Med Steps 5 Challenge

Sunday Sevens #188 26.5.19

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Hello there, Sunday Sevens has made it back to a Sunday! It’s been another extremely busy week at this end, with a school sports day, an inservice day, and now we’re halfway through a bank holiday weekend. I had to put an extra page in my diary this week to allow for all the things we’ve had going on! I’ll be glad when summer comes and things quieten down a little – I hope!

Med Steps 5 weekend

Last weekend was Med Steps 5 weekend. In previous years the fundraising event ran just on the Saturday. This year though, there was a family event on the Sunday. Children were given a Med Steps passport to complete along the route and were awarded medals at the end.bThis brilliant event, as always, raised funds for the wonderful Cancer Relief Centre in Gibraltar.

One very big boat

Do you remember that in last week’s Sunday Sevens I told you about this big boat? Well this week it even had a helicopter on the top! And I hear it belongs to Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook fame.

Last rays of sunshine

I happened to step out onto the balcony just at the right time to spot the sun about to dip down behind the hills across the Bay from our house one evening. It’s at times like this that I’m so grateful for where we live.

Street art

This little chap has been all over social media in Gibraltar lately. The sloth has been painted onto some hoardings around building work and I happened to walk past him mid week for the first time. Moments later I spotted this lovely cat too just a bit further on!

Jacaranda galore

This year I’ve noticed just how many Jacaranda trees there are in Gibraltar. I have been trying to photograph one with it’s gorgeous blue/violet blossom for the past couple of weeks but normally the background has been blue sky which didn’t display the colour of the blossom well. I spotted this one on Main Street and the building behind it showed it off to great effect.

Polling Day

I’m sitting here in front of the TV this evening watching BBC coverage of the European elections whilst simultaneously watching the local coverage from the Gibraltar Broadcasting Corporation on my tablet. We, in Gibraltar went to the polls like the rest of the UK on Thursday. Gibraltar is eligible to vote as part of the South West region of Great Britain. Gibraltar voted overwhelmingly (76% of the Vote) for the Liberal Democrats – the party leader, Sir Vince Cable was in Gibraltar to campaign just a week or so ago on a pro-Remain ticket, there was even a Gibraltarian candidate standing as a Lib Dem MEP.

Beautiful botanical gardens!

We took a walk through the beautiful botanical gardens yesterday. No matter what the weather or the time of year, it’s always special here!

That’s all for Sunday Sevens for this week, thanks very much for stopping by.

Sunday Sevens was created by Natalie from Threads and Bobbins.

Sunday Sevens #137 20.5.18

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This Sunday Sevens is being sent by a rather worn out Postcard from Gibraltar, the reason why will become apparent in the sixth photo!

Sunday sunset

We had a beaut of a sunset on Sunday evening. So colourful. I’ve not included a sunset in Sunday Sevens for a while, so thought I’d put this one in.

It’s starting to look like a dress!

At last at my dressmaking class I am seeing progress. My dress is looking like a dress! Now time to fiddle with the frill!

A farewell lunch

An arty friend of mine is leaving Gibraltar and returning home to the Netherlands. This week I met her for lunch along with another arty friend to say farewell. We had Indian Tapas. It tasted as good as it looks.

Sunny morning walk by the sea

On Wednesday morning I went for a bit of a walk, I went for a coastal option rather than climbing up the Rock like normal. It was beautiful as I walked through Catalan Bay.

Experimenting with backgrounds

My next watercolour painting will be of nasturtiums, and I’ve been experimenting with the background to set them off nicely. I want a traditional Gibraltar stone wall, but how do I do that without drawing atttention away from the flowers? We’ll see if I can pull it off or not!

Med Steps

So yesterday was the Med Steps Challenge. It was really, really hard work – but then it wouldn’t be a challenge if it was easy would it? Not got much to add to that, still feeling rather tired!

Royal wedding fever

Royal wedding fever hit Gibraltar yesterday. I missed most of it slogging up the Rock, but had a quick trip to Ocean Village later on and there was a lot of well dressed people hitting the cava. One or two looked like they had started at breakfast time and were pushing on through to the FA Cup final. I think there may be a few sore heads around this morning!

That’s all for Sunday Sevens this week, thanks for stopping by! I’m linking with Natalie from Threads and Bobbins for this weekly blog series.

