I was late posting yesterday's and did it this morning so you might have two to read today!
Today I was having a very rare sort of day - a day home alone. John was shooting off down to Paphos early with a list of DIY and home type man-things that needed doing and you can just never tell how long this will take particularly when businesses are closed from 1.00pm until 3.00pm or worse 4.00pm - it makes scheduling your time so difficult especially when you have the drive from Drouseia which can be 30 minutes one day or an hour on another.
You can tell we have visitors coming as I was charged with cleaning the window ledges and tracks which is something that get done once in a blue moon - or maybe I should say once in a blood-red moon as there will be one on Monday! To be fair this isn't just because we have visitors it is because we are taking the opportunity of cooler weather to get some maintenance done and we have been planning to 'tank' inside the shutters and for John to tile to make it a neater job and hopefully stop any water getting through (there appears to be a hairline crack on one of the windows frames in our bedroom which seems to allow water in periodically).
The tanking paint is black and very sticky at the best of time - I started off well but as the morning wore on it got hotter and hotter and then the paint got stickier and stickier.
John said to try not to make too much mess and I tried but it wasn't easy and inevitably black paint got in places where it wasn't supposed to go and trying to remove it with white spirit just left a smear of what looked like severe nicotine!
I am not sure whether John will be happy with the job I have done but hopefully it will be covered up by the tiles and no-one will notice. I managed two windows before calling it a day. I got fed up of climbing up and down on and off the dressing table so that I could reach and I had to abandon the piece of blue insulation foam that Sean had given me as a kneeling pad because it turned out to be harder than a hard thing!
I got the guest bedroom ready for when my Aunty Joyce and Uncle David come and stay next weekend. They arrive on Monday and will be with Mum and Dad to begin with, then come to us for a few days and then back to Emba. It was a particularly lovely fresh day today and this is the view from the guest room window. Not a huge amount of colour in the garden but the bit of rain we have had recently have stopped it looking quite so tired.
This is the view from the side door in the guest room. It used to be our room and then we moved - for three reasons: (a) the water pump is noisy and situated in the cupboard in the other bedroom and we thought it unfair to inflict it on visitors (b) the side door leads out to a decked area which gets the sun in the morning and is a nice place for visitors to relax and to the outside shower if anyone is brave enough and (c) that bedroom can be bloody freezing in the winter!!!
Our visitors always tell us that it is a quiet and relaxing room to sleep in so we are glad that they come and enjoy themselves and feel refreshed afterwards.
I do my ironing in that room - the view out of the side-door is the view that I get when I iron and I can think of worse things to be looking at - I am on-top of the ironing at the moment which is a rare occurrence and will last until tomorrow when I will do more washing!
Both Charlie and Boris have been around the house all day today - they like it when we are at home and stay at home with us - Charlie often sleeps in front of the gas fire even though it is not on and it is 30 degrees outside - I guess it must be habit or just a place at which he feels really comfortable sleeping.
Boris had been snoozing on the bed whilst I had been doing the ironing
but woke and decided to go on a bit of an explore up the Singing Ringing Tree - his climbing skills are a bit rubbish or maybe the fact that the tree has been severely scalped means there are less paw-holds for him to get a grip on but he was determined and eventually got himself settled and started to investigate the decorations.
He was particularly taken by the lovely stained glass butterfly which my friend Hazel bought me when she was last over. We really hope that she might come over again and soon now that she has retired from her teaching job. Bet she is finding it very strange at the moment not to be involved in Back to School and all that that involves - teaching has been such a huge part of her life and she was a very good one. She managed to give a lot of very small children a really good start on their educational journey and she will be missed.
Charlie and Boris are great friends and partners in crime. Having finished the ironing I packed everything away and went across to the kitchen only to find Boris sitting on the pool ring with Charlie in hot pursuit - chasing dragonflies I would guess - thank goodness the cover was on the pool otherwise I could have seen Boris going for an unscheduled dip!
I had a little time for some craft before John came home and I took the opportunity to finish a project which I have been wanting to do for months. This was going to be done up on the roof terrace and this was the view today - what a fabulous working environment!!!! Sadly I could hear the drone of the water bearing helicopters which meant that there was a major fire somewhere - not visible from anywhere on the roof so a bit further away thank goodness (for us anyway). As it happens John could tell me it was somewhere near Armou and was indeed a biggie with smoke visible for miles.
So my project today was to refurbish the 'rustic' coffee table that John made from a shutter a couple of years ago. I like it but the weather has begun to take its toll.
I started by sanding down the top - not using John's precious Makita Sander - but using the hand sanders to take off any of the rough edges before giving the top a coat of white paint.
With it being sunny and a bit windy it didn't really take too long for the paint to dry. I wanted to be able to still see the grain of the wood through the paint so one thin coat was going to be enough.
I then dug out the decal wording that has been sitting in the craft cupboard for absolutely ages waiting for me to do something with it. I hadn't realised when I bought it that it was so big so it needed a project like this.
Transferring the words from the backing they come on to the transparent sheet and then onto the final surface takes the patience of a saint which is something I do not possess so part way though I was ready to lob the sticky stuff in the bin.
I persevered and eventually got the design I wanted. A quick coat of boat varnish will ensure that it lasts a little while as it is outside all the time and the boat varnish always seems to bring out the grain even more. I have to say I was pleased with the end result.
