A Matter of Choice

It's my favourite time of year here in Cyprus,  (well, it's one of them!)  the weather is warming up nicely, nearly everything is open again and summer is very nearly here.  Time seems to speed up as we hit this point every year, once Easter has been and gone, there is more going on, more places to go,  the beach becomes more fun (I'm never really a fan of wearing coats and welly boots to take the boys to play) and we start to spend most of the time outside. So far I've only paddled in the sea but the boys have both been in.  I have braved the pool though, only once so far - it was really cold and the boys were laughing the heads of at me as I screamed and shouted my way through my first few lengths.   It got better though and I happily stayed in for almost half an hour.  It's great now that Louka doesn't need me to be in right next to him as long as he has his armbands on he is ok with me sat on the sunbed watching.  Plans are ...

I used to love joining in with Mich's Reasons to be Cheerful but it's been such a long time that I have - joined in that is, I've been cheerful of course!   When I noticed the other week that it was going back to her blog this week I realised there was no way I couldn't join in... Tomorrow sees the arrival of my oldest friend,  my playgroup buddy from the age of 3, school friend, college, (no not college that didn't really last very long!) and general drinking / partying / getting into trouble friend! Almost two years ago she turned up on my doorstep in Cyprus for a surprise visit and it was just brilliant to catch up after all the years and show her my new home - especially as it was her first trip abroad and not only her first solo flight, but her first time on a plane at all! This year the trip was planned, and like a kid at Christmas I've been counting down since the flights were booked! I've been searching for some old photos of us, but all I ...

Last Sunday was an unusual day, I said  'see you later' to my friend Michelle  and then went straight to the airport to meet my friend Larisa which was great timing as it cheered me up! I saw Larisa once last August when I was in the UK but Aaron hadn't seen her since we left almost 2 years ago and Leo wouldn't have remembered her.  Leo loves to look at photos so in the week leading up to her arrival I showed him lots of photos so he knew who was coming. I think she was quite surprised he took to her straight away like he'd seen her every day of his life, even before she showered him with presents! Regular readers (and fellow ex-pats) will know that one of my least favourite things about living in Cyprus is the lack of reasonably priced clothes (and toys, books, stickers among many other things) so Larisa had been gathering goodies for us for a while. I'd also been on ebay winning random items to be sent to her, I'm surprised she had any room left for he...

I'm still smiling, well I say smiling, it's more like grimacing through the pain!  On Tuesday I picked up Leo off the sofa and pulled a muscle in my back and it got steadily worse throughout the day, Wednesday morning it took me 20 minutes to get out of bed :( I'm still cheerful though as in particularly good timing I've met the lovely Claire from MG Fitness  and they don't just do fitness, Claire is also a qualified sports massage therapist so has been helping me out and at least I can now get in and out of bed! Tomorrow I'm due to meet up with a couple of my friends at the local soft play place, I'm only kinda cheerful about this one of the girls leaves Cyprus next week to move back to the UK and we're really going to miss her. I am looking forward to the meet up though as Aaron is also coming (to save me having to climb round the play area with a bad back!) and he's only been to soft play once with him before, so will be great for him to see h...

I love it when we have people come out to see us, not only is it great to see them but it means that we get out and about and do 'touristy things'. Last week we had a visit from a good friend,Leo's Godfather in fact and like AJ he is a bit of a photography fan so we tried to take him to some photogenic places. One of these is the Chapel of Prophet Eilas,  named after the  Prophet Elijah  and is built on a granite hill with almost vertical sides, right in the heart of the tourist area of Protaras. There are 153 stone built steps up to the church (no, I didn't count them, I just read that in a book!) so although I have wanted to go for a while now, (it's even on my 101 list ) we have put it off as it's not a buggy friendly activity! However now he's walking well we thought we'd give it a shot...... Lots of steps for little legs! Walked all the way up with Daddy.  I'm glad AJ was there, Leo walked up very well but had to be carried down most...

This weeks Gallery was very tricky, yes I do realise I often say that but the problem this week was slightly different. You see the prompt was "Show me the funny" as usual I have a whole host of photos I could use, and a hundred funny stories to go with them.  When you have been to the amount of adult only Butlins weekends as we have and held as many parties with our mad bunch of friends it's inevitable really. My favourite is a friend of our dancing in his boxer shorts at a fancy dress party we had, holding a bottle of champagne in one hand. I also have a whole series of photos taken over a couple of years of a friend posing with cleaning cones - it turned into a tradition every time we went away! I could go on and on. The reason I haven't used them is the fact that although I may be in a different country now but I think those involved may jump on a plane and come and slap me round the head. Instead I give you.... These were taken back in March wh...

I find it hard to believe we haven't yet been living here for 3 months! I assume it is a good sign that it feels like we have been here forever? So much has happened in such a short time that our first few weeks here appear to be such a long time ago. We had our first visitors this week, (Aaron'sMum and his two of his nephews) and it was great to show them around, it also makes you see the place in a slightly different light. The weather has also changed in the last week or so - there is a definite feel of spring (summer to us!) in the air. In the last week we have been to the beach three times! It's not yet sunbathing weather - not that it would be easy to sunbathe with a mad 9 month old baby, but it's so lovely to be out and about in the sunshine. I have a car now which is making a world of difference to me as I was getting cabin fever being stuck indoors while Aaron was at work. I love my car - it's a Mitsubishi Mirage - I had never heard of that model before...