Friday photo challenge (week 20) Challenge

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This, my friends is the Med Steps. Tomorrow it’s the Med Steps 5 Challenge, when around 200 brave/crazy people will attempt to walk it 5 times all in the name of charity.

The walk/climb takes you from the south west side of the Rock of Gibraltar, along paths, through a tunnel and up many, many steps round the south edge and up the west side to the summit of the Rock. It’s quite a climb.

I will be one of those walkers tomorrow morning, all of us raising much needed funds for the wonderful Cancer Relief Centre here in Gibraltar. Wish us luck!

(For more info on the Med Steps, this post may help you, and my experience of last year’s Med Steps 5 Challenge can be found here).

Challenge is the theme for this week’s Friday photo challenge, next week, it’s floral.

Sunday Sevens #134 29.4.18

~ Making Stitches ~ 8 Comments

Hello and welcome to this Bank Holiday edition of Sunday Sevens. We are enjoying a 4-day weekend here in Gibraltar with Workers Memorial Day tomorrow and May Day on Tuesday. Fortunately, we enjoyed some rather nice sunshine yesterday, although we have had heavy rain and thunder storms overnight, so it’s turning out to be your usual British bank holiday! However you are spending this weekend, I hope you’re having a good time 🙂

Heavy seas

Last Sunday I took a walk around the eastern side of the Rock and was mesmerized by the waves. They were crashing on the rocks below like billy-o and were quite hypnotic to watch.

Poppies & partridges

Poppies and Barbary partridges were the order of the day for my Monday trip up the Med Steps. These were the first poppies of spring this year and are always such a treat to see.

Just killing time with a crochet rainbow

One afternoon I found myself with some time to kill in the car while waiting to pick up Little Postcards. Fortunately, I came prepared with my crochet. A lovely way to while away a few moments.

Another painting finished…

At my art class this week, I finished off my freesia painting. That’s four now that I have done in this style and I’ve really enjoyed painting & drawing them (all four are below). The first one (the purple iris) was a copy of a greetings card, which my watercolour teacher had by an artist called Judy Ball. The original was a lino print rather than a ink and watercolour picture.

I then copied that style to do my own compositions of daffodils, tulips and freesias.

Gib Rocks

The Postcard from Gibraltar ‘Gib Rock’ has been set free in the beautiful Alameda Botanical Gardens. It was left in a particularly tranquil spot, one that’s special to me, because it reminds me of my lovely Gran. She sat in this area for a while on her only trip out to Gibraltar to visit us. If you should happen to see my rock, I’d love to hear from you 😊.

Out of my window

I love that whenever I look out of my window here, my view is always changing. I glanced up while on the phone one lunchtime this week and spied this old fashioned ship picking it’s way amongst the bunkering tankers and cargo ships. I have a great app on my iPad called Marine Traffic (a bit geeky I know) which lets you see the name, country of origin and destination of many of the ships out in the Bay. Sadly, I was too busy to take the time to find out about this one. It does look rather magestic don’t you think?

And finally, time for something different…

I spotted this little chap in the middle of the lawn behind the Gibraltar Register Office this week. I hadn’t walked that way for quite some time and had never seen him before. I think he’s rather sweet, and I think Gibraltar needs more garden gnomes!

I’m linking with Natalie from Threads and Bobbins for this weekly blog series.

Sunday Sevens #132 22.4.18

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Hello there, welcome to the latest Sunday Sevens, a week which began in bright sunshine and ended with grey cloudy skies….

Don’t go into the water!

There were reports in the media last week that lots of Portuguese Man-o-war were being washed up on Gibrataltar’s beaches. Not wishing to miss out on seeing them, I headed down to Camp Bay with the Little Postcards last Sunday to see if we could see any. We weren’t disappointed. I had never seen them before and found them rather mesmerising with their bright blue colour and tentacles drifting below the waves.

We kept our distance though, as they can be very dangerous, even lethal in some cases. I thought it best to show the children what they looked like in case they should ever encounter them again. Now they will know to avoid them in future.

I’ve got a beach!

This week I managed to keep up with the Coastal Crochet CAL (Crochet along) and now have the beginnings of a beach on my Seaside Stash-busting Blanket. It was very nautical for a while there, but now I have wet sand, seaweed and pebbles.

