Friday Smiles 2023 # Week 43

Well our birthdays may have been almost two weeks ago but we had another little celebration on Monday when we had some 'Happy Birthday' post. I think there was a blip in the Spanish postal system as I knew two of my sisters had posted cards for each of us, well in advance, and they hadn't arrived. But on Monday we had cards from three of my sisters, Jean, Dorothy and Brenda as well as some from our eldest son and his family. (I also had an internal letter from Alicante, Spain but I couldn't read the post mark to see how long that had been travelling for). It was a lovely surprise, and we enjoyed opening them while we had our 'elevenses'. My sister Jean makes beautiful hand-crafted cards which are always a joy to receive, but this year I was particularly inpressed with this beautiful black-work rose sent by my sister Brenda. She will be ninety-three in a few week's time, and I just hope I am still as creative when (if) I ever reach that age.

Now the nights are drawing in I usually find myself settled in front of the TV in the evenings, and as I am no good at just sitting, I am again tackling some crochet projects. I am determined to finish at least two of them by the end of the year. The green cardigan is back on track, and for now I am saving that to do at my sewing group as it is fairly easy to carry with me, and I can work on it and chat at the same time. At home I am trying to complete a shawl that I started before my holiday. There is no urgency as I do not need another shawl, but the pattern intrigues me, and it was a good stash-buster that didn't require me to buy any new wool. Hopefully I will be able to show it off soon.

However, I have, of course, got a new project in mind. Again it is a pattern that caught my eye. Although it is intended as another shawl or coat, I thought I could adapt it to cover the back and seat of my new little chair that is coming next month. I think we will mostly be sitting on the new sofa, so the chair will likely be sat on by one or more cats and I want a throw on it to protect the fabric! The pattern looked complicated so I decided to do the test swatch they provided with the pattern to make sure it was sensible to even attempt it, as I will be buying new yarn for this once the chair arrives and I can match the colours better. So here is my test piece.

The actual throw will be rows of vines of leaves and berries running across it, with the wide border running down both sides. It looks a little misshapen here because I should have changed hook size for the border and I didn't bother for the practice. It also is a pattern where the yarn is cut at the end of every row, hence all those tails. I can hear you say "I couldn't face sewing all those in". Well you don't have to. You work a simple double border as I have on the right side of my piece, encasing the ends between the two sides of it. So I have tried all parts of the pattern and know it is do-able, so watch this space. It will take me at least all winter to do, so the chair will have a different throw to start with, but it will be nice to have one that blends in. These colours are very similar to the acual furniture and the red berries highlight the tiles on the floor. I may even decide to make the red the main colour for the border too.

On Sunday Chris drove me to church and we are now able to use a section of the new motorway that opened this month. It cuts a big corner off our journey and is a faster, better road. I am very impressed by the engineering skills of the Spanish workers. They build excellent roads, and this one involved the construction of two new bridges across the existing motorway, and a complex system of entry and exit roads. Here is the view as we approach the new bridge, (the blue railings). As you can see, at least on a Sunday morning it carries very little traffic, but it is busier when the marble lorries from Macael come down to the harbour.

Sunday was warm enough but the sky was covered by multiple layers of light cloud, that all moved at different speeds so it was constantly changing. Needless to say I could see faces in it everywhere. But in places it was just lovely to see, with the sun's rays trying to break through, then small blue patches appearing, the contrast of sun on the hills with dark clouds behind them, and on the way home, the rain falling on top of the mountains while we remained in semi-sunshine,

So this first collage is just interesting skies, all taken through the window of a moving car so not perfect.

This set are all skies where I could see a face, (and one that looks like an eye with strands of dark cloud as the eye-lashes). Some of the faces are more human and some animal to me. Some of you will see them and some won't, but they fascinated me.

Last week I saw this meme on facebook and thought "That is for me". 

And then last night certainly got me excited. Apologies if you saw this on Facebook yesterday but I had to share it straight away. It is a collage of photos taken over about a quarter of an hour, as the sky started golden and turned a firery red, and then faded to pink and purple.

