lined skirt

Hello there, I hope you’re having a good weekend. It’s been a bit damp and grey here in Gibraltar which isn’t the norm for this time of year, but summer’s around the corner and we had a little taste of it last weekend.

Sunday Sevens is a weekly blog series featuring seven photos from the last seven days. It’s the creation of Nat at Threads & Bobbins blog. To find out more, pop over to her blog.

May Day in Gibraltar

Here in Gibraltar, we don’t need too much of an excuse to have a party, and May Bank Holiday weekend was the perfect opportunity. The skies were blue, the sun was out and lots of people headed out to enjoy the beautiful spring weather. We made a bee-line for Commonwealth Park so the boys could run off a bit of energy with their scooters. This photo makes it look pretty deserted but I can assure you that there were dozens of other families there doing the same. You can probably see them in the distance on the grass.

Later in the day there was the added excitement of a free live concert in Casemates Square featuring a series of local acts culminating in Ben Haenow, the X Factor winner from 2014.

Crochet

There was no art class this week so on bank holiday Monday instead of painting, I found myself sitting in the sun and fancied doing a spot of crochet. This little butterfly fluttered off my hook ;-).

Dressmaking class

It’s finally finished, my lined panelled skirt with an invisible zip. I’m not sure how much I like the fabric and style now it’s made up, but I learned a lot making it.

Watercolours

As I didn’t have watercolour class this week, I did a bit at home. I’m pleased with how my window’s coming along. I’ve managed not to spoil it…. yet!

Med Steps

So far this week with school closed 3 days out of five here (bank holiday Monday, Acension Day on Thursday and In-Service day on Friday) I only managed one single trip up the Med Steps. It was perfect conditions, overcast and cool, so I did it in a good time. However, now I’m getting a bit worried that it’s less than a week to go to the Med Steps 5 Challenge on Saturday and that scares me a bit!

Ouch!

On Friday night my right index finger had an argument with a pair of doors and lost. On Saturday I woke with a blue nail and swollen finger and felt rather down in the dumps as I’d spent much of Friday busily doing jobs so I could do some crochet on Saturday.

Unable to pick up a hook, I decided to read instead and began Empty Cradles (Oranges and Subshine) by Margaret Humphreys. It’s not the cheeriest read to lift the mood but is incredibly powerful.

It tells the true story of the hundreds (if not thousands) of British children who were shipped overseas to Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Rhodesia from the 1940s until the late 1960s. They were sent away from children’s homes in the UK to help populate areas and work the land, with little hope of seeing their families or homeland again. If you are interested I social history, I can highly recommend it.

My last post

When I pressed publish on my last post Saying goodbye on Wednesday morning, I was slightly nervous about putting out such a personal account. I was overwhelmed by the response to it, both on WordPress and Facebook, and I would genuinely like to thank you for taking the time to read it and those of you who sent messages afterwards, it was very much appreciated.

We are really blessed with the wonderful community we have here in Gibraltar and from what some people have told me, it’s a sadly rare occurrence. I shall treasure the friends I have close by and am confident that those who have moved on to pastures new will continue to play a part in our lives either online or through visits. All is not lost!

Sunday Sevens is a weekly blog series created by Natalie at the Threads & Bobbins blog. It gives you a chance to reflect some of the things you’ve been doing in your week through a series of seven photographs. To find out more, or to join in, pop over to her blog for more information.

I hope you’ve had a good week, it’s been a busy one here and I can’t believe Sunday’s come around so quickly again!

Med Steps training

A certain seriousness has come into our training for the Med Steps challenge this week with the realisation that we have just a month left to build up our stamina to manage 5 times up the steep climb to the top of the Rock in one day. The charity event, which raises money for the Cancer Relief Centre here in Gibraltar, is open to individuals and teams (some of whom actually run up!?). You can enter a team of 5 and each individual can do it once or like us (in our little team of 3) you can all do it 5 times. We won’t be breaking any records and the event is open from 9 until 5 on the day so there’s a very good chance we’ll take a long time to complete it.

One morning we all got together for a team training session – our first collective one for weeks, and did twice round. It’s starting to get really rather hot and this photo was taken on our second circuit (not too far from the top) when I stopped for a breather and some water. We are praying for overcast weather on the big day so we don’t all keel over from exhaustion and sun stroke – I fear some unflattering head gear may be de-rigeur. I’ll keep you posted on our progress, we are stepping up our training this week….

Postcard family bake-off

We have a Postcard family birthday coming up soon and one of the little Postcards thought we should have a baking competition to decide on the birthday cake of choice ahead of the event. Sadly it was not in the luscious English countryside and neither Paul Hollywood, Mary Berry nor Mel or Sue were in attendance (probably for the best).

Now, I do enjoy eating cakes but am not the world’s best baker by any means. In the interest of family harmony, I ‘threw’ the competition (shh – don’t tell anyone) by making millionaire’s shortbread ably assisted by the smallest Postcard while another young Postcard made a chocolate fudge cake with a garnish of sweets! The chocolate fudge cake won as it was a ‘cake’ and did taste rather good. The millionaire’s shortbread was incredibly sickly although it did improve on chilling. Now I have to make another cake in time for the birthday celebrations!! Just as well I’m doing the steps a lot in order to burn all of this off!

Final home furnishings class

This week, we had the last of our 12 home furnishings classes and we made curtain tie-backs. You may notice they are the same fabric as the cushion I made last time for the transport fan in my life – I hope he likes them! The Transport for London inspired material came into my possession after reading Nana Cathy’s blog post about The Remnant House (a great fabric shop in York). I had a look at their website and bought myself some great fabric to make things for my boys. So thank you Nana Cathy for telling me about this fab shop. I hope one day to visit it for real, although I fear I’ll end up adding considerably to my stash and to-do list when that time comes!

If you are in Gibraltar or nearby, and fancy having a go at learning to make curtains, cushions and tie-backs, I was taught by Dorcas Hammond of Dorcas Hammond Designs. She’s very experienced and a great teacher. Pop into her shop on Governor’s Street or find her on Facebook to get more info on her classes.

Dressmaking class

Sewing has begun in ernest on my first ever lined skirt in my dressmaking class. I had to unpick and re-sew my invisible zip but apart from that it was a good lesson this week and I’m pleased with the progress I made. Fingers crossed the rest of the skirt will go well 🙂

Watercolour class

In watercolour class this week, we focused on skies and the different techniques you can use to paint them. One of the most interesting finds was that by painting a thin wash of raw sienna first even under blue you can get a really nice glow. I’ve got work to do on my cloud formation as they are a little sausuge shaped for now but it was fun.

A nocturnal visitor

Spring must be here because for the first time this year I spotted one of these little chaps on the bathroom window. You can see the lizards or geckos even in the middle of winter here if it’s a sunny day. They crawl out from their hibernation place and bask in a sheltered sunny spot, but they disappear long before the sun goes down and the temperature drops. This week though, we have started to have a few warmer evenings and so this little chap was lying in wait for an unsuspecting moth to come fluttering next to our bathroom window and pounce! It’s quite spectacular when it happens – like a mini version of ‘Wildlife on One’ on your window!

Bunny update

Bunny’s doing well and his fringe is continuing to grow, however because of his long hair/fur he has a tendency to get dreadlocks and matted areas despite regular brushing so we are going to have to take him to the vets soon to have a bit cut out near his tail. It’s a bit close to his tail for us to want to attempt to cut in case we hurt him. He also needs some injections so that he can have a hop about on our back patio too… poor bunny it’s as bad as having to hoodwink kids into going to the clinic for jabs 🙁 not looking forward to that.

I hope you have a great week, goodbye for now!