The kitchen gets painted - AT LAST!!!

 
Eventually I have persuaded John that we really must give the kitchen a lick of paint and as Michelle is coming in a couple of weeks I really wanted to get it done before she arrives.  We had been to SuperHome to get the paint the other week and we had nothing planned today so we were up and at 'em.  My first job was to clear away the work surfaces and anything else that might be in the way and John started taking down anything that was in the way and covering over anything that couldn't be taken down.

There is actually very little wall to be painted but the ceiling is also being done.   What was time consuming was taping everything off and preparing for cutting in which is generally my job - I quite like cutting in because that is the point of no return!  To be fair the kitchen walls weren't too bad but the ceiling was supposed to be white and had now taken on a grey hue - thanks to the woodburner.  It does make you think about was is happening to your lungs when you see the smut which the fire leaves behind.

All the tiles got a degreasing.  I hope that you can still get the Astonish de-greaser spray somewhere down in Paphos because it is excellent.  The light fittings got a clean and the kitchen doors will be done after the painting.

We had decided that our cut-off today was 4.00pm.  By this time the walls were done and about half of the ceiling.  You can see from the photograph above the difference in colour between what was there and the new magnolia!  We have visitors tomorrow so Wednesday will see us complete the painting.  I have the door frame around the toilet and the back door to do.  John declared that it had been a successful day as we had managed to refrain from killing one another and were still speaking!

I am a bit excited about one of the cacti that I have in the house.  It is a newbie which is planted in a glass.  It looks like it is about to flower.  I have got a bit of a thing about cacti and succulents - they are so diverse and fascinating - I don't know how long it will take for the ring of flowers to be out in full but when they are I will update the blog with a photograph.

After we got the kitchen back to some sort of normality I got our supper ready as we were knackered.  John was ecstatic that we were having the leftover beef and orange curry from the other night.  To go with it I had made some roti (flatbreads) which were super easy and brilliant for moping up the sauce.

I think being in the fridge had brought out the flavours even more than before and it was super spicy but really tasty.  There was a small amount of the sauce left so John suggested I freeze it and use it as a base for another curry which was a great idea.

After what had been a pretty good day we had some sad news about Mum's friend Eileen who is very poorly in hospital.  Mum and Dad met Eileen and Eric when they were going to retire to Cyprus.  Sadly Eric never made it as he passed away just prior to the move.  Eileen did go sometime later and lived next door but one to Mum and Dad and she and Mum were friends for years before Eileen returned to the UK to be nearer family as she got older.  She is six month's older than Mum.  I had to ring Mum to tell her that Eileen was very poorly which accounted for the fact that Mum had not been able to get in touch with her recently.  Our thoughts are with Eileen's family particularly Hilary and Keith who are good friends of ours and with whom we have spent many great times.