Lorna's life in Spain

A new challenge in my life .....ZUMBA!

2011-12-30T03:29:00.007-08:00

Well when you are writing a blog, unless you get feedback of course you never actually know if anyone reads it, although thankfully my stats say you do, so thank YOU very much. I must admit it can be incredibly therapeutic although I'm not sure how interesting a read it is. Anyway of course whoever is reading this now may or may not know, I used to be a dance teacher in my past life .... BS (before Spain) A bit of a health problem meant I could not give my pupils the energy they deserved from me, so now, four years later, I was in need of a bit of a "fix" for want of a better word.

Our life in the summer here enables us to earn a bit of money to tide us over, although without a lot of luxuries. We often say how if we were still living in Brighton, I am sure we would have had the latest in phones, possibly an ipad, whereas our poor old pay as you go is now held together with duck tape, and our very basic laptop thankfully keeps us in contact with family and friends! However apart from, of course, missing the family, I would not change it for the world. Anyway, I am digressing as usual, but we could do with a bit of an all year round income if I'm honest, plus I was needing a bit of dance, exercise, plus choreography challenge in my life, and I was considering teaching some style of dance or fitness style in our local town. I have to admit when I saw the zumba media hype I felt it was just what I needed, especially having a background it Latin American as a style taught I was champing at the bit, desperately wondering if I could make it work, in our sleepy little traditional town.

We decided I should give it a go, and I managed to book into an instructors course whilst I was in England for Kaci's birthday. I was so concerned that I would be twice the age of the majority of others on the course I decided to try and get as fit as I possibly could leading up to it. This did mean buying a wii zumba game, and shutting myself away in the casita when it was not rented out and jigging about in temperatures of sometime over 40 degrees. I told myself if I could do that I would keep up with the "youngsters" fairly well! I don't mind admitting having done very little apart from the odd wii fit sessions and walking the dogs I was extremely unfit. My first attempt of a 20 minute session did not even last the full 20 minutes.... oh the shame! I stuck a it though and now can do an hour every day, if I wish to.

Mark very kindly gave me a lift to Billingshurst at some ungodly hour in the morning of the course, and I immediately met up with a shy little "girl" and we went in together. I sat waiting for the other "zumberies" to arrive and was so surprised to count approximately 50 of us! The instructor was Naomi, and she was such a star. Straight away putting us at our ease and yet within seconds on beginning to warm up I realised I had a huge smile on my face, due to her infectious attitude and the great music. The course lasted the day and I staggered out with a huge smile on my face and my hair very unflatteringly stuck to my face.... haha, I loved it. I had done the course, it was now up to me to try and make a go of it in my sleepy Montoro.

With the help of my good friend David who helped with my website translations etc I ran 2 free classes in December. This classes were great with 20 - 25 in each class. Since them I have to admit I am struggling rather. I don't think the Spanish put Christmas onto a credit card, and very sensible too, from what I have been told, no one does anything in January, apart from stay and home, keep warm, and save money, and hopefully it will pick up again in February.

Fingers crossed they will be flocking in soon!

My very first class!

Kaci is 2 !!!

2011-12-30T03:29:00.001-08:00

Back to sunny Brighton for my gorgeous granddaughter Kaci's second birthday. Well ok it was November and certainly not sunny, but sunny in my heart, if you know what I mean! Frankie had planned a little party for Kaci in a local hall, with a great little soft play area, so the day of her birthday was kept for a few close friends, little cousin Maisie, and a fun time with her daddy!

Maisie and Uncle Marky came over in the morning, they had a little lunch , sang happy birthday, scoffed cake together and played with great imagination as you do when you become the wonderful age of two!

Nothing like a good chocolate cake!

Maisie cheeky and full of chocolate cake haha!

Kaci was in her element with all her little friends around her at her party, they played on the soft play equipment, and danced too. Smiles all around. I was so happy to be there!

Kaci looking so cute in her party outfit Jordan bought her

Tea time!

As always when I go back I can only ever meet up with a small handful of friends. It was wonderful to catch up with my dear friends at the stroke club I used to volunteer at, and a close friend or two. Of course my main priority is to spend as much precious time as I can with the family. I know you all appreciate that!

What did help to make my trip special, was spending a couple of nights with Mark, Callie and the gorgeous Maisie too. I so can't wait to do it again in March for Maisie's 2nd birthday!

Good friends birthday bash

2011-12-30T03:28:00.000-08:00

We had an invitation to have lunch out with great friends. It was Pat's birthday, and Pedro had suggested we try "El Tomate" an extremely well known bar/ restaurant in nearby Bujalance. Woooo what a feast haha! I will try most things once although we all know Alan can be a fussy bugger but here in Spain, there is always meat, and plenty of it. I'm not really sure if I can remember everything we had, we ordered it as tapas dishes, rather large ones, and all tucked in. A meal here usually starts with cheese and ham, which you drizzle local olive oil onto, with bread, often that be stale, but not today! The first course was followed by a cold soup, garlicy (of course) and tomato'y, mmm very good, whitebait followed that! A Spanish dish called flamenquin was served up after that, with chips ....... then the main courses came along, pork, chicken, more chicken in a sauce and rather a lot of chips too! The wine flowed although I'm not very good at drinking, one glass does me for hours, cheap date I am!

The atmostphere in Spanish restaurants are loud, bubbly and full of laughter, and you find yourself having to shout to the person closest to you, to be heard! When we had finished all all went back to our local hostel in Montoro and Pedro bought some bubbly. We all raised our glasses to Pat, what a lovely day, with great friends!

The comings and goings of our cats!!!

2011-12-30T03:27:00.002-08:00

We have this wild vision of our cats sitting down for monthly meetings and Mummy Barb discussing who should leave home right now, and who can stay for a little longer. At the beginning of the year we had living with us, Barb the mum, R Denise the dad (I know, I know) and the 3 kittens Sergio (Ramos) Andres (Iniesta) and Fernando Torres (Fern) who were the litter of 2010. In the spring we were delighted with the new arrivals Messi (Lionel) and Xavi. According to Alan his other name just is n't important! Sergio disapeared, tail between his legs no doubt, just before their arrival. R Denise seems to appear every two or three months to check on his family, and to make sure there have been no new butch felines hanging around. Soon after the kittens were born Fern also disappeared. This was very strange as she was extremely tame. I guess Barb feels the home can only sustain one female at a time, and she was packed off with a little stick with a tied up handkerchief attached to it, to pastures new too. At the moment Andres appears every two or three months like R Denise.

Which means of course at the moment we only have Barb and the two kittens. We have however seen two rather large tabby and white cats hanging around and howling trying to attract Barbs attention. Im pretty sure this springs kitten will be made up of the tabby kind. We shall see. Say goodbye to the litter of 2010 bless them, that have all sadly moved home now!

Sergio

Andres

Fern

R. Denise

What a season

2011-12-30T03:27:00.001-08:00

After coming back from Brighton we had two or three more guests before we hibernated for the winter. What a year we have had. Sadly just one unsatisfied guest who had booked through an agency we tried. We were not really sure if this would work, as we like to explain to people how remote we are, and the fact that we have animals, and we live in an old olive mill. Sadly their complaint was that our furniture was old fashioned. Personally we don't think ikea furniture works in an olive mill, but hey 2 unhappy guests in 3 years probably is nt too bad. As as the saying goes, "you cannot please everyone!" This year we have opened our home to another wide variety of people, which we really love. We have enjoyed the company of two Dutch actors, and American actor and actress, a bank manager, motivational speakers and a gentleman that worked in the house of Lords, to list a few. We love getting to know our guests whilst of course giving them the privacy they want and need, during their much awaited holiday!

This year we have realised that our holiday apartments are in fact perfect for children. Originally we felt we would attract more couples, but this year we have encouraged the children, and adults if they wish to come and walk the dogs with us, and of course feed and spend time with the alpacas. This summer very often we have got up and had children waiting for us as they were so eager to walk the dogs! We also introduced a "paint a pot" morning and asked the children to paint a ceramic plant pot for our small courtyard. This went down very well and more often than not the parents would want to "help" too, it was extremely therapeutic. One particularly guest comes to mind, Callam who asked for Bruno Mars to be played whilst he painted, and he sung with great gusto whilst painting his pot. When ever I hear Bruno Mars now I think of Callum.

Now it is December and we have just taken out first booking for next year which is great, we are looking forward to making new friends again!

Callie and Maisie having fun feeding the apacas

Kaci and Frankie concentrate on painting their pot!

My special treat trip!

2011-12-30T03:14:00.001-08:00

After having Frankie, Kaci and Jordan here at the end of August, it was a lovely feeling to not be leaving the airport and them, a sobbing wreck, as I was going back with them! Mark and Callie had very very kindly paid for me to go back and look after their gorgeous Maisie for a week, wooo hooo it was like Christmas! Mark works long shifts and Callie was away on a course for her new job. In actual fact Mark did manage to get a few days off too which was so lovely. Its not very often we get to spend quality time together these days. I had such a great time. Maisie and I went out a few times and met up with friends, and we had a great day out with Frankie and the big cousin Kaci, and we went to a great little farm in the country.

The farm had a little animal show that Kaci adored and was shouting out at the animals, bless her, where as Maisie was quite nervous, and cried a little, but she was still very young. After the animal show the girls spent hours on the swings, slides and their favourite was the trampolines. There little faces were a picture. Sadly for the first time ever I forgot to take my battery for my camera and I have no photographs of this lovely trip. Oh well I guess it means we will have to go back to the farm again!

Thanks so much Mark and Callie, it was so kind of you, and you know how much I loved it by the amount of tears I shed on leaving.... I wonder if it will ever get any easier!

Is sooooooo behind!

2011-12-30T02:29:00.000-08:00

Ok today is the day I get my backside into gear and try hard to get my blog up to date before the new yea. My dear mum always said to me never have a pile of ironing that needs doing before the new year...... sorry mum, now its a back log of blogging, but that's much more fun!

The family arrive, well half of them!

2011-10-06T03:51:00.001-07:00

I was so very excited for Frankie, Kaci and Jordan, Frankie's boyfriend, to come for a holiday. The weather was just about perfect although possibly a few degrees cooler would have been even better. The decision was made that they would come up on the train, from Malaga to Cordoba as we have no air con in our car, as we thought it would be far more comfortable for them, and we met them there at the station. I waved excitedly when I saw them get off the train, and rushed around to the exit, that they would come up the travelator to. Kaci had obviously been prepped to say "Ola Nanny, I've missed you!" However when Frankie gave the cue and said to her "What are you going to say to nanny?" What came out was ICE CREAM PLEASE! Bless her, it did make me laugh!

I had such a lovely time, spending time with Kaci, and "Grandad Alan" and I took her out a couple of times on her own which was great. We had long walks up the track looking for "horsey's" and also over the dam of the reservoir, where we saw about 20 "horsey's", drinking from the lake and just soaking up the sun by the track. One was particularly friendly and Alan and I both managed to stroke him, we called him "Mr Tumble" after one of Kaci's favourite TV.

Now my Frankie is not very brave when it comes to getting into the pool, even though it maybe 40 degrees outside, Frankie is, I am afraid to say a big wuss. It did take Kaci a few days to get in, but once we were all in together playing she absolutely loved it. When she was n't right in the pool she just loved sitting on the side with her little watering can and bucket playing with the water.

As the weather was so hot we did not go out very much. We did meet up with friends one day, and had tapas in town, and Kaci ran around outside playing football, with the boys, and we popped into see our good friends Tim and Susi, and of course a trip to the zoo. We spent quite a bit of time with the dogs, especially Blue, who Kaci adored, I think Jordan rather fell in love with her too. We all walked the dogs most days which was lovely, and all fed the alpacas most nights too.

Kaci and Jordan painted a pot for us and wow Jordan was a a bit of an artist! This year we have really brightened up our small courtyard, with ceramic pots that the children that have come here on holiday this year, have painted for us.

I don't think it was quite the total break that Frankie would have hoped for, those toddlers certainly know how to keep a mummy on their toes. Hopefully they all enjoyed a different lifestyle and some gorgeous hot sun for 10 days, I know I loved having them all here!

Kaci concentrating on her pot!

Football with the boys!

Alpaca dinner time

All walking the dogs, including the lovely family here on holiday with us!

Lunch time, enjoying the zoo!

Fun in the pool with "Jordi!"

My favourite photo!