It being Friday John and I were having a steak and movie night - we always used to when we were in the UK as it would mark the end of the working week and the beginning of the weekend. Please look away if you are vegetarian - tonight we had some of the finest fillet steak Cyprus has to offer!!
I had chose a film which had been rated 'probably the best film of 2014' - not a romantic one that is for sure but thought provoking!
Today I was having a very rare sort of day - a day home alone. John was shooting off down to Paphos early with a list of DIY and home type man-things that needed doing and you can just never tell how long this will take particularly when businesses are closed from 1.00pm until 3.00pm or worse 4.00pm - it makes scheduling your time so difficult especially when you have the drive from Drouseia which can be 30 minutes one day or an hour on another.
You can tell we have visitors coming as I was charged with cleaning the window ledges and tracks which is something that get done once in a blue moon - or maybe I should say once in a blood-red moon as there will be one on Monday! To be fair this isn't just because we have visitors it is because we are taking the opportunity of cooler weather to get some maintenance done and we have been planning to 'tank' inside the shutters and for John to tile to make it a neater job and hopefully stop any water getting through (there appears to be a hairline crack on one of the windows frames in our bedroom which seems to allow water in periodically).
John said to try not to make too much mess and I tried but it wasn't easy and inevitably black paint got in places where it wasn't supposed to go and trying to remove it with white spirit just left a smear of what looked like severe nicotine!
I am not sure whether John will be happy with the job I have done but hopefully it will be covered up by the tiles and no-one will notice. I managed two windows before calling it a day. I got fed up of climbing up and down on and off the dressing table so that I could reach and I had to abandon the piece of blue insulation foam that Sean had given me as a kneeling pad because it turned out to be harder than a hard thing!
I got the guest bedroom ready for when my Aunty Joyce and Uncle David come and stay next weekend. They arrive on Monday and will be with Mum and Dad to begin with, then come to us for a few days and then back to Emba. It was a particularly lovely fresh day today and this is the view from the guest room window. Not a huge amount of colour in the garden but the bit of rain we have had recently have stopped it looking quite so tired.
Our visitors always tell us that it is a quiet and relaxing room to sleep in so we are glad that they come and enjoy themselves and feel refreshed afterwards.
I do my ironing in that room - the view out of the side-door is the view that I get when I iron and I can think of worse things to be looking at - I am on-top of the ironing at the moment which is a rare occurrence and will last until tomorrow when I will do more washing!
Both Charlie and Boris have been around the house all day today - they like it when we are at home and stay at home with us - Charlie often sleeps in front of the gas fire even though it is not on and it is 30 degrees outside - I guess it must be habit or just a place at which he feels really comfortable sleeping.
Boris had been snoozing on the bed whilst I had been doing the ironingbut woke and decided to go on a bit of an explore up the Singing Ringing Tree - his climbing skills are a bit rubbish or maybe the fact that the tree has been severely scalped means there are less paw-holds for him to get a grip on but he was determined and eventually got himself settled and started to investigate the decorations.
He was particularly taken by the lovely stained glass butterfly which my friend Hazel bought me when she was last over. We really hope that she might come over again and soon now that she has retired from her teaching job. Bet she is finding it very strange at the moment not to be involved in Back to School and all that that involves - teaching has been such a huge part of her life and she was a very good one. She managed to give a lot of very small children a really good start on their educational journey and she will be missed.
Charlie and Boris are great friends and partners in crime. Having finished the ironing I packed everything away and went across to the kitchen only to find Boris sitting on the pool ring with Charlie in hot pursuit - chasing dragonflies I would guess - thank goodness the cover was on the pool otherwise I could have seen Boris going for an unscheduled dip!
I had a little time for some craft before John came home and I took the opportunity to finish a project which I have been wanting to do for months. This was going to be done up on the roof terrace and this was the view today - what a fabulous working environment!!!! Sadly I could hear the drone of the water bearing helicopters which meant that there was a major fire somewhere - not visible from anywhere on the roof so a bit further away thank goodness (for us anyway). As it happens John could tell me it was somewhere near Armou and was indeed a biggie with smoke visible for miles.
I started by sanding down the top - not using John's precious Makita Sander - but using the hand sanders to take off any of the rough edges before giving the top a coat of white paint.With it being sunny and a bit windy it didn't really take too long for the paint to dry. I wanted to be able to still see the grain of the wood through the paint so one thin coat was going to be enough.
I then dug out the decal wording that has been sitting in the craft cupboard for absolutely ages waiting for me to do something with it. I hadn't realised when I bought it that it was so big so it needed a project like this.
Transferring the words from the backing they come on to the transparent sheet and then onto the final surface takes the patience of a saint which is something I do not possess so part way though I was ready to lob the sticky stuff in the bin.I persevered and eventually got the design I wanted. A quick coat of boat varnish will ensure that it lasts a little while as it is outside all the time and the boat varnish always seems to bring out the grain even more. I have to say I was pleased with the end result.
It being Friday John and I were having a steak and movie night - we always used to when we were in the UK as it would mark the end of the working week and the beginning of the weekend. Please look away if you are vegetarian - tonight we had some of the finest fillet steak Cyprus has to offer!!
I had chose a film which had been rated 'probably the best film of 2014' - not a romantic one that is for sure but thought provoking!
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