3 times round

I can’t quite believe I am writing this, but although I didn’t plan it, I managed three times round the Med Steps this week. I had intended to do twice round but something Mr Postcard said as he went to work (along the lines of “two not three?”) planted the seed and once I’d completed number 2, thought, why not? I went for it. It was very difficult. This photo was taken at the bottom of the final set of steps. I was sitting on the bottom step at the time! I’ve got less than a month to go now before the Med Steps 5 Challenge, so there’s no time to waste!

Princess line seams

This week’s dressmaking class was all about the princess line seams. Boring photo I’m afraid.

Double daffs

I went crazy and splashed out £2 on a bunch of daffodils for myself this week. They had beautiful double heads and made me smile.

More stepping

The beautiful sunny weather we had at the start of the week had disappeared by Friday. I headed back up the steps. It was very blustery up there and just a little bit scary as I turned the corner onto the east side. It was blowing me backwards as if I wasn’t allowed to go up. Once I was properly round onto the eastern side, it was much more sheltered and not a problem at all.

Seeing as I can’t show you blue skies on this one, I took a few pictures of the beautiful wild flowers up there, including the Gibraltar national flower (the Gibraltar Candytuft: bottom right) which is in flower in a few sheltered spots now.

Gib Rocks

There is a phenomenon sweeping Gibraltar at the moment, especially for families with young children, called Gib Rocks. It started just a few short weeks ago, and the idea is to paint rocks and stones with bright colours, a message or a picture, then hide them somewhere in Gibraltar for someone else to find. It was sparked by one Gibraltar-based family’s trip to Battle in the South of England at Easter, where a similar scheme is in operation. On their return, they set up a Facebook page called Gib Rocks and at the last count it had over 3,600 members. It’s kind of mushroomed!

Anyway, we decided to join in too. I shan’t show you what the Little Postcards painted, as they wanted to keep it a secret, but I’m rather partial to rainbows so I could only paint one thing couldn’t I? It’s drying off nicely now ready for it’s final touches, I’ll keep you posted on where it ends up…. watch this space!

I’m linking with Natalie from Threads & Bobbins for this weekly blog series.

Sunday Sevens #131 15.4.18

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Hello there, and welcome to this week’s Sunday Sevens. It’s been a bit of a busy day, hence the lateness of this!

Sunshine ☀️

After a dodgy start, last Sunday was glorious. In the afternoon we took the Little Postcards to the park to run off a bit of energy ahead of school starting back the next day. On our return, Mr Postcard and I, took a few minutes to sit out on the balcony before dinner to soak up a few rays – rain was forecast for the next seven days – you have to take the opportunity while you can!

Back in the groove

Oh, how I missed my crochet while I was in the UK over Easter. I took a portable project with me but sadly the hook recommended was too small for my tension and although I had the next size up with me that was too small too… I did the first two rows of 300+ stitches and frogged it three times before giving up.

There was a lovely looking yarn shop in Sidmouth where we stayed but it was closed (understandably) over Easter weekend, and in London, we took a big diversion one day to visit Loop in Islington (a gorgeous yarn emporium). They had every size hook imaginable in stock apart from the size I needed – grrr! Never mind, I got to scratch my crochet itch on our return and managed to catch up on about 3 weeks worth of rows of the Coastal Crochet Seaside Stash Busting Blanket.

Med Steps training

I’m committed to doing the Med Steps 5 Challenge again in May this year, but so far my training hasn’t gone to plan very well. On Monday I managed a first for this year, twice round! The second trip was not easy at all but it feels like I’m finally getting somewhere!

As you can see above, I started the first trip up in drizzle with a rainbow in the Bay and finished the second in sunshine….

Back to art class

It feels like it’s been a long, long time since my last watercolour class. It’s got to be about a month since I last put pencil or brush to paper. This week I headed back to my class and began a new ink and watercolour painting, freesias this time.

Happy post & a bumble bee 🐝

I have been meaning to go and pick up a parcel from the post office since we returned from our Easter trip to England and a message on the radio gave me the kick up the behind I needed. The parcel post is moving locations across Gibraltar this weekend, to make way for a new school building project.

I didn’t want my parcel to get lost in the move, so hot footed it over to pick up my latest Little Box of Crochet. Being a native Mancunian, I just love my bumble bee brooch! I also have a friend who’s expecting a baby girl, so I have just the person in mind for that crochet project, once it’s complete!

Wet, wet, wet!