Filming

2011-09-24T06:59:00.000-07:00

Hooray for some exciting news! On 27th July we had a Canadian film crew here to film our home for a TV show, called "Live Here, Buy This!" The show asks Canadian and American home owners where they fantasize about living, and about what kind of lifestyle they imagine themselves living in, in these places. The film producers chose our house as one of them :-) The crew also filmed in Cordoba as well as the surrounding areas near our home too, as part of the show. The program is aired in Canada in spring 2012, and then sold on to America and other countries after this.

The exciting day arrived, and an estate agent came along with her daughter who was to be discussing our home with the presenter of the show, the lovely Shantelle Canzanese, on camera, who was gorgeous in every way, I guess Canada's answer to Kirstie Alsop, although younger and prettier.... sorry Kirstie (I'm sure she does n't read my blog!) The morning began with a very quick hello, and the crew were shown all around, where they quickly made up their minds which parts they wanted to film in. The mornings filming got off to a quick start and filming began outside the casita, and far too close to the adolescent boy alpacas! As the camera started rolling they thought "action" was a sign for them to all start piggy backing around the field, orgling at the top of their voices. Ohhhhh the embarrassment, I had to put the hose on them, and luckily they soon calmed down.

The first part of the morning was taken up by discussing our home, whilst they walked around it, and the temperature just got hotter, and hotter, and hotter. The poor sound man had a touch of "man flu" when he arrived and would n't even shake our hands, and the poor guy felt worse and worse as the day went on, eventually he jumped in the pool and cooled down, and seemed to feel much better for it. I think it was possibly the hottest day of the year, certainly up to aproximatly 46 degrees!

Lunch was discussed prior to the day, and we were all going out for lunch together, until of course everyone realised on arriving that we are not a short walk to the nearest restaurant, so Alan and I drove into town and bought some lovely salad etc. and we made a lovely lunch for us all. It was too hot to eat outside, even in the shade, so we ate in the big kitchen with fans on us.

Of course the kitchen had been cleaned to within an inch of it's life, and had to be done again as there were still the "beauty shots" to be taken. We were told our house would look "beautiful and sexy" fantastic, so we all got stuck in. Shantelle tried to wash up but that was Alan's department, and then she wanted to mop the floor for us! In the end we both allowed Ken Seeback the director of the filming to mop the floor bless him. He has certainly been well trained! The filming recommenced after lunch, phew I did feel sorry for them as the temperature went up and up!

After lunch Alan and I were told they wanted us to do a 10 second piece to camera, stated why we liked living in Spain. If any of our friends asked us that, we would ramble on for hours, I'm sure, but the fact that we had to do it in front of the camera was a whole different story. It took about four takes and of course were encouraged to smile and look happy whilst talking to the camera. I'm pretty sure a lot of gobble-dee-goop came out of my mouth, and it sure was n't Spanish. However any of my dancey friends will be very pleased to hear that although I was only being filmed from the shoulders up, I was standing in an excellent third position.

It was a great day and the film crew were all lovely. Even the sound man gave us a big hug on leaving. In fact if any of you are on facebook you can "Like" the page of the show "Life here, buy this!

Lunch time!

Cassandra and her lady bits!

2011-09-24T06:08:00.001-07:00

Having had the awful worry with Cassandra and flystrike, we are as you can imagine extra vigilant with all our animals at the moment. We were still putting cream on Cassandra and then noticed another swelling, the "ladybits" again, but on the other side, we did nt know what it was, so the first thought was to phone our vet. It was nearly 10pm on a Saturday evening, plus we knew he was very soon going on holiday, if he had not already left. Luckily he had not gone, but we suggested we took a photo, and emailed it to him, so he could have a look and see if he could diagnose the problem. He said sure no problem. We got there and him and his wife were all dressed up to go out, but as ever he was more than happy to help. He felt she could have been stung, or just had an inflamed area. Nothing too much to worry about. he gave us a prescription for a steroid cream. So off we trot to the out of hours pharmacy, As we turned into the main high Street, we were met with a policeman, blowing away at his whistle, directing the crowds away from the town centre, and the away from where we wanted to go. It must have been a religious festival that we did n't know about, and there was a beautiful effigy being carried out of the church, with the locals all in their finery watching . We followed the road round in the direction we were hastily pointed to, and found and got stuck in a wedding party,just as they were coming out of the church. Weddings are very often held during the late evening here as the temperature tends to reach at least 40 degrees most summer afternoons, so the locals enjoy the slightly balmy evenings. Nightmare upon nightmare we then had to take the tiny roads around the town. When we first moved here we had a little drive round some of the tiny streets, and after driving round for about half an hour, we were approached by a man on a motor bike and shown the way out... how embarrassing! We had actually had guests do the same thing and been guided out too! Well surprise surprise we came out at the first church and the effigy had hardly moved, so we decided to call it a night, and make our way home. Cassandra's cream could wait until the following morning. This we did and got caught up in a local cycle race, never a dull moment here hahaha!

Our lovely little town of Montoro

Rafas poorly foot returns, with avengeance :(

2011-09-24T06:01:00.001-07:00

All our alpaca problems all seemed to happen within about a month, and seemed to flit from one problem to another so I am sorry if this part of the blog seems a little disjointed.

Well the grey boys had been moved and caused a mini orgy, but the other three boys Rafa, Galaxy and Santa missed the other boys so much, we moved them very soon afterwards. On reflection we should have given Rafa's foot a little more time to heal, however obviously we thought we had. So the boys all had access to a huge open space, basically three paddocks, where at least we thought they could have space. Not on your Nellie they are all still joined at the hip, and still as blooming frisky!

Of course we kept an eye on Rafa's foot. We made up a small pen to feed the boys in at dinner time, to we could keep an eye on it, and for a couple of days it seemed fine, it actually looked like it was healing nicely. He was n't limping, just bouncing along with all the others, usually first, when we came in through the gate, shaking our bucket to let them know it was dinner time. A few days past and we thought we should get hold of him and have a good look, when to our horror we saw a little maggott between his toes. FLYSTRIKE AGAIN! We were devastated!!!

Alan had watched Andres deal with Cassandra's flystrike problem, and was confident who could deal with it, and he did, extremely well. Poor Rafa was obviously in a lot of pain and discomfort whist Alan one by one removed the pesky little blighters! At one point Alan had gone to get fresh water and Rafa tried to jump a hurdle and I got a rather nasty bruise and scratch from his nail as I think I may have caught him, mid jump. Poor little fella. For days we checked it two or 3 times a day and treated it with antibiotic cream. A few days later you could tell it was feeling a lot better as he would let Alan lift his foot, and have a good look without him struggling. I was very proud of Alan, I'm not sure I could have dealt with it!

Rafa going for a walk one day!

Alpaca Orgy!

2011-09-08T09:20:00.000-07:00

As you may have read, in my last blog, because of the fighting due to being a little frisky we decided we needed to move the boys, that have been in a rather small area since shearing, hence the fighting I'm sure, so we walked Marcus and Eduardo around on leads, having of course penned the girls in through the girls paddock, and another small paddock to a large area with some grass and weeds, and our plan was to give them a few days on their own then bring round the other three boys. So we did that and went shopping. A couple of hours later we drove up our little track and turned the corner where we can see the girls, usually sunbathing and we were faced with a bloody alpaca orgy!!! There were the three girls sitting in a row all facing the same way, the two outside girls Cassandra (typical) and Lily with a male on top and Bermuda sitting in the middle of them waiting for her turn. BLOODY HELL! So who knows, we may have babies next year. Never a dull moment here eh haha!

Rafa and the start of a poorly foot!

2011-08-25T10:12:00.000-07:00

After shearing at the beginning of May, the boys were in a small paddock closest to the house, and the girls nearby, although not too close to cause any excitement or to be able to see each other. It was just the way they had finished up after the upheaval of shearing, besides we like to move them around a bit, musical alpacas, and it stops them from being bored. In time they would all be back in their normal places. Meanwhile it was great to have the boys near us again. They are far more sociable than our girls, and particularly like to come to the fences and have a sniff and a good look when we take the dogs out for a walk. Only a few days after the incident with Cassandra I happened to notice Rafa lying with one leg stretched out in front of him, and he had blood between his two toes, he had probably caught his foot on a stone, although now we are on high alert, always on the look out for blood. Luckily the boys being in the smaller paddock meant we could keep an eye on him easily. For three days at least we cleaned it thoroughly and put the same cream on it that Cassandra had and sprayed him 3 times a day with the same insecticide spray.

The boys had been in the smaller paddock for a couple of weeks and as much as we loved having them there, they needed to be moved, it was just too small for them and they were getting a little frisky, there was a lot of piggy backing around then green spit flying through the air. It seemed to be that our two handsome grey boys Marcus and Eduardo were causing the friskiness so a decision was made to move them round to a larger paddock, just for a couple of days, to give the others a little more space, then we would take Rafa, Galaxy and little Santa round to join them. That was the plan. The plan however did not quite go to plan. Dum dum dummmmm! The next instalment to come... possibly tomorrow!

A slightly younger Rafa, loving Arthur!

Dreaded Flystrike! An alpaca owners nightmare!

2011-08-24T02:51:00.000-07:00

We were feeding the girls one morning and for some reason noticed that Cassandra's tail was slightly raised, luckily it allowed me to see she had blood around her bottom and vaginal area. My first thoughts were that maybe she had suffered a prolapse. It was around 8.30 am so I phoned our vet. I asked him if Alan could come and get him, you may remember he does n't drive, he sounded a little hesitant and said errr around 11 am I can come. That was fine with us, Cassandra did not seem to be in any pain or discomfort and she was tucking into her food.... nothing new there, so that was fine. As summer here can be particularly flyey, (how on earth do you spell flyey?) we decided to spray around the area with an insecticide, that we always keep in case an animal gets a cut or graze. One of the fears when you are an animal owner is the dreaded flystrike!

Alan collected Andres at 11 as arranged he explained he had been watching his little daughter in her end of term show of Grease, we now had his full attention though! Whilst we were checking on Cassandra, spraying her with insecticide etc we did notice the infected area seemed very swollen. We could not understand what she had done, if it was an internal problem or a cut on the outside, we just knew there was a lot of swelling! We could also see some minute white things, our fear was that they were fly eggs that would turn into maggots!!!

OK it get's nasty now, put your noodles down! I held Cassandra, as now when we do treatments on the alpacas sometimes I struggle with doing injections, their skin is like a tight drum and some antibiotics are very thick and I have to admit there are a few jobs in life that Alan can do better than me and so I do the holding/ cuddling. Andres knew exactly what he was dealing with and as he went to his Black & Decker box, also known as his medical box, I did n't want to look in case a scalpel was involved. A scalpel was not involved but a blooming big pair of tweezers were. Sadly what we thought may have been eggs were in fact the tails of maggots that were already inside her. We were totally devastated, although Andres was not at all perturbed, I guess he is used to dealing with it. I learnt a lot about maggots during that morning, whilst he took about 20 out of the cut, and the swelling seemed to reduce with every one he removed. He explained to us that the maggots were only 2 or 3 days old, which he could tell from their size and all from the one egg as they were all the same size too. We also learnt that as they eat dead and infected tissue or skin whilst they are inside the body they actually breathe out of their rear end, so what we could see was their tail which they breath of out. I still hate the little blighter's but it was interesting to learn about it.

To this day we don't know what Cassandra had done, she could have sat on a sharp stone or caught herself on a branch, we just don't know. However she healed remarkably quickly once the maggots had been removed and she had a course of antibiotics, plus an antibiotic cream too. Thankfully she is fine now, but we are always keeping our eyes open for slightly raised tails, as I'm sure you can imagine! Poor Cassandra!

Our gorgeous Cassandra

A sneaky weekend in Brighton

2011-06-22T01:19:00.001-07:00

My beautiful God daughter Miss Jenna Avenall now Mrs. Stringer, was due to be married in June, this was a wedding I dearly wanted to attend. Luckily for me, even during a busy time with holiday lets, I scarpered off leaving poor Alan to hold the fort, whilst I managed to get in a sneaky weekend, and see my best friend in the whole world's little girl, tie the knot.