I am pleased to say that Tango seems to have rallied again this week. He still wanders around looking a bit lost, but that is due to being completely deaf, and having very poor sight. But he is no longer hiding in a corner and sleeping all day, and he is eating well again. Here he is watching the sunset with me. Even if he can't see very well, (I don't even know whether cats can see in colour), I am sure he is aware of the changing light.

Apart from that I have had long chats with some of my boys, written e-mails to folks who are not so keen on using the internet, and read a lot on my Kindle.

I also finished making a set of ten more Christmas cards, to use locally.

So now I will prepare to link this up with Annie's Friday Smiles and publish it tomorrow morning.

Friday Smiles 2023# Week 42

Although I have had a very pleasant week, I have been very lax about taking photos and hence have very little to show you.

The week has been warm and sunny without being too hot, and the autumnal turn that was forecast did not really reach us. However we have now been warned of a 'polar jet' of cold air sweeping our way and bringing very high winds, colder days and heavy rain. They warned us to tie down any outside furniture etc that could be blown around, and not to leave the house unless we had good reason too. Well so far the sun is still shining but the wind is getting up and I can hear it rattling the doors and whistling round the corners of the house.

Fortunately I had an 'appointment' for a face call with a dear friend in UK this morning, and we chatted for a couple of hours!

On Sunday it was my husbands birthday so I made him his favourite roast beef dinner. He declined my offer to make him a cake, as he would rather have a chocolate biscuit than a piece of cake.

On Monday I had arranged to visit a friend a half-hour drive away, and we spent a lovely afternoon drinking tea and chatting in her garden. (Again no photo I am afraid).

Tuesday it was my birthday, and I had  happy face-time calls from all my boys. We then decided to go out for a joint celebration lunch. We are used to having our main meal at mid-day and neither of us can cope well with a big meal in the evenings these days. We had a lovely meal sitting on a sunny plaza down by Mojacar beach and it was very pleasant. I had asked Chris to buy me some of the new Sketchers Slip-on shoes and I wore them that morning. They are so comfortable, like walking on clouds, and will be ideal footwear all through the coming winter.

When we got home I did bake some cakes. First I made my favourite which is Canadian date cake, (also known as matrimonial cake?). It is a layer of oats, flour, butter and sugar followed by a mushy layer of cooked dates, and topped with more of the oat mix. Then I made a very moist triple ginger cake using a recipe I found online. I cut a small piece of each to keep at home for us, and cut the rest up to take to my sewing group the next day, and they all loved it.

There have been a few clouds each evening as the sun sets so I was hoping for a nice colourful sky on Saturday, but the clouds deepened and I just got this lovely golden burst as the sun tried, and almost managed to break through.

Last night I was sitting out on the porch at sun-down; It starts to set around 7.00 now. I can't see the hills it sets behind from there but I did notice some little fluffy curls of pink in the opposite direction, where whispy clouds were reflecting the late sun rays. So I took this photo and then went round to the other side of the house to see if there was a colourful sky.

But when I got round there all I could see were these few puffs in an otherwise clear sky. I thought it was fun because I immediately saw a face so I took a couple of photos. Then I realised there were two faces depending on how you look at it. In the first I have zoomed in and it is almost a female face with heavy eyes and a cigarette between parted lips. 

In the second one when I moved out further, the woman's eyes become a moustache and the two extra white wisps become the new eyes making an almost 'Santa' like face. Its probably just my imagination, but I will leave that idea with you.

And finally, as we are talking skies, each morning there has been a layer cloud at sunrise which soon burns off, but it gives us some very pink and orange skies for a short while which we can see as we lie in our bed. (We still sleep with the windows wide open). The view is seen through the fly free netted area but I am rarely up in time to photograph it and we do not have a very good position in the yard to see it from. But our local radio station, Spectrum FM, has its office right on the sea front at Mojacar and sometimes the presenter puts a photo on Facebook that he has taken from their balcony. So today he called it a 'Rather  Moody sky' but I think it is lovely. Here is his photo.