This week, we had storms on Tuesday and again on Thursday. It was pretty wet for us on Friday too but I persevered and climbed up the again on Friday. The Steps were closed on Wednesday and Friday after the storms so I went up the road on the other side instead. I’m chuffed with myself that I managed 3 training sessions in total this week.

Football crazy

Yesterday meant lots of football, and with it lots of very welcome sunshine. We had a league match to attend in the morning for one Little Postcard and then a 5-a-side tournament in the afternoon. Never a dull moment in this house!

And that, as they say, is that. Sunday Sevens complete for another week. Thanks for stopping by, I hope you have had a good week and that the week ahead is kind to you.

I’m linking with Natalie from Threads and Bobbins for the Sunday Sevens blog series.

Sunday Sevens #130 8.4.18

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Hello there from Gibraltar on the last day of the Easter school holidays. Life will hopefully fall back into some sort of routine from tomorrow. We’ve had a lovely week and a bit of family time with travel to the south of England, which we all enjoyed, but it will be nice to get back to normal again… here’s this week’s Sunday Sevens:

Down on the farm

On Easter Sunday we piled into car and drove from our holiday home in Sidmouth in Devon to a fabulous farm shop and café for breakfast. Greendale Farm Shop, just outside Exeter, has won awards and I can see why, it was fabulous. We had great breakfasts ranging from a mini full English to bacon butties, omelette to waffles and ice cream?! The shop was excellent, as was the farm itself.

The Little Postcards were mesmerized by the free range chickens who followed us wherever we went. As for Oscar the ostrich, the jury’s out. Just for the record I was informed that there was a more than passing resemblance between myself and the pot bellied pigs (see what I have to put up with!).

Train travels

We were on the move again on Monday, we travelled from Devon to London Paddington. The train was terribly overcrowded, we stood all the way from Exeter to London 🙁 it was so overcrowded even the toilet door handle was shocked:

I stood next to it all the way :-/

Being tourists

On Tuesday we met up with some old friends who used to live in Gibraltar and did a spot of sightseeing. (It was lovely to see them again.) First stop was St Paul’s Cathedral. I had never been inside before and was mesmerized by this place which, when I was a little girl in 1981, hosted the fairytale royal wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Di.

I had a Ladybird book of the royal wedding which I knew off by heart cover-to-cover preparing myself for my own wedding to a Prince…. I did indeed meet my prince, Mr Postcard, our wedding was a rather more low key affair but no less special 😉

Flying high

On Wednesday we took a bit of a tour around the capital for the benefit of a Little Postcard who has a thing for public transport, we rode the Tube, the Docklands Light Railway, a regular train which ran on part of the soon to be opened Cross-Rail project and hitched a ride on the Emirates Airline cable car. It gave us a great view across the O2 towards the City, and despite the rainy weather was lots of fun.

A perfect spring morning

On our last morning in London, we woke to blue skies and set off for a bit of a walk to make the most of the good weather. We headed to Kensington Gardens and as you can see it was glorious. What a charming park, despite being busy with people it didn’t feel overcrowded and it was great to get a fix of green in the Big Smoke. Many of the trees were starting to show signs of spring and it was so good to see.

Heading home

On Friday we headed home to Gibraltar. Before setting off from Blighty we had an overnight stay with more friends in Sussex and we headed out for a walk near to where we were staying. On that walk I spied these pretty primroses. I do love visiting England in the spring. The sprouting trees and hedges and spring flowers hold such promise of the beauty which is yet to come. Thank you England, we had a lovely trip!

Back down to business

Too much time has passed without Med Steps training, so once my washing airers were full of clean wet washing and I could wash no more, it was time to hit the steps again yesterday.

I have to admit feeling a little disillusioned and unmotivated about my training of late as life and bad weather have rather got in the way. However, as I stepped I plugged in my headphones to listen to an amazing podcast. It was the latest in the Blogtacular Podcast series and featured Lauren Mahon, the author of the blog Girl vs Cancer.

It was incredibly powerful as she spoke of the importance of support services to help people undergoing cancer treatment. It reminded me why I was training for the Med Steps 5 next month, which raises funds for the Cancer Relief Centre here in Gibraltar so it can offer a whole range of much needed support services to those undergoing treatment as well as their nearest and dearest. I’m back on track now!