It did of course mean I managed to spend time with my lovely kiddiwinks and their babies too. For once I had made arrangements for Frankie to pick me up at the airport and I was going to have my hair done, straight from there. Sods law I had a delay, to cut a long story short the pilot was given three different gates to stop at, and I think he got in a huff and braked exactly where he was. About a mile away from where we wanted him to be! We got ferried out to him by buses, and we had a hysterical mum getting extremely cross as her "Baby was going to die, in the heat!" Errrr hello, you have been in Spain, I really don't think five minutes in a bus is going to do too much harm. The poor cabin crew, I'm sure it can be an pleasant job when everything is going smoothly, but crikey they took some stick, that day! After we were all in, doors closed, seat belts signs on, out came the co-pilot -I guess he is called. He was very apologetic and said someone had nipped into their stand. A little like someone nipping into a place in front of you, at your local NCP I guess. Well he apologised and told us as we had lost our take off spot we would have to wait two hours. there was a chorus of "OHHHH NOOOOO's!" including from me. Frankie would be preparing for work, and to pick me up, and Louise was booked to do my hair. We were allowed to make phone calls to change plans and settled down for a long wait. After all of about ten minutes, out came the "co" again, with the great news that we could be off in 10 minutes after all...... Hooray!!! He was now the hero of the day? Panicy phone calls were all made again, rescheduling for the second time! We landed aproximatley 45 minutes late. My hair appointment was cancelled. The lovely Louise however, did some juggling and fitted me in later that evening. We drove straight to Frankie's work, and I went off to the hairdressers from there.... phew!

Saturday 11th June, and we woke up to a glorious day, beautiful temperatures and sunshine, just perfect. I was luckily enough to be invited to the whole shin dig and Mark, Callie and Frankie were joining us for the evening celebrations. What a beautiful bride, there were of course a few tears shed, as she walked down the aisle with her very proud dad beside her, Jenna looked stunning. Jenna plus 4 out of 5 of her bridesmaids being in event management, meant the day been planned down to the final detail, in fact the weeks leading up to the special day had all been meticulously planned!

I was honoured to be sitting with the family and we had such a wonderful time reminicing, in fact I travelled up to the reception with Mandy, Wendy's sister and I don't think there was a break for a breathe for more than two seconds. Is n't reminising wonderful! We all had such a wonderful time at the wedding. I had a rather lovely rosy glow after having five alcoholic drinks in 9 hours, and boy did I dance, I have n't danced like that for years. In actual fact the dj said I was a good dancer haha. How good was that!

Wendy and Jenna, my beautiful friend and gorgeous daughter!

Oopsy after a little drinkypoos

The following day we were hoping to have a lovely family day out, sadly the British weather played havoc with that so Mark and Callie coped with a house full of us, for the whole day. The babies had a great time playing together, and we finished off the day with a good old Chinese take away.... one of the few things I do miss here in sunny Spain!

"I WILL kiss my little cousin!"

My gorgeous grandgirlies - Maisie

and Kaci

Fun with balloons!

Callie and Maisie come to Spain

2011-06-16T13:29:00.001-07:00

Just typical, Mark my son was starting training for a new job and could n't come over for a holiday, however I was over the moon when Callie said she would still bring Maisie over. That's Marks gorgeous lady and my beautiful granddaughter aged 15 months. Like Frankie had done at Christmas Callie did the journey on her own, with the cases, buggy and car chair. It sounds a nightmare, but I am so pleased they have both done it, and all for for me!

It was a hot and rather humid day, and we were indecisive as to whether or not we should stop off about 30 minutes from home, to get Maisie out for a breathe of fresh air, and a cool drink, but she seemed quite comfortable and so we continued our journey. Thank goodness we did as the moment we arrived at our gates, the heavens opened, and stair rods fell. Alan got simply drenched just opening the gates, we drove in and sat in the car for 40 minutes, whilst we waited for it to stop, even just a little.

Eventually we got out of the car and made a dash for the big kitchen, on route we noticed our gorgeous nectarine tree battered and broken from the storm In the kitchen we found flooding from the roof, nothing new there, although it was the end of May. The casita that Callie and Maisie were staying in was also saoking and sadly too so was Maisie's cot. Alan ran around like a loony and battened down what he could whilst Callie and I, and little Maisie just sort of sat in the kitchen, waiting for it to pass over..... for quite a while!

Our poor nectarine tree

The pool was in a state

and as for the track .....

The track being in this condition meant we were unable to get out for a couple of days.

Eventually a tractor came down and flattened it and scraped the huge boulders out of the way that fall from the steep sides, if the rain is torrential. When we did manage to get out, the first trip was breakfast in Cordoba, where they do this lovely "toast" or "tostadas" which is like a large flat roll, toasted with butter or as the Spanish have, and I do occasionally, with olive oil and tomatoes. Maisie was able to toddle around with nanny chasing her, to keep up with her, and then off to the zoo we went.

Our trip to the zoo was almost identical to when we took Kaci at the same age. The interest in a particular animal would last from zero seconds to possibly 30 seconds, then we were on the run again. Cordoba zoo is lovely and quiet and it so safe for little 'uns to toddle freely around. However the donkies were a major hit, Maisie loved them and stroked them without any fear what so ever.

Maisie and a lynx rather liked each other

Throughout the holiday, Maisie met and interacted with all the dogs and alpacas too, showing absolutely no fear what so ever. Our large dogs Arthur and Blue do I accept look rather scary however they truly are gentle giants.

Callie and Maisie with Big Arthur

One of the reasons Mark and Callie were hoping to return this particular week is because it is the week long Cordoba feria. Each town in Andalucia, and probably Spain no matter how tiny has a feria, and the Cordoba one, is pretty amazing, and the highlight of their year. Of course Mark could n't be with us, but we still dressed ourselves up and had a lovely evening. Maisie looked so beautiful in her little Spanish dress.

The gorgeous entrance to the Cordoba Feria which takes months to complete, and then months to disband again.

Two of my gorgeous girls, Callie and Maisie

Maisie meets a little Matador at the feria!

Flamenco dancing in a bar

Maisie loved the lights and music
Love it :-)

and with "Grandad Alan" (he's not really, but!)

We took Maisie out onto the big courtyard one day, where the dogs live. Immediately Arthur came and lay in front of Callie and Maisie as if he was guarding little Maisie, probably from the nightmare that is Miliko! Bless him!

With Blue

The day before we left with a tearful goodbye, we thought it would be nice to take the alpacas for a walk

The festival of the patios

2011-06-16T13:28:00.003-07:00

Our dear friends Mike and Linda, who we only get to see every few months, as we live three hours drive away, were determined to make it up to Cordoba for the very famous "Festival of the Patio's" Now I hope they wont mind me referring back to their blog to remind me of the right blooming ole hoo haa that had trying to arrange it!

It is a direct line from Ronda to Cordoba, so they decided to come on the train, until they discovered the cost was 120 euros return! Apparantly they had heard of a ticket that offers pensioners 40% discount on train fares, so the day before they were scheduled to come, they headed off to the railway station. Unfortunately, the computer was down at the station, and were unable to get them, and this is where the nightmare of the tickets begins. Linda had read somewhere that these cards were available at the travel agents, so they charged down to the town centre, and tried three travel agents. Unfortunately, they were declined at all three as it was too close to their lunchtime, and siestas were looming, but they would all be happy to help them after 5:30 when they re-open! So back they went at 6 o’clock and bought the tickets. Unbeknown to them they had to pay the agent a commission, more blooming money! The travel agent also offered to organise their rail tickets....... er no thank you, and they returned to the railway station to buy the tickets.

Would you believe it, the computer was still down, so they were told they would have to purchase the tickets the next morning, on the actual day of travel! Thank goodness Mike and Linda decided to arrive at the station early and were thrilled to find no queue at the ticket office. However, when they attempted to purchase their tickets, they were told that the returning train was virtually full and that there were only first class tickets available!! So, after chasing around for the best part of 2 days trying to obtain a cheaper price, they ended up paying over 145 euros, whereas if they had just bought 2 regular tickets in the first place, it would have only cost 120 euros! Bless them!

There was one saving grace however, a little light refreshment and a rather large gin and tonic too. I have a feeling it could be first class all the way now for Mike and Linda!

We first had a peak inside the famous Royal stables of Cordoba, where an equestrian show is held, it is called "The passion and Spirit of Andalucian Horse"

The stables are set inside a rather beautiful old building and the horses, are just stunning. The shows are not on until late in the evening due to the heat here, in the "frying pan of Spain!"

The Royal Stables

Stunning horse just been exercised

We thankfully, after all this palava, did manage to meet them at the station. We visited a few of the patios, which once again were absolutely stunning, then relaxed and chatted, ten to the dozen, with an ice cold drink. Viewed a few more gorgeous patios, by which time it was time for lunch. As Mike and Linda were obviously tied to time and the excitement of first class rail travel, the day went far too quickly. We had such a lovely day, with wonderful friends. We must do it again next year!

Some beautiful patios below!

Light, music and water show in Cordoba

2011-06-16T13:28:00.001-07:00

Alan's mum Linda, came out for a well earned break in May. Whilst she was here we visited a new night time water light and sound spectacular show in the grounds of the in castle of the Christian Monarchs (Alcazar) very close to the Famous Mezquita, in Cordoba. It is a new spectacle, with a little history lesson, which is n't too difficult to understand as it is projected on the walls in pictures. The next stage is the beautiful fountains set to a mixture of pan pipe and flamenco guitar music. The fountains "dance" and are lit magnificently. It is lovely to be able to go out in the evening and feel comfortably warm, as opposed to perspiring out of every poor throughout the day, or feeling cold and shivery, as we probably would going out for a late night in Brighton. And at the moment, all for free. It was a lovely evening out! We started off with a delicious meal at a nearby restaurant, then wandered comfortably full, round the Jewish Quarters of the town to the castle. Great night, we would thoroughly recommend it, and actually had some guests go last night, who did also enjoy it!

A beautiful spring

2011-06-16T13:27:00.002-07:00

Another stunningly beautiful spring and summer here in the rolling hills of Andalucia. We planted some tomato plants, that have been so successful, I shall soon be eating them for breakfast, lunch and dinner, as well as giving them away! We also planted strawberries that we only had about two fruits from, so that was n't really a result, plus something else that we can't remember whether they are peppers or cucumbers, sadly nothing has appeared on them! Oh well you can win them all! I thought I would post you some rather lovely spring and summer photos to enjoy!

Wild lavender

This wild flower fills the hills
Nectarines on our tree

One of the two strawberries!

Home grown tomato, basil and olive oil from our own trees!

Poor Lily's abscess

2011-06-16T13:27:00.001-07:00

After Lily had been sheared it was pretty obvious she was sporting a pretty large abscess on her right jaw. We felt so bad that we had not noticed it before, but were pleased we go down the route of "all off" during the shearing process, whereas some breeders like to keep a fuller fleecy face, in which case goodness knows when we would have spotted it. First trip was our main stop in Montoro, Andres the vet. He was happy for us to treat it ourselves having contacted a few good friends on the web, that have dealt with the same problem. It's great we can always help each other out when need be, with advice and words of comfort, and also exactly what prescription and dose you will need.

We began all precisely, measuring the abscess so we could see if it was growing. However after aproximatley three days the abscess had already burst. The injections were awful for her. Lily has a bit of a mite problem and is very used to being handled, and I think secretly rather enjoys it. She does little sighs as Alan puts cream on the backs of her legs, although gives him a little airey spit when he touches up her eye brows! She is not so keen on that. The fluid in the injections was rather thick, so we had to use a thicker needle that we would have prefered, it was so difficult to push through the syringe, it was really upsetting her, poor Lily. After a few days we began penning her into a smaller area to help her feel more secure and stop her leaping about quite so much, which it did help a little.

So aproximately three days after the treatment started, we noticed blood on her face, so we knew immediatly the abscess had burst, we then had to ensure all the horrible stuff was out. This was rather like a scene from the TV show Embarrasing illnesses, which is not to be watched whilst eating dinner. As we had read about, the abscess was full of a cream cheese type of matter. Good ole Alan is not queasy about anything like that, well strangely enough, apart from dog poo haha. He set about squeezing, whilst I cuddled, I cuddled Lily that is, not Alan, just to clear that up in your mind. Well Alan squeezed and pressed, and Lily was a star, I guess she was already starting to feel better! We had to then flush out the "hole" with betadine, then apply an antibiotic cream, and finally spray her with an insecticide. The last thing we needed were flies to strike in there. Well the treatment went completely to plan, thank goodness, and now a few weeks on you can hardly see a mark on here. Thank goodness, we shall certainly be more vigilant in looking for lumps and bumps in future!