The black clouds rolled away but we are watching for them to roll back in now as the sun prepares to set, and maybe they will bring that promised rainfall. Meanwhile I will prepare this to link up with Annie's Friday Smiles ready for publishing in the morning.

Friday Smiles 2023 # Week 41

Well, we have just waved 'Good-bye' to our son Tom as he drives off to Alicante airport for his flight to France. He is meeting two friends there, and they have tickets for two of the rugby quarter finals matches this weekend, before they all fly on to home in Denmark. He is very independent and makes an easy house-guest, and we always enjoy  having him here to stay, even when, like this time, it was not an official holiday and he had to 'work from home' most days. He did work hard too, and seemed to spend most days in zoom calls to various people, but he finished around 4.00 when the Danish workers go home, and usually drove down to his favourite strips of coast to sit on the beach for a few hours before coming back to us for his tea. Then he set up his 'office space' out in the porch, with a cup of tea, or a glass of beer or wine, and his lap-top, and worked again to do all the things he hadn't managed all day because he was in meetings!. But he always stopped in time to sit and relax with us for an hour or two, before we all went to bed.

Of course, he didn't need to work at the weekend so we had two lazy days in the sunshine, sitting outside chatting and listening to music. He is used to the cold water in Denmark and found our pool very comfortable, but although I stood on the first step with my feet in the water, it felt decidely chilly for me! On Sunday we had a typical Sunday roast dinner, eating out on the porch under a warm Spanish sun. Lovely!

He had booked today off for packing and travelling, so before he left we walked up to a little kiosk that opened up on the top plaza a few months ago, selling only churros and drinks. The churros was delicious, made freshly for each customer as they ordered, and it was a nice way to end his time with us. (For anyone who isn't familiar with it, churros is a simple batter, piped into very hot oil and served well sprinkled with sugar). It is an option to buy some very thick chocolate milk to dip it in but we didn't bother with that today.

I have been busy while Tom was working, and I almost finished the first sleeve on my green cardigan, but when I tried it on I knew it wasn't right. The raglan shapings are much too long, making the whole garment too long, and the sleeves feel uncomfortable. So I made the huge decision to undo all the sleeve and body, and now I will decide where to stop the raglan and set the armholes at the right level, and then I will work it up again. I am not going to waste the wool, nor all the work I did to make the yoke section, but I would rather get it right so I end up with something I will be happy to wear. I am in no rush for it so I am going to work on finishing another project I started before my holiday, and keep the green piece to work on at my sewing group session. I am sure it will be worth the extra effort in the end.

I have also been working on my second owl and this one is done in Macrame. (Knotted string). Here he is finished. He is my first proper macrame project and although he is not perfect, I am pleased with him. He will be hanging on my wall alongside the paper-crafted one I showed last week.

Leo is continuing to improve, becoming more lively and eating everything I give him. He is only gaining weight very slowly, but at least he is gaining. He has discovered his talent as a hunter and this week has brought in a little bird, and cicada and countless large grass-hoppers.

Tango on the other hand has been declining. We have noticed this for some time, especially since he bacame stone deaf, and we now think partially sighted. He doesn't move around much and is eating very little. But he is thirteen years old, going by the three years the vet estimated was his age when we rescued him, and he had a very rough start to life. He also has had a special diet for most of his life because of a urinary tract condition, and I think his kidneys are not working too well now. But he is not unhappy and doesn't seem to be in any pain, so we are letting him slip away at his own pace, unless he starts to show signs of distress. In fact today he seems a little brighter, so maybe he will  be with us for a while yet. I hope so anyway.

He tends to chose a spot to sleep in for a couple of weeks and then moves on to somewhere different. Last week he spent most of his time in the bottom shelf of the TV stand. Leo took it upon himself to keep watch over him.