Thank you for stopping by and reading this Sunday Sevens. I’m linking with Natalie from Threads & Bobbins.

Sunday Sevens #119 21.1.18

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After last week’s sad demise of my trusty iPhone after 3 years of loyal service, I was very fortunate to have Mr Postcard buy me a new one (hooray!). As a result, normal Sunday Sevens service is restored and I have lots of photos to celebrate. Here’s this week’s edition of Sunday Sevens…

Sunshine after the rain

Last Sunday was a rather damp, grey and dull affair but we were treated to a rather lovely sunset. It’s amazing how a little bit of sunshine, even if it’s fleeting, can lift the spirits.

Joining squares

One of my many New Years resolutions was to finish some of the many on-going WiPs (works in progress) I have going on. This blanket was begun back in the summer of 2016, when I undertook my first Summer Craft Challenge.

The plan had initially been to create a blanket for our bed, but it soon became apparent that that would require a gazillion squares and I kind of ran out of oomph. Recently, I became aware of a place which is in need of small blankets for needy children, so I decided to pick up where I left off and get cracking with this again. When it’s complete I’ll show you how it ends up.

Dressmaking class

Over Christmas I was supposed to go shopping for some new fabric for my next dressmaking project in class. Unfortunately I failed in that matter. The local fabric shop in Gibraltar is up for sale and their stock is quickly dwindling. I had hoped to pop over to Spain to buy some fabric from a shop in La Linea, but unfortunately didn’t reckon on the whole 3 Kings holidays so that rather scuppered my purchase too. So, when it came to my dressmaking class this week, I decided to take one of my WiPs out of storage and use my time fruitfully pushing that towards the final straight.

Those of you who have been following my Sunday Sevens for a while may remember this skirt which was supposed to be made for me to wear to two special family weddings last year. I ended up falling in love with a dress in a shop window and that ended up being my wedding outfit, while this skirt was rather, well, forgotten about. Now it’s back out of its bag and ironed, I think I rather like it again, so I got busy on the hems. We’re not finished yet, but I’m heading in the right direction.

Med Steps training

I have managed to get up the Med Steps a couple of times this week. The first trip was on Wednesday, when it was gloriously sunny. Although we did have a water feature to get our socks wet in. A fresh water pipe which was coming out of the Rock high up above our heads had burst and for part of the route, the path had effectively become a stream. It made conditions a bit slippy underfoot. We reported it to the wardens but they were waiting for the appropriate authorities to come out and fix it. As it was high up on the Rock, it wasn’t a straight forward job.

The next day, Thursday, we went back up and what a difference a day makes! The two photos below were taken 24 hours apart. It was very blustery and grey but on a positive note, the water leak had been fixed, so we didn’t get wet feet this time!

Fabric shopping

On Wednesday, after my trip up the Steps I happened upon a good idea. I had been racking my brains on when I would get the chance to get into Spain to buy my dressmaking fabric whilst the Little Postcards were at school, and in between all my other commitments, when I suddenly realised it was Wednesday and that’s market day in La Linea. The market stands just on the other side of the border between Gibraltar and Spain, and is easily walkable from Gib in just a few minutes.

I keep meaning to visit the market but there always seems to be something which I need to do on a Wednesday morning, and I always forget until it’s too late. This week, though, I remembered. I’m ashamed to say that after eight and a half years of living in Gibraltar, this week was only my second visit to the market. Thankfully, my memory served me well and they did have fabric stalls. After much mooching I found some black stretchy satin and black crepey fabric for my next project. Here’s hoping I bought the right thing or I’ll be going back again next week!

My Year of Colour

Over on Instagram this week, there has been a mini trend of creating your year of colour. I thought I would have a go myself and was rather pleased with this rainbow of bright dots. The idea is, that the year of colour website sifts through all your photographs from the past year and picks out the predominant colours and weighs up how popular certain photos were before generating your year of colour. It’s just a bit of fun, but I enjoyed playing with the site.

Watercolour production line

I was on a bit of a roll at my watercolour class this week, working on three paintings at once! I finished last week’s jam jar posy, did some cyclamen in a pot and had a go at some purple foliage in another jam jar.