Lily before treatment, and on the mend!

Shearing

2011-06-16T13:26:00.003-07:00

Usually shearing is a pretty hectic, although fun day, with friends that are able to help, staying for a bbq, swim and a good old catch up. This year however for pretty different, there was the sum total of Alan and I, Kym and James Dixon our fantastic regular shearers and eight alpacas. That was it! James and Kym spend most of the year in Europe, including the UK, and the rest of the time in Oz, their home.

The build up was a bit of a nightmare, we had dreadful weather and all of us in Andalucia were trying hard to keep our animals dry leading up to our appointed shearing dates, with heavy storms forecast. The poor 5 boys were shut in a little stable, for about three days, and the girls in a shelter too. The day before shearing we actually had some dry weather so let them all out for a run around, and shut them back in again overnight.... just in case.

Well the sun was shining down on us the day of shearing, well for most of it anyway. Due to the weather being a little on the dodgy side, we got stuck in straight it. As usual everything ran as smooth as clockwork. Bless his heart little Santa was crying like a real baby, as his favourite friend in the whole wide world Rafa was being sheared, he just did not know what was happening to him, and it all got too much for him when it was his turn, he just could n't stop green oozy stuff, oozing out of his mouth and a wee bit of wee wee happening too. Thank goodness for an old towel kept handy, just in case. Bless him. James and Kym stayed over which meant we could have a lovely relaxed evening together before leaving for our friends in Ronda early the following morning. Keep in touch guys, we wish you all the best best for the future, we will miss you xxx

Usually I post before and after photos of all the alpacas, but just for a change, just a few random ones for you this year!

The boys looking a little gloomy

Breakfast before shearing

Cassandra, she is such a star, being sheared by James

The girls follow Alan to another paddock, to make room for the boys

Little Santa, watching Rafa being sheared

The boys checking out who is who!

Semana Santa celebrations in Montoro

2011-06-16T13:26:00.001-07:00

The celebration of Semana Santa (Easter week) is huge in Montoro, in fact we were talking to a lady who had come from Granada to experience Montoro's celebrations. These celebrations were made so much better this year as we spent time with our great friends Pat and Pedro, who were able to tell us, where to go, when and why.... even if it meant considering leaving home at midnight to see the most amazing parade.

We met on the Tuesday evening first, for a great night full of loud marching bands, men dressed in Klu Klux Klan style outfits. The hoods are actually worn throughout the week to signify the mourning of the death of Jesus and removed to celebrate the resurrection. These outfits certainly do not have any other significance to the Klu Klux Klan. Ladies dressed in black with high mantillas walk through the streets, and the most unbelievable effigies which are carried through the streets. each effigy is very heavy, especially in Andalucia. Stong men carry them, in stages, swapping every 100 metres on so, and they will feel pain. These men feel it an honour to be carriers. An effigy can weigh up to a staggering 7000 lbs, 5150 kilos!!! Emotions are high and people shed tears at this awesome display of their beliefs. We stood for hours and every second was worth the wait as we saw two beautiful effigies make their way around the town. The first had Jesus on, following by the awesome candle lit virgin Mary! Tuesday evening with followed by a gorgeous meal, in one of Montoro's finest eateries!

Just stunning!

I was "umming" and arring" about meeting Pat and Pedro for the all nighter for the Maundy Thursday parades. In the end I decided not to go as it had been raining on and off and it meant leaving home around midnight, and Alan picking me up again around 7 am. I'm afraid in the end I did n't go, I was n't quite hard core enough. Poor Pat and Pedro, did go and it all sadly got rained off. There would have been some devastated people that had be planning the night for the past year. I believe the Maundy Thursday parades are really the ones to see!

We did however go into town on Sunday for the celebration of the resurrection of Jesus. The town were all out in their finery, some you would think we going to a wedding, rather than watching a parade in the street. let's hope next year I can manage the Thursday parades too!

We did however watch the Sunday morning parade deplicting the resurrection

New babies on the farm!

2011-06-16T13:25:00.001-07:00

We knew Barb the mummy cat was expecting, the big tummy was a dead give away, plus the fact that she always has a litter this time of the year. The day came that she know longer her her cute kitten bump, but where were the kittens? The year before she had them fairly openly in the barn, and seemed to even call us when she felt happy for us to see them, however this year was different. We tried watching her carefully over the next few days, checking out where she was going, and hunting around areas of chopped wood, the barn, the stable, and other places that she tends to move her kittens to, when she feels ready. In fact we were very worried that they may not be alive, she certainly was n't spending much time with them! It took us days to find them, and that was mainly due to Arthur the Spanish Mastin. He would bark uncontrollably at her as she walked passed his territory, otherwise known as the big terrace, were he and the other dogs, hang out! Nothing new there though. There is a funny little out building near his big gates, where he likes to stand and bark at stars, full moon, or anyone working on the olive trees. Alan and I had even climbed in to this precarious little building and could n't see them.

I guess it was about a week later when Alan came in with the news I was hoping for. He had found them, there were two, and they were both alive. I shot round there with a camera, I was so pleased.

The little out building

They were living in this hole in the wall!!!

Cuddled up together

Barb really kept these kittens well hidden, but it is great to see nature at it's best, without any interference from us. From the beginning Barb was bringing them up to be independent as she could, and not depend her her too much. She would go to them every few hours, and then return to do her own thing, laze in the sun or hunt, without the fuss and bother of new born kittens constantly by her side. As I am so late keeping you all up to date with the blog, I can however let you know about 3 months down the line, the kittens are beautiful and pretty independent. Still extremely nervous but that is fine with us. I have shared some up to date photos below. I'm sure you will agree they are little stunners. After a particularly good football match we saw on the television recently, we can now introduce you properly to Messi and Xavi! Who knows what sex they are, but they join last years litter of Andres (Iniesta) Sergio (Ramos), who sadly seemed to get a transfer somewhere else, and Fernando (Torres) who know appears to be just Fern, if you know what I mean! Enjoy our new arrivals!

Mummy Barb at dinner time with her babies

The stunning Messi

And cute little Xavi

A Little poorly Blue

2011-04-17T14:15:00.000-07:00

Please don't panic when you read this post. I began it around six months ago. In have now managed to with elbow Alan off of the laptop (I have now sent him to watch some Lose Women) plus the weather is just far too hot to do any more than the essentials, so at last I can catch up on my blogs.

Our beautiful female mastin Blue had a little period of being under the weather, poor love! Around November we noticed when we took her for walks, she was passing blood in her urine. At first we did n't worry too much as we knew she woud be soon coming into season, and thought it maybe linked with that. However after she had finished her "time of the year" she was still passing blood. We discussed it with our vet and he recommended blood testing her here at home, as she gets very travel sick in the car, so we only take her out in the car if it is a real necessity, and he was coming to blood test the alpacas anyway. It showed she had a bit of an infection so he precribed some antibiotics. As she is a very big girl, and they are prescribed by weight, we had boxes and boxes of them, bless her. A month later and yet another course of antibiotics and poor Blue seemed no better.

The next plan was a urine test. Hehe Alan looked so funny going off for a walk wearing a rubber glove and carrying an old tupperwear container. She always does a wee at the same place so we were ready to launch the tupprwear container under her, when all of a sudden she caught us totally unawares and squatted in a diferent place! Phew Alans rubber glove worked well and we managed to collect what we needed.

The testing of Blues urine showed crystals, in simple terms we had to change the PH balance of her urine. So we did quite a bit of research on line, and it all added to to the same answer - we had to buy a bag of hugely expensive food! So we bought the hugely expensive food, that for most dogs would have lasted months, for Blue, just over 2 weeks! She was doing well however and the blood loss almost completely stopped, however we knew we could not afford to keep her on the specific diet. Once again we chatted to our vet and we decided with his blessing to feed her rice, and hot dogs (like the farmers eat here whilst working) and a small handful of her normal dog food. What we did not want were for her to be on the dry biscuity type of food.

It is now six months down the line, and touch wood she is doing great. She has lost weight and is more perky and puppy like that ever ..... Oh God! She still loves her dinners and leaves a trail of dribble when she knows it is on it's way!

Beautiful Maisie's 1st birthday

2011-03-02T12:26:00.001-08:00

I had yet another wonderful trip back to Brighton at the beginning of March to celebrate the beautiful Maisies's, Mark and Callie little stunner's, 1st birthday! Luckily for me Alan is happy to stay here whilst I get my fix of the family, including the gorgeous babies, a handful of close friends and just go back to the world I used to live in, just for ten days! The first night I stayed with Mark and Callie as Frankie was working until late, although she managed to visit quickly, share a huge hug, then off she dashed again. The following night Frankie and I were looking after Maisie, as Mark and Callie were going to wedding reception. The girls had great fun in the bath together, and settled down in their cots without too many tears. The following day was beautiful although a little nippy, so we wrapped them up nice and warm and all had fun in the park!

The morning after the girls sleep over Fun in the park I think it was the day before Maisie's birthday, that Kaci and Maisie went along to the fabulous Richard Lemon photography studios. Maisie was having the last of a portfolio collection photographed, and was allowed to bring someone with her, so Kaci was in her pretty dress too, all ready for the ocassion. Now I know every grandmother worships the ground their babies walk on but they really were so funny and adorable. Maisie was like a little model, with this little half smile, and even a slight stuck up air about her, as though she was a little professional, and Kaci just laughed the whole way though. I'm sure it made Richards job so easy... We in fact went to school together. I have n't seen him for blah blah number of years so it was lovely to have a little catch up. The night before, the tables were turned and Kaci and I had a sleep over at Mark and Callie's. Fun in the bath once again, and no tears this time.... lovely! Wednesday 9th March was Maisies birthday and Mark and Callie were having an open house all day, I think they were all exhausted at the end of it. Maisie looked like a little beautiful princess and was happy to watch as slightly bigger cousin Kaci, helped out, by the assisting, if not taking over, in prezzie opening.

Bath time

Kaci loves to cuddle Maisie

Maisie looking beautiful on her 1st birthday

Maisie also had a little party at a play area in Brighon, the Saturday after, which was just ideal for the litle ones, with lots of play areas plus they had managed to borrow a tiny bouncy castle which was just perfect. Another great day! It is always great to catch up with friends, I wish I could see more, but I try hard to get the balance with being every waking hour with the family, but loving to catch up with good friends too. Luckily everyone seems to understand. Another wonderful trip!

Maisie is good enough to kiss / eat!

Woo hoo blood tests are finally done!

2011-02-27T04:07:00.001-08:00

After months of waiting we got the long awaited email from Andres, our vet, to say our local authorities were in fact ready to blood test our alpacas. We had spent months cuddling them, to get them used to being handled, and even holding Alans electric razor to their ear's, as they would have small areas shaved, so they would not be afraid of that... daft or what! However I think it worked. We were as prepared as we could be, although we thought it maybe a few hours for Andres to be with us as he was aso giving the dogs their annual jabs too.... yikes!

Right the plan was the girls first, in order of the easiest, so hopefully Bermuda being third and last of the girls, would not be too nervous. They had their blood test for brucellosis first, which was very simple, Andres managed to get the vein immediately in all bar one of the alpacas, which can be extremely difficult, and then another patch shaven to do a TB test. The thickness of the skin was measured followed by an injection, which then needed the reaction to be remeasured again 72 hours later, in simple terms. (If I have not explained any of this correctly please feel free to comment, so I can correct myself) So the girls were as good as gold, we then had to bring the hurdles up to the boys, for their turn.

All the boys were stars apart from Rafa who has always been nervous when it comes to injections. He will be first to explore a new area of paddock, or first to come and say hello to the dogs, or any visitors, but an injection is a different kettle of fish altogether. After trying a couple of times, and him jumping about like a demented kangaroo, we decided to leave him until last. We made a much smaller pen for him and after a few attempts, and he did get a little stressed bless him, Andres managed to get the blood needed. Two minutes later the boys were outside, and all including the big baby Rafa were chomping on some lovely alfafa, none the worse for their ordeal!

