Preparing for our course...

This morning Di, Kelly and I were summoned to the Community Office to meet the Lady from the Cypriot Handicrafts Organisation who had come to show us what we needed to do to prepare for our weaving class which is the week after next.  There are going to be three working looms and one ancient one in the bottom of the Community Office - this room has the most horrendous acoustics so we are anticipating ending each day with a massive headache!!!

Two ladies were grappling which what looked like a world record cat's cradle - fortunately we don't have to get involved in that side of things.  This would be John's idea of a complete nightmare - he cannot bare anything which remotely resembles a snake's wedding!!!

Apparently our instructor is a lady called Stella who has limited English so that is why we wanted to be there the same time as Kelly - we love her company anyway and she is always a hoot at these craft sessions but her knowledge of both English and Greek is invaluable - I say English in the loosest possible sense as hers has been honed by an extended stint in the States You Shmucks!!

We left clutching our 'homework' - a massive bag of fabric in rainbow colours.  These have to be cut into strips in readiness and we were shown how to do it - if we forgot apparently we can google the technique by searching for "cutting stips for rag rugs".  You can buy the sort of rug we are making in Jumbos for a couple of euros which makes you realise that some poor poor person somewhere is making these for a complete pittance.

John went off down to pickleball and Di and I followed on as we were slightly delayed by our craft session although only by a couple of minutes.

Pickleball this week was great fun - everyone was on top form and we had some massively long and massively competitive rallies.  Pickleball purists play a 'close to the net' volley game and are often irritated by those of us who like to play the long ball - I have to because my eyesight doesn't accommodate close up play and I would rather have a good run around and exercise than a game of volleys and drop shots.

It gets dark so much earlier nowadays and we had taken Lakis car for a run now that John has got it a new battery.  We realised that there is something awry with the lights on Lakis car as their function doesn't seem to correspond to the stalk position and only one side of the car seems to be working at any one time so we couldn't afford to leave Mum's too late and end up driving in the boondocks in the dark.

It rained quite hard in Emba whilst we were playing pickleball and the unsettled weather was passing through with sunshine trailing behind it so we were treated to some spectacular skies on our way home.  We learned on the way home that Argy had had an accident and it would appear she may have broken her wrist which will be a nightmare for her and what a shame as she only celebrated her birthday on Tuesday.

This evening was the Steel City Derby being played at Bramall Lane and so we were making a bit of an evening of it with a very very very nice piece of fillet steak which we got from Paps a couple of days' ago.  We both agreed it was quite possibly the best bit of steak we have ever eaten and to accompany it I made my own onion rings which, once I had tweaked the batter mix, were absolutely lovely but probably very full of calories.  I would certainly make them again.  Anyway tea was scrummy and turned out to be the best bit of the evening as the Mighty Blades only managed a 0-0 draw having missed a penalty.

It was definitely a snuggle up evening - that is the normal thing for a Friday and so for the first time this year we drew the curtains in the conservatory - not that it was cold in there but we thought it felt and looked nicer.  We have some new voiles but haven't put them up as yet.  The current ones have done a good job but have been somewhat wrecked by the cats.

I left John to watch the football - I knew that this crunch match would bring about more shouting, moaning and general disgruntlement than normal.

I snuggled up in bed with Boo at my feet trying to get my head around all the things I need to get sorted so that we have a stress free Christmas - I need to get the few Christmas Cards I write sorted and I need to make my donation to charity in lieu of cards which I no longer send and with Mum here I would like to get some sort of menu sorted so that I know what we are going to be eating and when.

I fell asleep but stirred when John came to bed and grunted something in agreement to his statement that the Blades were 'bloody useless' and that 'Billy should have taken the penalty."