Another crochet project

I know, I know I didn’t need another new crochet project when I have others on the go (2 x blankets, 2 Little Box of Crochet projects, 2 shawls & 2 unicorns waiting in the wings) but I just couldn’t resist. I’m joining along with Eleonora of Coastal Crochet and her Seaside Stash-busting blanket CAL (crochet-along) well, it is stash-busting so it’s got to be a good thing right? Each week Eleonora will publish four rows of her pattern for you to crochet along with. I think I can manage 4 rows a week… maybe. Check out her blog or Instagram (@coastalcrochet) for all the details.

So there you have it, a rather longer than usual Sunday Sevens, but then I did have a new camera phone to play with. I hope you have had a good week this week and that the next seven days are kind to you. Thanks for stopping by!

I’m linking with Natalie from Threads and Bobbins for the Sunday Sevens weekly blog series.

Sunday Sevens #117 7.1.18

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Hello and welcome to the first Sunday Sevens of 2018. After all that build up, the festivities seem to have passed in a flash and we’re one week into the New Year already. Schools in Gibraltar go back tomorrow (hooray!) and life is returning back to normal. Let’s rewind a bit though and look back at New Year’s Eve…

Happy New Year!

We brought in the New Year in Spain. We ran away for a few days and did things like play Cluedo, table tennis, swimming and chilling out. It was a really lovely break. The hotel next to our resort laid on the most impressive fireworks display. We have stayed in the same place a couple of times before and in the past the only fireworks locally were a few rockets set off by families living nearby. This time it was something else.

Starting as I mean to go on!

Within half an hour of us arriving home in Gibraltar on Monday morning, I had my trainers on and I headed up the Med Steps for my first of many climbs (I hope) this year. It’s been a few months since my last visit and the first signs of spring were in evidence with these beautiful narcissi dotted along the pathway.

The view from the top was so clear, Africa looked so close!

Morning moonlight

I believe it’s a ‘wolf moon’ that we had on New Year’s Day and into the 2nd. Here it is just as it was about to disappear behind the hills above Algeciras on Tuesday morning. This beautiful image was captured by Mr Postcard on his way to work. Just as well he took it – I was fast asleep!!

Child cruelty

As the schools in Gibraltar haven’t started back yet after the Christmas break, I have had three Little Postcards at home this week. We had beautiful weather for much of it and it felt criminal to stay indoors, so I dragged them out with me and took them for a steep walk up the Rock.

We started from the centre of town and walked up to Princess Caroline’s Battery from where we could spy on the city below and watch the comings and goings at the airport. I was an awful mother, taking them away from their devices, making them walk miles and miles up a ‘vertical hill’ (their words not mine). But I did get them ice cream at the top and in hindsight they said they enjoyed it ;-).

Being tourists

Last month, Gibraltar’s newest tourist attraction opened – a viewing platform to see the entrance to Gorham’s Cave and Vanguard Cave. They are part of the UNESCO World Heritage site we have here in Gibraltar and the site of significant archaeological discoveries relating to the Rocks earliest inhabitants. We decided to pay it a visit this week and enjoyed a really informative talk by our guide. It’s well worth a visit.

Three Kings Cavalcade

Friday was 5th January and that meant it was time for the annual Three Kings Cavalcade in Gibraltar. After a decline in the number of floats in recent years, there was a lot more out in time for the 61st Cavalcade. Local businesses, community groups and even families put on elaborate floats to delight the crowds. This marvelous fish was on a float made entirely of recycled materials – what a fabulous idea!

That’s all for Sunday Sevens this week, a week in which I launched my Friday Photo Challenge and was overwhelmed by the response. Thanks very much to everyone who’s taken part so far!

I’m linking with Natalie from Threads and Bobbins for this weekly blog series.

Review of 2017

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Crumbs, it’s looking awfully like we are on the cusp of another New Year, it surely can’t be a whole year since the last one, it’s gone far too fast. I guess now’s as good a time as any to have a look back at some of my Postcard from Gibraltar highlights from the past 12 months….

January 2017

A new year meant a new challenge for me this year, a photo challenge. Last year I read Nana Cathy’s blog and was intrigued by her weekly photo challenge. When January came around I thought I’d join in myself. It’s been such fun and quite inspiring throughout the year to have weekly prompts to find pictures for. If you fancy joining in check out Wild Daffodil’s blog for more information.

Also in January I joined forces with my friend Kate of H and FlossieDoodle to start the Gibraltar Crochet Collective. We did meet weekly to crochet and chat over coffee although our meetings have got less and less frequent due to other commitments lately. Our mascots Gib and Rocksy went for a bit of an adventure.