Now for our other 4 legged friends, the dogs! I remember last time we seperated the dogs, in preperaion for their injections The three little ones in the small courtyard, and left Arthur and Blue, the big mastines out in the big courtyard, but it was like the battering of the doors in a Jurrassic Park film, and Andres was muttering "Madre Mia!" So this time we just let the dogs all run in together. Of course they were all very excited. They are to see any visitors and Andres's green vetinary wear did not put them off in the slightest. The needle was so very thin, Blue, Carlos, Geri, even very skinny little Miliko never flinched, as it went into the loose skin betwen their shoulder blades. However as Andres was preparing the injections, (in one of the photos below) Arthur suddenly had a slight panic attack. He went from having a nice cuddle with Alan, to running full charge down towads the apartment we live in, and hid in a corner :( What a big wuss! We tried everything we could to entice him out, and after a while he sloped up, feeling rather nervous towards me. Andres made a leap for it, and managed to get the needle almost in, a split second later, Alan leapt into action and managed to get it in a tiny bit, but Arthur threw himself on the floor, rather resembling a crocodile roll. The needle came out and was bent. There was no way we were going to get that injection into him, at that time. Luckily for us Andres left us with another, which Alan gave him perfectly the following morning, whilst Arthur was eating his breakfast, and guess what, he ever felt a thing. What a big baby haha!

Me and my big lovable wuss, Arthur

Andres getting the injections ready, before Arthur does a runner!

Lovely walks with the big boy!

2011-02-27T04:06:00.001-08:00

Before breakfast Arthur the extremely handsome, and also extremely large, Spanish Mastin and I enjoy a leisurely walk together. Just the two of us and my Mp3 player that was a gift from a dear friend. It prepares me for a good breakfast and the day ahead. Arthur is such an angel to walk on his own. Actually we used to walk the five dogs together but it was just such hard work. As crazy as it seems, it is easier to do three walks. It's not so much the walking that was the prolem, it was the high pitched squealing from Miliko that worked all the others up into a frenzie, plus he runs round grabbing their leads in his little mouth that only opens a fraction, due to an accident, before he "found " himself under our fence. I shall endeavor to add a video below that will explain my case!

A few mornings ago, we had not long left the house, and strolling up the track when I felt Arthur slightly cower, and started to growl. I knew it would n't be horses and he ignores them, so I was unsure as to what on earth could have scared him. Haha there in front of us was a large white sign nailed to a tree "Se Vende" a for sale sign and a phone number, bless him! Talk about a big scaredy cat! Once he realised there was no threat, and it was n't alive, he was happy to walk past it. Then just before we usually turn around we heard a little yapping! For half a second, the thoughts that went through my mind were... "Oh no, I'm not going to be able to hold him if he goes!" "If he catches it, will he eat it?" Once again he became at first rather nervous, as four dogs were close, three were very close, but the forth another mastine hid, typical behaviour it seems. Three little dogs including one that looked like a cross between a dachshund and a wirey coated terrier, and the other two were n't much bigger, basically told us it was their territory and we were n't welcome. Arthur looked at the other dogs, and as he cocked his head from side to side, I'm sure he was saying "Can't we be friends?" I guess the answer was a firm no, so we turned around and went home.... bless him!

Me with my big boy Arthur

A lovely trip to Gaucin and Ronda

2011-01-29T10:13:00.003-08:00

It was a great surprise to be invited to our friends, in the beautiful white washed village of Gaucin, in the mountains north of Marbella, for a get together, for friends with alpacas. Jane and John have moved into their new stunning home with views across to Gibralter. I could n't wait to catch up with great friends, and of course have a nosey around their new place, which is now finished. Alan and I saw the new house whilst finishing touches were being done! As usual there was a beautiful lunch for us all, with a drop of the ole vino! Good times!

John and Jane's gorgeous new home

Can you spot the rock of Gibralter?

Beautiful little girl!

What a house!

We were also lucky enough to be invited to stay that night with two of our closest friends, although sadly not in distance, Mike and Linda. It meant that the following day we would only have a journey home of three hours rather than four! We had a nice meal out in the evening in a well known chain of "restaurants" that cannot be named for risking Linda's reputation! She was happy to eat inside, but was ready to make a dash for the door if need be ;-) We chatted late into the night, and had such a lovely time. Thank guys, can't wait to do it again! And I must say we love the way your menagerie is growing. It was two dogs, which has now grown to four dogs, plus your gorgeous chickens, and extremely handsome cockerel!

Mike and Linda's handsome donkey's

Number 3, Sally

..... and number 4, Jack

Blood test practice

2011-01-29T10:13:00.001-08:00

Since the end of last summer we have been trying to start the journey of our little farm being classified as Brucellosis and Tb free, which gives a status of M4 T4, I think thats correct! The fact that alpacas are so rare in Spain, and particularly in our area, OCA the Spanish version of DEFRA (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) are really unable to make up their minds what to do with them! We have had numerous conversations with our vet regarding this, and are no where near starting the process. In January this year the laboratories all closed, for two weeks, as they were changing something... computors or machines, goodness knows what, but this was nationally! Although Andres our vet, who I am very pleased to say reads my blog now, decided it maybe good to do a practice run. Any alpaca breeders will confirm how very difficult it is to take blood from an alpaca. We have watched numerous youtube videos, which we have sent Andres links to the best, and he and us have all researched online.

>Alan and I have done huge amounts of alpaca "cuddling" to try and make them more relaxed and less likely to jump in the air at the point of the needle making contact, or more likely trying numerous times to find the vein. So one morning we got the boys all in and started with the most relaxed boy, who is known to us as Marcus, it's actually not his name haha. We have two gorgeous grey boys and we have called them the wrong names since they arrived to us. So now Eduardo is Marcus and Marcus is Eduardo! Bless them, they don't care at all :) Well Marcus stood calmly and still for around 10 minutes whilst Andres prodded and poked around trying to find the vein in his neck, he was an absolute angel. Andres also tried on Eduardo but he was far more jumpy, so we gave up on him for that day! When Andres comes back to do the blood tests to send to the lab he will bring clippers with him, as their fleeece is really thick at the moment. Recenly we have been cuddling them, and holding Alan's electric razor under their ear's to get them used to the noise too. Hmmmm I wonder how many other alpaca owners in the world have done that, or just us two dafties :)

We are now mid February and the last time we went to see Andres about blood tests was aproximately two weeks ago, whilst we were in him consulting rooms he had a phone call from OCA, and he translated back to us that if the animals were cows or goats they would know exactly what to do, but alpacas are so rare they have no categories for camelids! Now they are all discussing it further and there maybe someone else, maybe a vet from OCA or an "important" person to oversea the bloodtests especially the Tb skin test, or maybe just our own vet, who knows! Maybe March now! This year..... please!

Marcus, what a star!

It's good to talk!

2011-01-29T10:12:00.000-08:00

Well you may or may not know, Alan and I live a pretty secluded life here, in a beautiful part of inland Andalucia in Spain. Untouched completely by tourism, and there are very few English people around us. We, well I should really just speak for myself and say I love our life style here, if only I could afford to see the family a little more often, life would be pretty near perfect. Living here we chose not to be in an ex pat community, and although we have a handful of English friends, apart from meeting in the post office or in the local supermarket, for a catch up we don't very often get together. It's not that we are miserable buggers, we all chose to be here, living amongst the olive trees and Spanish farmers rather then in a built up area eg. Benidorm, or Torremolinos. If that is your choice, then that is great for you, however it is a very different life style to what we have!

I'm digressing as usual...... when we do get together with friends, it makes it all the more special. We had a double whammy recently when we met up with Kev and Sue who are moving here permanently later in the year, in the local hotel for a drink, then we introduced them to Pat and Pedro our other great friends, who live around half an hour away. They got on great, and Pedro told them if they needed any help he would always be there for them. Kev and Sue went back to their house to carry on with some work and we joined Pat and Pedro for lunch. It is wonderful to have some great friends, already here, and more moving out shortly. I can't wait!

IT'S CHRISTMAS!!!!

2011-01-16T10:02:00.000-08:00

Well Christmas is long gone now, sorry it has taken me so long to blogger my wonderful time!

The Lead up to Christmas....

As you may have read in my last update, we had dreadful rain leading up to Christmas and our little bridge leading up to our house had been washed away. Thank goodness this had been repaired, and our next worry was whether or not Frankie would be able to get here to us, due to the snow in England. For a start the flights were being cancelled left right and centre, plus of course there was the predicament of getting to Gatwick airport. Thankfully Frankie's big brother and his lovely lady, took Frankie under their wing and were adament she stayed at their house the night before the flight. Mark had already arranged to take her and Kaci to the airport, so it saved him the worry of also getting to Peacehaven and then back to the A23. Alan and I had to check the departures before our drive to Malaga the following morning, and hope and pray, all would be well.

Someone was certainly looking down on us that day, as many flights were in fact cancelled and Frankie only had the matter of a 45 minute delay! Frankie was rather nervous of how Kaci would be on the flight, would she be able to keep her still, on her lap through take off and landing, let alone other times, and would she be one of those screaming children on the plane? Frankie chatted to the cabin crew and they suggested she sit near the back where at least Kaci could have a little wander around if need be, and not get in too many peoples way. In actual fact Frankie need n't have worried, she was an angel. She looked at her books and played with her "baba" and finally fell asleep as Frankie pushed her pushchair through the arrivals gate, not a second before. You cannot believe how good it was to see them both!!!

Frankie, Kaci and I had 4 wonderful days together where we chatted and relaxed in front of the log burner. Good job we are chatterboxes as the television broke down, just a few days before. You know what they say "It never rains but it pours!" Well the weather was very bad so we would pop out and see the dogs and alpacas occassionally, in between what the weather forcast called "drenching showers". Unfortunatly we were unable to go any further because the torrent of rain once again washed away our bridge. Now we had a new dilema! How long would they take to fix the bridge yet again and, if it took a few days - how were we going to get Chris from the airport on Christmas Eve?

Alan had a cunning plan! Not really cunning, however being a Black Adder fan, any plan has to be "cunning". We still had the cut down tree from the last time the bridge had washed away, so Alan was going to walk up a blooming blooming steep hill, to the end of the track which is aproximately 3 kilometres, of which the first part really is extremely steep. A friend was then going to take him to Montoro, where he was going to have to wait 2 hours for a bus, as our friends were going away to family, they could not pick him up later, and of course the buses are few and far between. From there he was going to get the bus to Cordoba, where poor Alan was going to have to wait another 2 hours for a train to Malaga, The plan was to hire a car in Malaga, wait 4 hours for Chris's flight to land then drive home. We could then leave the car the opposite side of the river to our house, but we could at least get out and use a car, the other side!

However................. it was not going to be a easy as that, and that sounded hard! Alan had been looking at a company to hire a car for a few days, and all seemed ok, until that very moring when he went to book it online, the price had trebled, plus they informed us by email that they would verify if a car was available within 48 hours???! There just had to be another way. In desperation we phoned our friends Tim and Susie, out of interest, as we thought they had two cars, thank goodness we were right, and they very kindly said we could borrow their pick up truck. In Spain it is the car that has to be insured, not the person, so we were able to borrow it. Yippee! This made life so much easier. Alan still had to walk the track, and get his lift into Montoro, however he could then get our last minute Christmas food shopping in town, come back home and still relax for a while, before heading off to the airport. Chris and Alan arrived home safely at 1.30 am having had to cross the tree/ bridge in pitch black with only a torch!

Kaci meets the alpacas

... and Arthur the Spanish Mastin

Christmas!!!

Our rental apartment all ready for Christmas

Christmas day was pretty good weather and extremely relaxing. We spent time outside with the animals and just relaxed, whilst having a ball watching Kaci opening her Christmas presents. Everything is so very exciting for a year old, the smallest book, the new pink food bowls, and of course the talking Winnie the Pooh, but especially the box it came in haha! She was such a joy! Kaci loved the cats, which she has seen before, she was a little nervous of our big dogs, quite understandbly, and called Blue and Arthur our big beautiful Masins Ted Ted's. The alpacas or "papas" she was as inquisitive about, as they were towards her! Boxing Day the weather was beautiful and sunny, so we decided to go to Cordoba Zoo. As we had the borrowed car of course, which had to be left the other side of the river. The morning started by crossing the tree bridge, then brekkie in Cordoba then off to the zoo. We had a lovely day there,and Kaci was really able run quite freely as there were few people there. It is a lovely little zoo, and it was lovely to spend our Boxing Day there as a family!

