Just moments

Early this morning I brought my eldest to the ferry as he is leaving for a little trip to my homecountry. He will be travelling all day and arrive late tonight in Amsterdam airport where my very lovely aunt and uncle will pick him up.

 I can't believe he will be 21 in a few days!

He and his brother have turned out into 2 wonderful and handsome young men and I am really proud of them both.
Of course they would kill me if I would dare to put a picture of them on here.
So I just show you a disguised picture of my eldest as he went harpoonfishing yesterday

Of course Lucky was there to keep a watchful eye

Where is he going?

O, I'll spend my time with chewing up some old cloth I find laying around

Yeah, that feels good and now it's time for some.....

digging.....

You never know what might be under all that sand

.
I hope my eldest is going to have a great time. Lucky and I miss him already.

The kindness of strangers

So much kindness out there.


The title is not mine, I borrowed it for a good reason.
I just want to bring your attention to this blog.

From Sandra's shop "Azulado"

                                                                                                                      

What's cooking today?

No, don't worry, this is not turning into a cookery blog. There are so many beautiful blogs about cooking around with the most inspiring recipes and even more beautiful photos....I could never even come close.

But as I was cooking our dinner earlier on I thought I'll share it with you because today's dish is so typical mediterranean: Calamari (or squid).
Fried calamari or fried squid is a well known and very popular dish but you can make calamari in many different ways and one of them is my dish today: calamari in a red sauce with pasta.

In our taverna in the summertime very often guests order octopus when what they really want is fried calamari. There is a big difference between them two.

Have a look at the octopus

Photo borrowed from wikipedia

The ocopus can also be prepared in many different ways. In the taverna we usually serve it grilled or as a cold dish: boiled and laid in a vinaigrette. The locals have it is a appetizer (meze) with their ouzo or tsipouro.
Sometimes we cook the octopus in a winesauce or as a stifado, which means that is cooked with a lot of small onions. Very tasty indeed.

But back to today's dish.

Here is one of the calamari just before I cut it up:

It doesn't look like this when it comes out of the sea, it has a reddishbrown skin which I took of before I froze them. It is best to freeze fresh calamari first if you want it nice and soft after cooking and not chewy like rubber.

Sauteed with onion and garlic

Bayleaves, cinnamonstick, tomatojuice and oliveoil

And the pasta

The kitchen smells lovely and dinner will be served shortly.

Focus

fo·cus  

/ˈfōkəs/

Noun The center of interest or activity.

Verb (of a person or their eyes) Adapt to the prevailing level of light and become able to see clearly.

Synonyms noun.   center - centre verb.   concentrate I Think I have found my word for the year 2013. A couple of words have been going through my head for the last few weeks but this one sticks out and I think it will be most effective, because "Focus:.. .....I must

I get so carried away trying to do many things at the same time, not only with crafting but in life in general that everything becomes a blur and nothing gets clear or finished and therefore after "unfold" as last year's word....focus should be my motto for this year.

Having said that, I am sure my crafting will probably continue as haphazardly as always but that is the way I enjoy it most. 

This week I have joined Wieke van Keulen's Haakrol (crochetroll is that the right word?). A perfect opportunity to practice and learn the basic of various stitches.

I also started to knit black woolly socks for my mother in law who suffers from cold feet. I didn't take a picture of that because how interesting could black socks look like..

And worked on some seaglass pendants, trying to find a style of my own:

All seaglass pieces are found on "my" beach right in front of our house

An oddly shaped green piece

This is a piece of  pottery also found on "my " beach

A big piece, almost a heart shape

A very rare pink piece

Have a nice weekend!

Doors

This morning Lucky and I went on a long walk. We also stopped by my mother in law who as always was very happy to see us. We sat and chatted on her little patio. I persuaded her in having her picture taken. Although she is a very good natured and happy person and always smiling and laughing, she will never smile on photos. 

She didn't want to be photographed with her apron on but when I said it didn't matter, nobody will see the picture, she agreed. So I am glad she is not a blogger although I do feel a bit guilty about the little lie.

The view from her house was beautiful as always. On our way back I took pictures of all the different doors we passed.

The view from her patio

And here are some of them. All different in colour, material and size. Some heavily locked with a padlock and some wide open.

A local artist, Costis Hatzioannou has painted many doors. A few years ago I bought one of his paintings. It was difficult to choose between the doors and the boats but (having my fisher-man in mind) I decided for the boats.

Sunny sunday

After a day and half of cleaning and clearing it is time for a little break so this morning I spent a couple of hours on the sunny (and clean) terrace and got the seaglass and wires and tools out and made some pendants. 

These last few days a lot of beautiful seaglass pieces have washed up on the beach. Most of them are white, not so many coloured ones. How lucky I am to find my hobby materials right in front of my doorstep!

Wishing you a nice sunday!

2013, let's get started

A very happy, healthy, creative New Year to everyone!

I know, it is almost mid January but I feel like my year hasn't really begun yet. Yesterday I came back from the mainland where I spent some days with my some good friends. Before that I was in Thessaloniki for a couple of days with my sons and of course grabbed the opportunity and had a great time once again with (blog)friend Ariadne. You know....shopping, chatting, lunching, cinema or in one word: fun.

I have been struggling this  whole holiday season to find my word of the year for the year 2013. And I still haven't found it yet. Maybe that is why I feel the year hasn't started properly.

Right now I am in the middle of clearing, cleaning and trying to declutter. A good start for also clearing your mind. Very necessary because my mind is overflowing with ideas of things to do.

"My" beautiful island in January