Another new project for me this month was my podcast, you can find my blogposts and the related podcasts here.

February 2017

In February I ran my Creative Gibraltar series looking at some of the very talented craftspeople who live in Gibraltar. I began with my lovely watercolour teacher Deborah M Lawson and ended with local craftswoman and up-cycling guru Sue Orfila. February also brought us the 2017 installment of Gib Talks. I was also fortunate to be able to speak to Gib Talks organiser Julian Felice before the event for one of my podcasts.

March 2017

March was a month for Lenten crochet (far easier than giving up chocolate) which helped support the Sixty Million Trebles effort, a beautiful Suffolk family wedding and a sad goodbye to our rescue bunny Snowflake.

April 2017

April began for us in Southwold in Suffolk, one of our favourite places and involved a lot of Med Steps training, which was very handy for burning off those seaside fish and chips! I was also able to finish another Sixty Million Trebles blanket – this one from the Gibraltar Crochet Collective.

May 2017

May meant Med Steps 5 Challenge again this year and I even managed to beat my time from last year! You can hear my podcast about it here. We also flew back to the UK for our second family wedding of the year.

June 2017

June started for us in Wigan in Lancashire, the location of our latest wedding and the perfect setting for a lovely walk. It was also the Calentita! food festival in Gibraltar. (For some reason the same aerial photo of Gibraltar appeared in May and June’s collages – not sure why that was. It is a good photo though don’t you think?).

July 2017

In July our big summer of travel began with a trip up to the North West of England and a flying visit to North Wales. We also drove to Portugal.

August 2017

This has got to be my most cosmopolitan of all months, featuring travel in Portugal, Rome, France and of course good old Gibraltar. Which reminds me, I have loads of holiday photos on my phone and camera SD card which are crying out to become blog posts – watch this space in the New Year.

September 2017

September is a big month on the Rock, this year more than most as Gibraltarians celebrated the 50th anniversary of the 1967 Referendum when they voted overwhelmingly to remain British. Gibraltar National Day on 10th September coincidentally happened to be the day of my 100th Sunday Sevens. We also had a fabulous music festival.

October 2017

October brought with it some interesting weather, beautiful sunshine, murky mists and exciting lightning storms.

November 2017

November was a good crochet month for me as I finally got around to making last year’s Little Box of Crochet autumn wreath. I also greatly enjoyed this year’s Gibraltar Literary Festival with talks by Nicholas Parsons, Patrick Gale and local photographers and naturalists Clive, Geraldine and Stewart Finlayson.

December 2017

December seems to have rushed by in a flurry of end of term carol concerts and panicked making of Christmas presents (some of which failed to get finished in time). There have been some opportunities for peace and quiet though, namely the last Saturday before Christmas when we avoided the shops and headed for the beach for peace and tranquility.

Summer craft challenge

For the second year running, during the long summer holiday we get in Gibraltar, I decided to set aside a little time each day to do something crafty and I documented this with my Summer Craft Challenge. Each day I featured a photo on Instagram and each week I wrote a blog post on my progress.

At the beginning of the challenge I made a little amigurumi unicorn which I got the kit for in an edition of Simply Crochet magazine. I christened her Europa and she became my Summer Craft Challenge mascot and came on our travels with us. There were several occasions when the Little Postcards thought Mummy had lost her marbles posing a crocheted unicorn in various European locations for photographs…

This year, I returned to work part-time after 13 years as a full-time, stay at home Mum. I have to admit that during the last few months I have found it hard to make time for Postcard from Gibraltar alongside my new commitments and at times I’ve wondered whether I can actually keep it up. I have had some really lovely comments and support from my online friends and that’s kept me going. Thank goodness I have Sunday Sevens and the weekly photo challenge to keep me ticking over during ‘dry’ spells.

I think I would really miss the community I have ‘met’ through Postcard from Gibraltar, and if I’m honest, it’s you and the support you’ve given me which gave me the confidence to apply for the job in the first place. Thank you very much to everyone who’s taken the time to read my posts over the past 2 and a half years, and for the virtual friendship you have given me too – it’s not taken for granted. Every comment and like is very much appreciated.

Here’s to 2018 and all the wonderful challenges it may bring!

Best wishes to you and yours for the New Year x