Anyway the dreaded 28th was looming up when they were travelling back together, and the day before we had made plans to visit friends in the hotel in town for a drink, then the lovely couple who had lent us the car, who have a miniature donkey and miniature pony, we thought Kaci would love them. So we all made it over the tree/bridge yet again and set off towards town. On route there was a blooming clunk, we had hit a huge pot hole!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And burst a tyre grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. Unfortunately the right tools were not in the car to get the spare from under a tow bar, so after about half an hour of struggling, Alan started to walk back to our house to get the tools from ours. A very kind local man, who we did not know stopped and tried to help, but with no avail, but he had seen Alan walking, and went back and picked him up, to take him to our house to collect the tools. Alan had walked over 2 miles with about another 5 to go! In actual fact that morning we had seen people literally drive through the river as it was n't very deep, and Alan decided to do the same and bring our car back. He then took us straight to the friends house, that had lent us the car, and we had to cancel the other friends in the hotel! Alan collected a mechanic friend that managed to change the tyre in just 20 minutes with the correct tools. What a blooming day! We did however have a lovely time with Tim and Suzy and their 3 dogs and pony and donkey!

Well the leaving day had arrived, and they still had not started working on the bridge so we drove back through the river the following day to take them all to the airport. I decided to drive (after the river crossing) as it helps to take my mind off the "goodbyes" which I hate and seem to get harder each time. Kaci is a dream, in fact she is extremely bright little girl, a total charactor, even Alan was quite smitten with her. Well that was my Christmas, apart from to say the bridge has now been fixed, the day after they left, let's hope it holds throug the rest of winter! I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas, and are taking some time to relax and recharge your battery.

I wish you a wonderfully happy and healthy 2011!

"Christmas Dinner please!"

Got to get into a box at Christmas :-)

Cordoba Zoo

A tired little girl, back home over the "tree/ bridge"

A little ride on Monty? Not too sure!

The rain in Spain ......

2010-12-08T07:59:00.001-08:00

Last year in the middle of December the rain started, and lordy Lord without a word of a lie, it hardly stopped for three months. We practically lived in our wellies, and the poor alpacas looked so glum, bless them! This year so far has been a lot better, however, when the rain began around the second week in December it was pretty torrential. "Drenching showers" the weather forcast called it! Once last year Alan saw the river flow over the top of our little bridge, ever so slightly! Oh no, not this year! I don't know if it was sheer volume of water that runs off down the hills, that filter through the gullies on the tracks, and into the little "arroyo's" that eventually join the huge Guadalquivir river, that runs through Andulcia.

When it rains hard here, we have very little solar, and the television has no satellite signal, so there was little else to do than read, be on the laptop, or gaze out of the window. Generally feeling rather miserable. We could hear our little river (arroyo) roaring with the speed the water was travelling at. Occasionally we would wander down our track in our wellies and coats to just look. At one point Alan had been looking over the alpaca paddock and he realised the bridge had gone.... disapeared.

The bridge is made up of a huge metal tube, which is basically held in place by rocks, stone and mud. An olive container (the back of a lorry) had been washed from its collection point, and had been dragged down in the sheer force of water and wedged under our bridge. Of course this limited the amount of water getting through the pipe and the water began flowing around the sides and over the top of it. The tube had been pushed further down the river, plus the olive containr too, and left a gaping hole between us and the town of Montoro............... yikes!

The following day, lots of locals, well maybe 20 or so, that's a lot for us, throughout the day, came to look at the damage done and many little meetings seemed to be in progress. Lots of shouting, wildly gesticulating , shaking heads, and then driving off was taking place. The following day, a man arrived with a chain saw and a huge eucalyptus tree was cut down, at a point across the river, so at least people could get across it. You see where we live, very few people if any use the houses around us as their permant homes. Their country homes are used for occasional weekends, holidays and through the olive picking season. They are often used solely by their olive pickers. Which could be a Spanish family of 4 or 5 adults, or even a group of Romanians. They would live there, and the farmers would come in to check on their work, maybe working with them, probably not, most days. Of course the olive pickers were in the same situation as us, as they could not get out to go to town. When word had got around, the olive pickers would walk down towards our house and climb over the tree and be collected by car from their bosses the other side, to get food in.

However we had no one the other side waiting for us!

After a couple of days, more meetings, more gesticulating, something seemed to be happening. We were sure someone official would turn up, with a tape measure at least. Nope that did n't happen, but one man put a stick in the water, to check the depth of the river. Another obviously felt he could not be trusted so he got IN the river, it was only about waist high by then. It had subsided considerably. The next thing we knew we heard rumbling and two tractors turned up, and things started to happen! It took two days for the tube to be back in place and a whole lot of mud to be dragged and pressed around it. Cars were driving over it, but how long was it going to last, was the big question?

To the left of the palm tree you can just see the corner of the blue olive container

The bridge has been washed away!

Sad looking Sunshine Santa

Its all coming back together

A tractor, a meeting, our alpacas, a man and his 2 dogs, in on the action!

Argh it's all gone wrong!

2010-12-05T04:02:00.001-08:00

When I went back to Brighton this time, Alans mum decided to come over a few days. It was great for her to have a break, from her busy schedule plus a bit of emotional support for Alan as, seriously, everytime I go back something goes wrong! Whilst I was away this time Alan had a) A litter of cats that seemed to just turn up, or were put under our fence. b) A local olive farmer asking Alan if he had seen his Romanians, which he had lost (his olive pickers that is) c) A group of men shouting for his attention as they were stuck in mud a couple of kilometres up the track, and they needed a tow! d) And our car battery died one evening. Ken, our good samaritan, fitted us with a new battery, and it seemed to be ok the following day! Nothing desperately terrible then, it all waited, luckily until I got back home!

Ok so I was back and cooing around the place talking about my beautiful granddaughters, and of course my kids too, and it all seemed to blooming go together! Alan decided to go out and play football one evening. He has been desperate to get back to it, but something always stops him. He just needs our friend to be with him for the first night, as of course it's so difficult with the language barrier. He was on his way up the track, excited and hopeful, bless him, when the phone went. It was David cancelling at the last minute, as he was ill. Whilst Alan took the call the car lights were dimming! He sadly turned the car around and drove back home. When safely at home, he turned off the engine, and tried to immediately turn it back on.... it was n't having any of it! The alternator had gone on the car, although luckily we were able to use it during the day! One of our genny's was n't working anyway, so it just left the second to stop working, which of course it did. No genorator mean no power unless it is sunny! Nope, none of that, just plenty of rain, plus our water pump also stopped working. This actually meant that we had water for about a week, but then it stopped! No genny to pump some more, so we had to fill water bottles from our water deposit to fill the toilet cisten, and use bottled water, heated in the kettle, phew luckily we were ok for calor gas, to heat the water for washing! Took me right back to the good old days, when mum said you had to have a strip wash!

So let me spell it out, we could only use the car during daylight! We had to order an alternator on ebay, and wait for it to be delivered to Spain. No water ....... thank the Lord for the bottled type. I would also lke to thank God for the evention of candles. It seriously was a hard couple of weeks.

Pat and Pedro our very good friends invited us over for lunch and a shower one day. Wow it was heaven, beautiful king prawns, clams artichokes and rice.................. PLUS a steaming hot shower, I wanted to sleep there....... no really! In fact maybe even move there!

No photos you will be pleased to know of us sobbing round the candles, so a few festive dogs to help cheer you up now!

Handsome Arthur

Beautiful Blue

Little needy Carlos
Our Geri

Our little mad Miliko

Brighton in November 2010

2010-11-25T08:18:00.000-08:00

Another beautiful and special trip back to Brighton to celebrate first, the baptism, followed by the first birthday of my beautiful grandadughter Kaci. It was great to be picked up from the airport by Mark, ready for the white knuckle drive on the A27. There are always lots of sucking teeth sounds when anyone drives me around, thse days, I am just not used to the traffic. We have a lot of traffic going passed us at the moment here in Spain as it is olive picking time, however that probably mean less than 10 cars a day, and doing two trips. Weaving in and out of a dual carriage way is rather like being on a roller coaster for me! First stop Mark and Callie gorgeous little house they moved into recently and seeing my beautiful little Maisie. She is more beautiful than ever, with cheeks you sooo want to squeeze. I was fed and watered, wonderfully by Callie and waited for my little Frankie to collect me after her dance classes, and take me to her and Chris's little home for a few days.

Kaci's baptism was at the catholic Church in Peacehaven and luckily the lovely Fr Tom was happy for Kaci to just walk around the church during the service, it may have been dificult to keep her still. It was a shame it was raining hard all day, but I know Frankie and Chris were so pleased with the turn out. Chris has a large family, but so many friends came too. It was so lovely to catch up. We even managed to get my little Uncle Charlie there, who at the pub, after the service, was given strict instructions to only have two pints, that is quite sufficient for him, bless him! It was also good to see Mark and Frankie's dad Garry, looking so well after a rather difficult year health wise too.

All ready for her special day

Having a potter about

Oopsy wet head!

Proud mummy and daddy

Kaci's little cousin Maisie of course came too

Kaci with her beautiful Godmummy Louise
And beautiful Godmummy Mairead

Tuesday 16th November was Kaci's 1st birthday, where on earth has that year gone. It certainly does not seem a year ago we were timing contractions, with nerves and excitement! We began the day with a trip into Newhaven to see my wonderful friends at the Haven stroke club where I was a volunteer, for many years. Back home afterwards, as Frankie and Chris had invited family and close friends over throughought the day. Kaci had such a wonderful day, and some even more beautiful presents. I was so happy to be sharing the day with them!

Birthday Princess

So very cheeky

Little Maisie comes to visit

Freddie has a soft spot for Maisie

My two beautiful grandaughters

How adorable are they!

It was also my son Marks birthday during my trip, so it was so good to be able to spend some time with him and Callie on Marks birthday.

Walking the alpacas

2010-11-01T09:43:00.001-07:00

We always thought it would be a great holiday experience to take an alpaca for a walk, and during the months of September and October we did some work with the boys. They had been on halters previously apart from our two youngest, Galaxy and Santa. so we concentrated first with Rafa, Galaxy and Marcus. Our first few times we walked the around their paddock then outside their paddock but still in our grounds. Rafa was a dream, and Galaxy very quickly caught on too, however Marcus was rather nervous, and many minutes were spent just standing still with him, whilst he sadly watched the other boys have fun exploring. Of course we persevered with him and he also now is very happy walking. We have a little route we take them on where they can munch on grass and weeds on the way. It is extremely relaxing and another way of getting close to ur beautiful alpacas.

We also spent time with the girls, Cassandra and Lily were perfectly happy to be haltered. Bermuda we don't think has ever had a halter on during her life, maybe just for her transportation, nothing she would particularly compare to being a pleasant experience. Over the last couple of years we have have had the pleasure of owning Bermuda, she has certainly become less nervous of us, and I certainly feel she has benefited from being in a smaller herd. Although we have not taken her out of her paddock yet, we were delighted to get a halter on her.

A bit of TLC with Bermuda

.... and she ventures out... just!

Great year with our holiday guests!

2010-11-01T09:42:00.002-07:00

What a great year Alan and I have with regard to our holiday lets this year. Our youngest paying guest was aged four, and of course my beautiful grandaughter Maisie was here at just around 8 weeks old too. Our most mature guest was 70 and spent his birthday here with us, before jetting off to do his regular charity work in Ethiopia. We have welcomed guests from the UK, France, Spain, Holland and Germany, and thoroughly enjoyed it. Most of our visitors hve integrated well with our animals and most of the children have liked to come and help feed the alpacas, and cuddle the dogs! However this of course is not obligatory. What a wonderful way of making a living! We had some wonderful feed back too in our visitors book. We have had a few enquiries over the winter, as yes no definite bookings, although we do like to let people know we are rural and of course have no such luxury as central heating, lovely log fire though. We have also been invited into our holiday apartments to share meals and drinks etc with guests too, how lovely is that! We do have four weeks of next summer already booked and deposits paid for.

Looks like another good year..... hopefully!

More great new friends!

2010-11-01T09:42:00.001-07:00

A few months ago we had a suprise email from a couple interested in buying some alpacas. They had put "alpacas in Spain" into google, and we were top of the list, good that! The very exciting thing was the only had a house 20 minutes away from us, just the other side of Montoro, and they were coming over to Spain in the next few days. We were emailing back and forth for the next day or so, and made plans for them to come to us and see our alpacas ............. I was so excited. Haha it's good to talk!

