Monday, October 25, 2010

The Island/To Nisi.

I don't watch much television as there are not many programmes on Greek TV that interest me, but occasionally we get some excellent serials and then I don't miss an episode if I can help it. MegaTV has just started showing a film version of Victoria Hislop's novel, 'The Island' or 'To Nisi' in Greek on Mondays at 9.45 p.m. If you click on the following link to a newspaper article, you can find out more about it.

http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/_w_articles_civ_0_27/01/2010_114376

I really love the soundtrack to the film. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2fSbCxEkpw -   'The Island' soundtrack

Here is a link to the original version of the song in the soundtrack, which was first recorded by Sotiria Bellou.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdiDTcnRSYQ&feature=player_embedded

Sunday, October 24, 2010

Sunday picnic on the beach.

The weather was beautiful again today so we were able to enjoy our picnic on the beach after all.


A table for two with a view of the sea and mountains.






A view of the mountains and town of Xanthi from Fanari.
                                  

Saturday, October 23, 2010

A beautiful Autumn day.

Today the weather has been beautiful - a bright, sunny autumn day, which I really didn't want to spend at home in the town, so we drove down to the coast to Avdira.






On the horizon you can just about see the island of Samothraki.



                                                                  

A view of the island of Thassos.

  I'm hoping that tomorrow will be fine enough to go somewhere for our Sunday picnic, because heavy rain has been forecast for most of next week.
     

Friday, October 22, 2010

Knitting.

Apart from sewing, I also enjoy knitting - both hand and machine knitting, although I can't say that I've mastered my knitting machine as much as I would like to, but now that I have more time on my hands, I hope to be learn new techniques and not restrict my machine knitting projects to drop-shoulder sweaters. My knitting machine is a Brother 930 with Ribber and here's a photo of it:

                               
Most of my sweaters were made long before we bought a digital camera, so I don't have any photos of them when they were new apart from this one:




I have to admit that I'm still rather 'afraid' of my knitting machine so for relaxing when I'm watching TV or listening to music, I prefer hand knitting. Up to now  I've just been knitting in stocking stitch using multi-coloured or batik yarns just to relax.
                  
This is a sweater I made two years ago.

At the moment I'm knitting a cardigan with a beautiful yarn called Alize Lanagold Batik Design which I bought at the yarn market Kurkcu Han in Istanbul. I'm following a pattern from The Knitter's Handy Book of Sweater Patterns' by Ann Budd.


Alize Lana Gold Batik.





                                     



                      

Thursday, October 21, 2010

Sorting out my clutter.

I haven't written anything in my blog all week as I've been busy sorting out cupboards and getting rid of all the clutter I don't need. It's a long time since I did a good sorting out but now I'll be able to find all things I need for my sewing, knitting and other hobbies. I found lots of articles on WikiHow to help me get organised and here's a link to them:



Clutter Busting - how to articles from wikiHow

Sunday, October 17, 2010

Sewing.

Last spring I started sewing again on my old Singer sewing machine, which I've had for about 30 years, and really enjoy it so I'll be writing about and posting pictures of my projects. I also hope I'll get lots of advice from more experienced dressmakers than I.

Here are three projects I made last spring. I made two summer blouses from Simplicity 2936 





Here are two photos of the blouses I made:
                                                                                                                                                            


I also made a skirt from Simplicity Pattern 2516.

Here is mine:





More about sewing in future posts.



No picnic this weekend.

As you may have guessed from my blog title, I really love going for picnics in the mountains and by the sea whenever the weather is suitable, which fortunately it often is. All the week had been rainy and cloudy, so we didn't make our usual plans for a picnic. It turned out to be quite a warm, sunny day, so instead we went to one of our favourite tavernas in the mountains near the town of Komotini. Here are a few photos:





Two photos of the restaurant before most people arrived.




Here are a few photos of the food we ordered ( and ate!)



                                  
The dessert was 'revani' ( Semolina cake ) with ice cream and was for both of us. The only problem was ( apart from the many calories) is that they brought us forks to eat it with. Eating ice cream with a fork, especially when it starts to melt, is not exactly easy.

Trying to design a page, chosing font colours and suitable background colours is turning out to be more time consuming than I thought it would be, but I suppose many people have the same problem when they start their blogs, so I won't let it discourage me.

Saturday, October 16, 2010

Starting my blog at last.

I've been trying to start my blog for months but it's writing my first post that has held me back because I can't think of anything original to say in my introduction! Anyway it's time to dive in and just start. Once I've worked out how to organise my pages, post photos etc, I'm sure that I will enjoy writing it. I don't intend to limit myself to one particular subject - I'll be writing a bit about my daily life, my travels and hobbies and interests, but also any other topics that I feel are worth including. It's a new adventure and I'll just have to see where it leads me.