair trimmed off around them and his back end is short and tidy too, so he is a very handsome boy tonight. The vet has offered to give him a monthly injection which may or may not help his legs, but it is very expensive, so for now we are trying jpoint care chews and today we bought special food for senior dogs with mobility issues. At 9½ years old he is not that senior, but I know his life expectancy is shorter than for some smaller breeds.

Foxy on the other hand is now 13 years old, and we know she is near the end of her life. We have known about her problem for some time as it has been many months since she consistantly ate proper meals, but of late she has got a lot worse, sometimes going for several days without eating at all. So last week the vet gave her an X-ray and confirmed what we already sort of knew, that she has a large mass in her abdomen that is now growing rapidly and compressing all her other organs. It is not treatable and she is on palliative care, but she swings from really good days to really bad ones. From last Thursday until Tuesday she was up and wagging her tail in the mornings, she followed us outside, and ate the puréed chicken rice and carrots I have been making for her. Then yesterday she couldn't stand up, wouldn't look at any food and just lay on her bed all day. We weren't sure what we would find this morning, but there she was quite perky again. So far she has not shown any signs of pain or distress, but we have both agreed that as soon as she does it will be time to let her go. It is a case of taking each day at a time, but she has given us a lot of pleasure over the past thirteen years, and I think we have given her a good and happy life too. (We keep moving her onto her nice soft bed but she moves back onto the bare tiles!)

I don't want to end on a sad note, so here are a few more things we have managed to acheive. We have cleared the corner of the garden that we want to remodel. Tired of waiting for the man who told us he would do the work back before Christmas, we decided to simplify the plans and do what we could ourselves. So today we ordered new garden furniture, and finished washing down the barbeque which we have ordered a new cover for, found new homes for some large pieces of machinery that needed moving, and visited several garden centres to decide which planters etc we would buy. Next Chris will dismantle the lean-to shelter that housed all the above items, and get the walls painted. I am excited to see the plans coming together.

I was getting withdrawal symptoms from family time, so this afternoon I had long video calls with my sister Jean and son Ben. Happy days!

Now to link with Annie's Friday Smiles ready to publish in the morning.