You know occasionally in life you have met up with someone and you just know you are going to click, and be grea friends? Well it was like that with Kev and Sue. Since meeting up that first time at our place, we have also had lunch at their lovely little house which will soon become their full time residence. They also came to us, with their lovely family for a bbq and swim in the summer, ooooh and we watched the semi final of the world cup at the park together on the big screen. One night we shan't forget in a hurry was in the middle of summer when we were eating outside in a lovely little restaurant in town, and totally out of the bue, we had, what felt like a mini tornado with torrential rain. Chairs and tables were flying everywhere, and all Sue and I could do was laugh hysterically! It was lovely to meet briefly this week as they did a flying visit, with brekkie and a chat in Cordoba. Good times! We are very much looking forward to seeing them in January on their next flying visit :)

In actual fact our first meeting was months ago now, but I like to ask friends if they re happy for me to mention them in my blog, I don't want to take it for granted!

Santa and the figs

2010-10-09T02:35:00.001-07:00

Santa the alpaca adores fresh figs, and we used to allow him one each day with his dinner, and the other alpacas too. We were thinking of weaning him, but he is a big baby and loves being with his mum, so we had just put it off. However he escaped twice to get to the figs that had fallen off the tree, and we knew it had to be done, and sooner rather than later.

One evening Alan had gone into town and I was feeding the alpacas, on my own. I knew immediatetly something was terribly wrong. Santa was lying on the ground with his head on the floor drooling. He struggled to get up as I got close to him, which was a good sign, although he did not eat, and he was drooling a lot of the time. Alan had the only phone with him, but luckily we had guests, with a phone, so I phoned Alan to tell him to get the vet, who of course does n't drive! However I guess I did n't sound paniced enough so he went to our pharmacist friend who gave him some medicine for him, then called into the vet to check it was ok or him to take. Andres the vet did say he could give him a couple of injections to make him more comfortable. But Alan just brought the medicine home, and not Andres!

When Alan arrived back he soon realised Santa was not in a good way. So we buddled him into the back of the car and took him to the vet in Montoro. I phoned Andres on route and told him we were on our way as it was around 9.30 pm and his surgery closes at 9pm. Santa was ok in the car, humming loudly of course as alpacas often do that when they are unhappy. Andres came down to the car, and we got him out. He was making a terrible crying noise, he was of course feeling like a child at a party that had eaten too many cakes and sweets, AND he wanted his mum! As we got him out of the car so Andres could listen to his stomach(s) (they have three), a little dog came running barking at him, I bet the little dog did n't know what on earth Santa was, nor would any of the neighbours in the area, I'm sure! Poor little Santa! Andres did not seem overly worried, and he gave him two injections which once again made him cry like big baby. One was a painkiller and the other to help with his digestion.

Andres and Alan bundled Santa back into the car again, and we managed to get him home without too much humming and crying. We had to make a snap decision that it would also be the best time to take him away from his mum, otherwise he may have been over the fence eating figs again. So at around 11pm we did a little "musical alpacas." Galaxy and Santa had been together as babies so we thought they would be perfect together until we wanted to integrate them with the big boys! They are still together now, and look rather like Siamese twins, although different colours, always close together.

Bermuda, Santa's mum did fantastically, with very little upset from her, and Santa and Galaxy are having a lovely time growing up together. Thank goodness, all is well!

A couple of days before the fig incident, we were trying to entice Santa out. Mum Bermuda looks up at him lovingly!

Meeting of great friends

2010-10-05T04:56:00.001-07:00

We do a regular shopping trip to another town around 45 minutes away from us each week, it's a day out really, plus a chance to stock up on things we may not be able to get in our home town. Like Montoro thre are very few English around there so I jumped at the chance to say hi to an English couple around the fruit and veg a few weeks ago. Not only was the lady English but lived 10 minutes drive from where I used to live in Brighton!!!!! How crazy is that! Pat's husband Pedro is orignally from Montoro, his family had a huge olive farm there many years ago. Pat and Pedro lived in Portslade near Brighton for 40 years then deided to retire in Jaen, the province slightly north of Cordoba and near Granada. After exchanging email addresses, we promised to keep in touch. We certainly have, we have lunched, dinnered, barbequed and swam. Funny is n't it, we have made such lovely new friends, just from a supermarket trip!

Pat and I, in the pool

Haha, Pedro trying to cuddle Blue

Unhappy guests

2010-09-23T09:15:00.003-07:00

I have counted up and we have had the pleasure, and I really mean pleasure, of sharing our home with twenty two families in the last two years. Sadly we had one booking that did not quite work so well.

When we receive an enquiry, we always refer prospective guests to our website, and recommend they check it out as we are very rural, and basically a small workng farm, with alpacas, dogs and semi tame cats. We also do not want guests coming and thinking then can walk to a village or bar, it takes twenty minutes by car, but then all your needs can be met with bars, restaurants, banks, shops etc, even though they are quaint and very traditional, there are no fish and chip shops, chinese take aways etc. We are in "real Spain" Well we had an enquiry, and Alan sent them the link, sadly not all of the prospective guests looked at it.

I was in Brighton celebrating Maisies baptism, and we already had guests here. Alan received a phone call from our next guests, that should have been arriving three days later, to inform Alan they were in Cordoba and ready to be met. We always meet guests just off of the motorway as the house can be difficult to find for the first time. Alan explained that there were not expected for another few days, and he was told they had changed their mind regarding their order of their travels. Rather than saying no it was not possible, he asked or them to give him a couple of hours so he could get the apartment ready for them, which they were happy to do, and he promptly rushed aound like a blue arsed fly!

.

We explain on the website that we have track leading to our house, however it is perfectly fine to drive on, and does n't need a 4 x 4, Alan knew sadly the moment they stepped out of the car and moaned about the track, it was going to be difficult. Alan is n't one for any form of confrontation, and he did his best to make them feel relaxed and welcome. The following morning of which Alan thought had been a good night with the dogs, and Arthur had been pretty well behaved, Alan was met by one of the guests and told in no uncertain terms that "The dogs had to go!" This was rather laughable until Alan was told that the if the dogs kept them awake again (although they certainly had n't kept Alan awake) THAT ALAN WOULD BE KEPT AWAKE! Quite was they were implying we are not sure. Alan rightly decided that we did not need guests like that and gave them back their money, and suggested they find a hotel. Apparantly as the left he was asked "No hard feelings?" A bit late for that I think!

In future we shall doubley check that all guests realise that we have a track, and dogs, which occasionly bark, and yes it does get hot in the summer here!

Thank you to all our other guests for making this so pleasurable!

Maisie's Beautiful Baptism day

2010-09-23T09:15:00.001-07:00

Sunday 12th September, it would have been my mums birthday, as from today it had another wonderful special occasion, Maisie's baptism. The sky was blue, and there are few better places to be than Brighton, when it is sunny. It was going to be a hectic day, so Frankie dropped me over to Callie and Mark's in the morning to help a little, although Callie and her mum had made a very good start before I arrived. I had a lovely morning helping a little, and just being there with Maisie and the family.

Maisie 's baptism was at St. Thomas Mores RC church in Brighton, and led by Fr. John. I have met him a few times before, a truly lovely priest, he started the service outside in the sunshine, and we then all followed inside. Frankie was looking after Dilan, who slept most of the time, the Godfathers baby, and Chris was on photography duty, whilst I tried my best to look after a rather excited Kaci who rather liked the sound of her voice echoing around the church.

The service was beautiful and Maisie looked and behaved like an absolute angel. As Mark held her at the font, she did not murmur once but her little head became lower and lower and she slowly and gently nodded off to sleep. She cried just a tiny bit as the priest anointed her with her holy water, that's good - I was always told that's the devil coming out - as if!

After the service we had a lovely afternoon at one of the local pubs where Mark, Callie and Callie's family had put on a beautiful buffet. It was really nice for me to meet more of Callie's family.

What a wonderful day. I am so much looking forward to a repeat when it is Kaci's big day in November!

A handful of my favourite photos

I'm hoping to post a few more photos soon

Brighton :)

2010-09-23T09:14:00.001-07:00

My trips to Brighton, were always great, and I love my children so much, but having these beautiful grandaughters as well, makes it doubley fantastic going back. It is so hard not seeing them grow and change every day, or even every week, that when I see them I am totally in awe of how beautiful they are, and what little characters they both are.

This trip was for Mark and Callies daughter Maisie's baptism, and I shall tell you all about our wonderful day in the next blog. Since moving to Spain our priorities in life are very different. We spend most of the time inside working, or outside with the dogs, or in the paddocks with the alpacas. No need to hair to be straightened very often, or make up to be worn, or even nice clothes to be worn. It came to prepare for my trip back and had not got a clue what I could wear, for Mark, Callie and Maisie's special day. In Montoro there are plenty of shops if you are a size zero up to about size 12 - the young girls / ladies are teeny tiny here, or there is the twin set brigade, that always look dressed for wedding. I don't fit into either of these catagories, so my four days in Brighton were going to include a trip round the shops trying to find something to wear- nightmare!

Day 1 - Shopping - We arrived in town, looked in 2 or 3 shops, went into a coffee shop then met up with friends, and babies.............. wonderful!

Day 2 - Frankie and I decided if we went to Eastbourne we could probably shop til we dropped and no skiving chatting to friends. Shame but it had to be done.

I was getting cross with myself, although I must admit Frankie was being very patient with me, then we found something, yipppeeee! Good old M&S! Our poor old feet, we could go home and relax and get ready for the big day tomorrow!

Kaci and Mairead

Maisie, dreaming about her special day!

The boy friend, Freddie with mummy Lizzie

Adios Nigel and Ginny

2010-09-23T09:13:00.000-07:00

Our good friends Nigel and Ginny Cobb, have decided to say "adios" to Spain, and "bonjour" to France. The cunning plan by their friends Kevin and Yvonne, was to have a great farewell party for them. The alpaca gang led by Mike and Linda, decided we could help out by getting Nigel and Ginny out of the house for a little get together of our own. The plan was that Ginny could tell us all about her fantastic trip to the other side of the world visiting alpaca friends. Along with of course a lovely lunch supplied by Mike and Linda, and a good ole catch up with us, David and Di, and Jane. After catching up for quite a few hours with the vino flowing we realised, after wondering how on earth we were going to keep Nigel and Ginny there, so long, in actual fact the problem was going to be how are we going to get them back to their place for the party. We had all trooped up to see Mike and Linda's lovely animals, including their notoriously naughty spit machine Lilly. They were all looking stunning, and Alan and I secretly love their donkeys, if they were n't so big they would be in the back of our car, and up on their way to the Cordoba Province by now.

Yvone had rung numerous times, the guests were there and waiting in anticipation and Ginny was in full swing talking about the stunning Lorca (the alpaca not the gay Spanish poet). Eventually Yvonne got through and spun Ginny a tale that some people from England had turned up unexpectedly to see them. Ginny was wracking her brain to think who on earth it could be, and the speedy thinking of Yvonne insisted it was to be a surprise but they had to go home now........ great tactic! Alan and I stayed to help Mike and Linda with their alpaca chores and have a freshen up, and we followed on later.

Nigel and Ginny called us a few choice names when we did arrive, far too rude to be put in print, and we had a super evening.

I think our friends will be moving soon and we wish them all the very best in their new life in France. They will be keeping a herd of alpacas in Ronda, and we hope to catch up with them as often as we can.

Ginny, Linda and Alan get hands on with the extremely

handsome Lorca

Alpaca friends together but a donkey wants the close up shot!

Why lean on a post when you can lean on a donkey?

How gorgeous is he!

Mike and Linda's beautiful dogs, pool and view!

He's a little nightmare, but we love him

2010-08-22T03:53:00.000-07:00

By mid morning, during the summer months, Blue and Geri are chomping at the bit to get inside for a siesta, Miliko is too, but he just wants to get in to cause havoc. Yesterday was one of those days. He looked quite settled and relaxed, when the three of them barged through the door of the apartment, otherwise I would have chased him back out. An hour or so later, I went to check on them. Blue and Geri were sleeping soundly, no surprise there, but silly me had not locked the door to our bedroom and bathroom. I shuddered to think of the destruction I might find!

Now bear in mind Miliko is the smallest of our dogs, has one leg visibly shorter than the other three and he can open open his mouth 18mms at the last measurement. Ok try and visualise the destruction........