I was woken up on Tuesday by a very orange sky lighting up our bedroom so I got up to try and get a photo of the sunrise. I missed the brightest bit but it was lovely, and eventually the sun broke through the clouds.

Later that day it set in a blaze of glory, and then a few minutes later it faded away.

And on that note it is time for me to save this to publish in the morning, and link it up with Annie's Friday Smiles.

Friday Smiles 2023# Week 40

The year is hurrying by and here at week 40 I have very little to write about!

Thank you for all the thoughtful messages last week after my fall in the garden. I am almost recovered now. My knee bends again, most of the way anyway, and although my fingers are still sore, the bruise is fading and it doesn't hinder me from doing what I want to very much.

We have had a lovely week of sunshine each day and I have spent time most afternoons, sitting outside to do some craft, or reading. I needed new books on my Kindle so I downloaded the one Lisca said she was enjoying last week, and also the first one in the series. (Lisca's was the second). I sat out on the porch until 2.00 in the morning to finish the first one! It was a bit blood-thirsty but a good read. There are several more stories in the series so I may try some more. We will see how the second one goes.

With not a lot of news to tell, I thought I would show you my current "Work in progress". This was my holiday project. I was away for a month so I knew I would need something to do and I wanted a project that only required one colour of wool, and was not a  too complicated pattern so I could crochet and chat to family at the same time. I am also trying to use up some of my yarn stash and I had enough of this one to make a garment, so it was an easy decision. I have finished the main body, so now I have to pick up stitches around those rather large armholes and work down for short sleeves gathered into tightish cuffs. Then there is a border to work all around the neck, bottom edge and fronts. It will all look a lot better when it has been blocked.

We had an exciting shopping expedition early in the week when we went looking at new furniture for the living room. We sat on a lot of sofas! We finally settled on a wide two-seater settee with both sides electrically reclining, and also a small recliner chair in matching fabric, all in a light-teal tweed fabric. It won't be ready until mid to late November so no doubt there will be photos eventually.

This morning I went to a little local market at the camp site, because a friend was holding her 'end of season' sale. She used to run a fashion shop, but now buys garments from outlets all around southern Spain, and sells them from her home and website. But at the end of each season she holds a sale to clear her stock and there are always some good bargains. Today I chose a bright orange jumper, (I do like colourful clothing!), a short bat-wing top in lime green, and some beautifully soft black tousers. The trousers need shortening, but that is not too difficult, and the fabric is fantastic. I forgot to take any photos while I was there.

I did some paper crafting this week and made a set of eleven Christmas cards. (It's not like me to do an odd number of anything but it worked out that way this time). I can't show them yet as they will be my craft blog entry at the end of the month.

Look who has just come out from behind my big cork pin-board. I wonder how long he has been hiding in there. I love those little suction pads on his toes that enable him to run up and down walls at great speed. He is a welcome visitor as he eats all the pesky bugs, but he really needs to find his way out the window before one of my cats come down here and spots him.

And today I am closing with a photo of my mum in my garden back in UK. I took it when she came outside to say goodbye to a friend who came to see her. I think she was around 85 at the time. She is always in my thoughts, but today especially as it would have been her 119th birthday today! She sadly died in the June just before her 90th birthday, having lived with us for almost ten years. So we all have lots of happy memories of her.

Now I am off to the hospital at Huercal-Overa for an appointment with the dermatologist. The ulcer on my hand is reluctant to heal completely and is still often infected around the edge, so my doctor has referred me to the hospital. My first appointment came through for the last day I was in UK, so unfortunately I had to cancel it, but I didn't have to wait too long for a new one, so it will be interesting to hear what they have to say about it.

Friday-a brief update: The hospital visit was positive. A nice young doctor took a swab for testing and has ordered a biopsy. My translator helped me do the paper work so I am 'on the list'. I have no idea how long I will have to wait but at least they are doing something.

And with that I will link up with Annie's Friday Smiles.