A Postcard A Day - Friday 3 July 2020 - Friday Smiles

Hello lovely girls,

Here we are again on Friday to show each other what made us smile this week. 

First of all my postcard:

That is the pretty envelope I received yesterday. The stamps on it are gorgeous! 

This is the postcard that was inside. It's a painting by Degas (Woman combing her hair) from the Louvre Museum in Paris.

 It was sent to me by Sylvie from Florida. And she sends me this 'Cheer up' sticker. Isn't that lovely?

And here is the little Renoir sticker

 There is a story attached to this piece of mail. Sylvie had sent this on the 6th of May and then was a little upset when her letter came back to her:

But she just stuck the whole thing in another envelope (the brown one at the top) and tried again, after communicating with me to make sure I was still living at this address. I explained to her that postal services had been suspended during lockdown in many countries, and that there were very few planes flying. I am so glad she persisted as I am over the moon with her card and the decorated envelopes. It made my day. Or should I say, it made my week, or even my month!!

I am really enjoying my walks with my friend twice a week. We walk for one hour and then sit down for ten minutes and turn round and go back. Sometimes by a different route like last Friday.

 Since the photo was taken I have done some more second fermentation with different fruits to see which one we like best (that is providing the kombucha turns out well)

 The 'hiperico' we collected on Friday is called St John's Wort in English:

You put it in a jar and cover it with olive oil. Leave it in the sun for a week and it will turn red. Below you can see that mine has already turned red.

The filtered oil will be very good for burns and grazes. It was used in WWI when of course they didn't have any antibiotica, but this works very well instead.

 My friend Dian came to visit me. She had some of the above mentioned cake and she was very enthusiastic about it.

It is called a yoghurt cake. It was so easy and quick  to make. If you have a little yoghurt pot in the fridge, this is what you can do with it! I used plain yoghurt and a few drops of coconut flavoring I have in the fridge. Here is the recipe, for those who are interested:

And then it was July.......

Hubby was on his scooter behind a car, who suddenly drove backwards and bashed into  his scooter. Both parties were insured and nobody was hurt, so it is no problem. We took the scooter to the repair shop, where the insurance assessor came to look at it. Then on Thursday we collected it again and are now waiting for the repair shop to tell us when we can bring it in.

That is it from me today. Now it's off to Annie at A Stitch In Time for the Link party. As usual I have some funnies for you at the end. This time I have some curious things about the English language, which are very funny to me, not being a native speaker. (And I couldn't help slipping in another nursing/medical joke).

Have a great weekend, and those of you in the US have a great 4th July celebration.
Take care,
Hugs,
Lisca

A Postcard A Day - Tuesday 29 June 2020 - T for tiles, beer and garlic

Hello lovely ladies,

It's Tuesday again and time for the T-Party. Elizabeth and Bluebeard kindly host this link-up party with a beverage. 

But before I show you my beverage, I would like to show you a postcard. It is not one that I have received, but one that i sent. I bought it last summer when I was in Portugal. It represents the different tiles (floor tiles or wall tiles) in Portugal. But we have them here in Andalucia too. They are a legacy from the Moors, whose Islamic art is still very much visible everywhere.

I sent the card to Russia, and I got a lovely message back from this young couple, telling me how much they loved the card and that the tiles reminded them of a boardgame they had recently bought. It is called Azul, and of course I had to look it up immediately on the Internet:

Just to show you that these motifs are used everywhere here, I'm showing you a bottle top from a beer bottle of the brand Alhambra.

It is our local beer as we live in the Granada province. The can also has the above motif.

I think I have mentioned before that I have started to make kombucha. (Fermented tea). It takes about a week for the first fermentation, and now I have put the kombucha in bottles with different fruits to flavor them and now I have to wait another week until this second fermentation is complete. Then we can taste it!

 I'll let you know how we get on.

Hubby has harvested his first garlics. We now have about thirty. So I got them all lined up on the table and I put them all on a string.  

Then we hung them up in our little shed.

 The broad bean season is over, but hubby has left several plants, so we can harvest the seeds. That is another little job I did this week: Taking all the seed beans (and peas) out of their pods.

Since last week, my friend A and I go for a walk twice a week. We walk from 9 until 11 or 11:30.  Friday we found quite a lot of 'hiperico' which is hypericum, which in English is St John's Wort. It is used as an anti depressant, but I have put them in olive oil. I'll leave them in the sun for a week and the oil will turn red. Then I filter the oil and use it for burns and scuffs etc.

 Here are a few photos from yesterday's walk. 
I don't know what this yellow beauty is. Erika do you know what it is? Sorry I forgot to photograph the leaves.

This (below) is the flower from a granada tree.  (pomegranates in English).

 We walked mostly along a dry riverbed.

 (Untended) olive trees

That is it from me this Monday night. I will post this at midnight and wish you all a very happy T-Day.
Take care,
Lisca

A Postcard A Day - Friday 26 June 2020 - Friday Smiles

Hello lovely girls! How are you today? 

Here in Spain the State of Emergency has lifted and that means a real relaxation of the restrictions, what exactly I haven't established yet as we don't venture far from home and only go shopping once a week.

I haven't received any cards this week, so I am showing you a card I have sent. I had a whole collection of Salvador Dalí art cards. And when people indicate that they like that sort of thing, I send them one out of my collection. 
This painting is called Gala Placidia, Galatea of the Spheres, 1952.

Gala was Dalí's wife and muse. Read about their relationship and Dalí's life in this interesting article.
There is a surrealist museum in Figueres, Spain:

You can visit the museum virtually via this link: https://www.salvador-dali.org/en/museums/dali-theatre-museum-in-figueres/visita-virtual/

Now, what have I been up to? Here are my collages for the week:

 As you can see I have started my kombucha again. The glass jar in the photo was later filled with (cooled) boiled water.

 The gym on the football pitch was fun. It was an evening of sports organised by the local council. Our little group was one of many. We had our little corner of astroturf (Grass doesn't grow in these parts, so they have fake grass) and our teacher had us do an hour of non-stop aerobics. After three months of near non-activity, I was absolutely shattered!

 Sunday was Father's Day ion Europe and my hubby enjoyed Zoom calls with different off spring and their families. 

On Monday morning I went for a long walk with my friend Antonia. It was quite blustery so I had to put the straps on my hat. It is a Tilly hat. Anyone remember those? We were told one Tilly hat was eaten by an elephant and after a while it came out 'the other end' , was put through the washing machine and consequently worn for many years by its owner. I have had mine for at least 20 years, but it has never been eaten by an elephant. It still is my favorite hat. (We have one each). As this is Friday Smiles, I'll let you read the owner's manual:
https://www.villagehatshop.com/content/TilleyHatManual.pdf

On Tuesday our friends came to visit and they helped me with my still life photo for the photo club. The theme was 'journalism' and my friend had brought an antique type writer and an old camera. I have the newspaper of  the 9/11 attack in New York in 2001. (It's the Scotsman as I happened to be in the Scottish highlands on a geological field trip, out in a field centre without radio or television. Very scary as we didn't know what was going on!)

I have no fancy lighting, so I had friends holding torches and mobiles on the correct bits. Great fun. The little photo in the middle is the result. I will enter it tonight. Fingers crossed I have the dimensions right this time.

As you can see our chili peppers have not grown at all. I don't seem to be able to get them passed the seedling stage.

And now it is time to join Annie at A Stitch In Time and Virginia at Rocking Your Week Friday.

Of course I will put some funnies at the end. 
Here's wishing you a good weekend, 
keep smiling,
Hugs,
Lisca