Hello there, I hope you have had a good week. Mine didn’t exactly go to plan, it started well, but ended with me under the weather with bronchitis :-(. Needless to say there are no glorious photos of the Med Steps this week, as much of it has been spent flat on my back in bed! Never mind, these things are sent to try us and I’m slowly getting better. Onwards and upwards….

Stormy Sunday

Last Sunday we saw the beginning of a period of stormy weather. We decided to head to the cinema in the afternoon as it certainly wasn’t a day for the park. By the time we had emerged tree branches were strewn across the road, at one point an entire tree was sitting chopped up  on the pavement after coming down in the gale force winds and closing a road for a time. We had managed to miss all the drama, oblivious in the cinema!

On Sunday night the winds came back with a vengeance. We were remarkably sheltered where we are positioned as the wind was coming from the east and we were protected by the Rock. In the North District, at Europa Point and in town, however, it was a totally different matter. A roof was rippped off an industrial building close to the foot of the Med Steps, a wall of scaffolding several stories high was blown down from a tower block which is under construction in Ocean Village and many trees and buildings sustained damage. It was quite a storm. Amazingly just one person was injured, and that wasn’t seriously. Just a few hours later and the roads and pavements would have been busy with school children and people heading to work, it could’ve been so much worse.

Cosy crochet

As it was too dangerous to attempt our usual Monday morning trip up the Med Steps I was able to complete the latest section of Eleonora from Coastal Crochet’s Crochet-Along. I’m really enjoying this project as it’s being drip fed to us twice weekly in small manageable chunks. On previous attempts at such things I have fallen by the way-side a few weeks in, unable to sustain the momentum to complete the 20 or so rows each week. You can find the details for this project in my last Sunday Sevens if you fancy joining in yourself.

Stormy skies

On Tuesday morning I wasn’t able to park in my usual car park of choice as it was already full at 8 minutes past 9! Presumably people had left their cars overnight as the traffic problems caused by Monday’s storms were rather bad. The commercial entry to Gibraltar from Spain was closed in order to try and ease some of the traffic problems. Several roads were closed because of the scaffolding collapse and that caused chaos.

I digress, anyway I ended up parking on the road surrounding the small boats marina as I couldn’t find anywhere else to park. I did so with a touch of trepidation as the day before had seen high seas and big waves crashing into buildings close to the sea. Would my car still be there when I returned at lunchtime from my sewing class?? Yes, thank goodness it was, it looked like it had had a bit of a drenching from a wave or two but it was otherwise intact.

It’s finished!!

Just one year late, I finished my wedding skirt at Dressmaking class. The hem is done (believe me there’s a lot of hem on the skirt and the lining – I was taking forever!). I’m really pleased with the finished article. It’s too late for last spring’s two family weddings, so it’s on standby for the next big occasion.

Super blue blood moon

Heavy cloud and rain overnight meant we didn’t get to see the super blue blood moon on Wednesday night. We did, however, see it over the Bay on Thursday morning. It didn’t have the orangey red tinge of the dramatic photos from elsewhere in the world but it did look a lot closer and very bright.

Plenty of time to read

So I mentioned before that I ended up in bed with bronchitis. I had been coughing since Saturday but by Tuesday afternoon (after dressmaking) I was feeling decidedly rough and it got worse from there. I spent an awful lot of time on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday asleep when I possibly could. And when not sleeping, I read. I’m not a huge reader these days as I often spend what free time I have doing crafty stuff, but I couldn’t really be bothered with that at all.

This week I managed to start and complete Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood which was really gripping and I’d recommend it. I will now seek out the Netflix series of the same name to see how it compares to the book. I also began a book which has been sitting on my Kindle waiting to be read for a while; Shadow of the Rock (Spike Sanguinetti) by Thomas Mogford. The story follows an investigation carried out by a Gibraltarian Lawyer (Spike Sanguinetti) and it’s quite refreshing to read about a place I now know so well, as the first part is set in Gibraltar itself.

Blue skies return!

I began the week with a photo of the Bay of Gibraltar and I will end the week with one too. This was taken late yesterday afternoon as the sun was setting on a beautiful warm day. I spent a bit of time sitting out on the balcony reading as I didn’t have the energy for much more than that, but it was lovely to feel the warmth of the sun after a week of pretty miserable and cold weather.

I hope the next seven days are good for you, and I hope to have a few more inspiring photos for you next week too. Hopefully I will have a mid-week post for you as well, I ran out of steam on that this week…. Thanks for stopping by!

I’m linking with Natalie at Thread & Bobbins for this weekly blog series.