Our bed that was clear apart from a sheet if we need it, yes don't forget it's August in Spain. We have huge plastic holdalls, aproximately a metre square that we keep bedding in. He had dragged one from the bedroom to the bathroom, and pulled out a towel, a mattress protector, and a thick furry throw. He had taken a bag that contained twelve toilet rolls up on to the bed to have a play with, plus, a new pair of trainers of mine and a glittery flip flop (he has already eaten the sequins off of the other one), one trainer of Alans and one slipper. A small shopping bag from a cupboard, oh and a TEN KILO bag of Geri's food which was a least half full, was also on the bed too. It was like a child surrounded by his toys but with lunch there to nibble on.

Little bugger!

Meeting with friends in El Torcal

2010-07-24T11:36:00.001-07:00

It was almost a year since we, the member's of the Spanish alpaca group AEDA, that stands for Asociación España de Alpacas, had managed to get together, for one reason or another. At last we managed to set a date at meet up at our friends David and Di's house in one of the most stunning regions of Andalucia, the El Torcal National Park. Just a short time after we arrived Di informed us they had a baby donkey born two weeks previously. That was it, the vino was put on hold and we all immediatly trotted, excuse the pun, to see him, and what a little beauty!

Mum and baby donk, how lovely!

It was a beautiful day and surprisingly enough we managed to get through our meeting in pretty good time, thanks to Mr. Cobb keeping his eye on the clock! Allowing us to have a good old catch up with good friends, something we miss dearly. I do wish we could get together more often.

Fabulous view from the terrace

Mike with David and Di's beautiful cria

Nigel gets a "hello" kiss

What a stunning journey home

The official naming of kittens

2010-07-19T04:49:00.000-07:00

Our kittens are a few months old now, and we could not decide on names for them. They were going to be called Wayne (Rooney), Frank (Lampard) and A.N.Other, probably Steve (Gerrard) however we decided to see how the English football team performed. We would now like to introduce the kittens and with names we decided on, you will of course notice they are not English names, at all, but of course Spanish!

Andres (Iniesta)

Fernando (Torres)

And Sergio (Ramos)

With his mum, Barb

Just a cute one of them all hiding together!

Spain, world cup winners!!!

2010-07-16T10:14:00.001-07:00

Alan and I are both patriotic I would say, I especially love my home town of Brighton, and long for my visits there. The sight of the sea, brings a smile to my face! However we chose two and a half years ago to move here, to Spain, and although I miss my family and friends immensly, I do not regret that decision.

Sadly I did n't think we will ever experience the thrill of living in a country, that would win the world cup, and are very grateful to have a, sort of, second chance, whilst living here in Spain. We watched the semi final with our lovely new friends Kev and Sue, and their family in the park. We had a lovely evening together. The atmostphere in the park was wonderful. I should decribe the park really, it is a small park compared to those we have in Brighton, small grassy areas where dads and children are often are seen kicking a football to each other. It has a little "walkway" where the elderly walk along throughout the evening, meeting up with friends, a typical fountain in the middle, but also three bars in the park too. The bar we like to go to, also sells food, has a large tv screen and also shading and fans. A must when it can still be 40 degrees at 10pm. Our Spanish friends met us at half time, after David finished work too. When the final whistle went, the noise from the local teenagers in their cars was so exciting. They obviously all dashed to their cars, and drove around, taking all of about ten minutes to circle the town, waving flags excitedly out of the windows. How on earth would they be during the final?

Well final night arrived, and Kev and Sue sadly went back to the UK before the final, although they assured us they would be thinking of us. David said he would like us to go to the casino with his family to watch the game. The casino is actually a members club, not what we would think of as a casino. We met up with his family at his house, and waited whilst their little boys finished face painting their faces and got their scarfs etc, and the tension was almost unbearable. I was worried that with the "English's" luck at football, we could not possibly bring them any luck, and the minutes ticked by, I was dreading the thought of penalties. When the goal was scored for Spain aproximately two minutes before the end of extra time, it was pretty blooming close to feeling it was England. We had followed Spain, and of course knew a little about Real Madrid, and Barcelona footbal teams, from which many of the players play for regularly. Well I know a little, and Alan knows loads!

The final whistle was blown, there was much back slapping, shaking hands, hugging and kissing, and then pretty much the place emptied. As we left we saw why. Practically every bar was empty, the tiny streets of Montoro, this typically old fashioned town, had never seen such excitement, and the street were full. A journey to our friends which would have taken ten minutes to walk (but you don't when you have two small children and it's over 40 degrees) took us about forty five minutes to drive. Cars in front of us were being rocked, and stopped from moving forward until you played a tune on your horn to enable you to pass. Teenages were crammed into cars, many sitting on the roof waving flags and blowing their vuvuzelas. Often driving through tiny passages, with old ladies sitting oustside, enjoying the very slightly fresher air that the evening brought. As we passed the park we had watched the match in just a few days before, the park was heaving, with many people cooling down from their excitement, in the park fountain. I was very happy and excited, and I wanted to be in that fountain!

When Alan and I got home we were in time to watch the highlights on our English channel, it was great to understand the commentary and relive the excitement of the match and the fantastic presentation, and fun and frolics after. What a night!

David and Jesus get ready for a night they will never forget

Alan standing out a mile, in blue!

The big moment

Sadly our camera was playing up, and I could not take any photos outside, when it was dark!

Update on Miliko at the vet

2010-06-25T06:28:00.002-07:00

As per usual I am about three weeks behind with my blog writing, nothing new there. However I though I must keep you all up to date with our little darling, that wrecks the place, and drives us and the other dogs to distraction..... yes Miliko. We took him along to the vet in Cordoba as arranged, for a check up, after one month, having being given the news that there really was nothing we could do for the little fella, regarding his soft tissue that had formed around his jaw, that had been dislocated, and preventing him from opening his mouth very wide. Well personally, I was over the moon, to hear it had stayed at exactly the same size. He can open his mouth 18mms. He can still eat his dinner, and tries very hard to play with toys, drag washing off the clothes line, eat candles, and I'm afraid even manage to eat baby birds. Sadly nature has it's way of keeping the bird population down, and Miliko is one of those ways. I was so worried that he had deteriorated and therefore would have an idea of how long the lil fella would have, but thank God, this is not the case just yet. We are going back to the vet in six months time, God willing. He will be one year old in August, bless him!

Miliko being a pain to Blue, whilst she is trying to watch her favourite tv program Bondi Vet!

Wonderful trip back to Brighton

2010-06-25T06:28:00.001-07:00

I know we all think we have the most wonderful children in the world, but I'm sorry, I do! Thanks to my wonderful daughter and family, I hopped onto an easy jet flight in Malaga for another little trip back to, what was a gloriously sunny Brighton. As usual it was not long enough to see many friends, although I did manage to catch up with a couple of besties. This time including my good friend Karen, that I worked with, in one of the schools, who was adament that she treat me to lunch, lunch was great, but the company even better. It was wonderful to catch up Karen, thank you! Poor Frankie is carless at the moment but we managed to get about on buses without too much difficulty, even though she is out in Peacehaven. Thanks to buses, and Mark and Callie driving around, I managed to see as much of the kids and beautiful babies as possible. The babies are both such charactors now. Kaci was standing up beside the furniture, and crawling, really laughing and squealing, as well as saying, dada, mumumum, and pa! This was her favourite thing to shout at me whilst I tried so hard to encourage her to say nana! I would just get "PA" in return. Maise is now having these great little conversations, but she sounds like she is having a good old moan, inbetween the most beautiful smiles. I am so proud of my Frankie and Mark, and their little families, and I just cannot believe how wonderful it is to be a nanny. It is so very difficult to be away from them for long periods, it helps when I have a definate date for a return trip. Which I am extremely happy to say I have just booked....... yippppeeee! Ok, proud nanny wants to show you all the photos below!

Maisie

Kaci

My two gorgeous girls!

Alpaca weaning

2010-06-06T02:55:00.000-07:00

The time had come, well if I am honest, probably a couple of months ago, that Galaxy needed weaning. Cassandra his mum was a little on the thin side so we knew it would be in her best interest, but we were worried as young alpacas get very upset and hum loudly whilst looking for their mum, and the mum gets very stressed and agitated too, thinking their youngster has gone missing. Santa who is younger than Galaxy can be weaned soon, although he was not ready to be weaned at the same time as Galaxy, we also knew that he would miss his little friend!

Galaxy had been into the paddock playing with Rafa, Marcus and Eduardo, the boys, a few times. It had started off very friendly, with the boys practically skipping, high off of the ground, but of course then a need to prove dominance begins, and when things would get a little rough we would put the hose on them, just to calm things. So we were unsure how things would be. Also Rafa was being a little bit bullied in the boys paddock so we had an idea that maybe we would seperate Rafa and Galaxy together, to enable them to do a little bit of team building before putting the boys back together again.

So the big day arrived, we had to plan it with great precision, unfortunately it was a day that we had guests arriving, but never the less it was the day Alan wanted to do it. We managed somehow to get Rafa and Galaxy past Marcus and Eduardo and through to their new paddock. All was well for about five minutes when all hell let lose! Eduardo and Marcus suddenly realised they did not want to lose Rafa from their gang, and somehow squeezed through a tiny gap in a fence, that was less that a foot wide, they were runing around excitedly. Meanwhile Rafa jumped over his new fence to see his mates, that we thought he would like to be away from. Ok project all halted until another day!

Let's try again! Having blocked holes in fences and tied up fencing to lessen opportunities of escaping alpacas we had another go. Maybe it was beause we were calmer but all seemed to go to plan. The grey boys, Marcus and Edardo were in a small area so they could not run around. Galaxy did run up to them and had a good sniff and said "hi!" He then followed to where Rafa had gone to their new paddock, yet again! All was calm and all was well. No alpacas could escape! After a couple of hours, Alan and I thought we would pop ino town as Galaxy seemed fine, and although Cassandra was humming pretty loudly we knew she just had to get through the next couple of days, and she would be perfectly happy again.

Alan went ahead and opened the gate and started the car, as I followed behind, Rafa tried once again to jump over the fence. Poor little lad his front legs and feet were over, with his back feet off the ground. I knew Alan would not hear me shouting for him over the car engine so I had to wait for him to drive slowly down from our car parking area, as of course by then he was wondering where I was. As he looked for me he thought I was standing, cuddling Rafa, until he realised that I was trying to take some of his weight as he balanced over a fence. Bless him! We undid some fencing, and managed to get Rafa back on four feet, with no harm done, apart from his dignity, and alpaca street credability. Since then Marcus and Eduardo have settled down nicely, Rafa and Galaxy are doing just great, and Cassandra was a little upset for a few days, and could often be seen looking over the gate for her little boy, but thankfully she is also doing fine now, and is starting to put some weight back on!

Rafa and Galaxy happy in their new paddock

Rafa explores their new stable

He seems happy!

Beautiful baby birds

2010-05-31T10:12:00.000-07:00

This year we have been lucky enough to really enjoy the beautiful birds around us. We think they are swifts, I have looked online and they certainly look like swifts, although apparantly they do everything mid flight, even sleep, and mate.... how bizarre is that! The problem is ours do seem to perch, well it's not a problem for them, only me trying to decide what they are! Well we have many nests too numerous to count, however some of them have been fairly easy to see inside, and watch the little miracles hatch.

Little fluffy heads peeping out!

Another full nest

We saw one little brave soldier take his first flight, he landed about five metres away on the ground. His parents watched intently and flew around him trying to encourage him, it was wonderful to watch!

About to take the plunge!

Mum or dad, encouraging him!

Ok who's next?

Poor Santa, then poor poor Alan!

2010-05-25T11:58:00.001-07:00

Feeding time with the alpacas usually goes very smoothly, apart from the fact that they all love their concentrated food, and there is always at least one alpaca, trying to get it's head into the bucket with the feed in. Santa, at six months old, is very playful now, and dinner time is no exception. We usually put down the bucket that has the feed in too, and being that its smaller he rather likes it. One evening a couple of weeks ago the dinner was all gone, but Santa decided to play with the bucket. He tossed it up in the air and it landed right over his head, and slid down his neck! Well the little fella leapt about, not knowing what on earth had happened to him. His mum on the other hand, huge, beautiful, gorgeous but I can floor Mr. Nigel Cobb in a split second, thought something was round his neck, and attacking her baby boy. Of course she thought it must be to do with us, and as Alan neared Santa to try and get the bucket from round his neck, the spit fest began! Well we have seen alpacas spit, luckily for us though, we have only ever had warning spits, that are usually little more than air. However not this time! Poor Alan was cornered by Bermuda who literally, and yes I mean literally covered him from head to toe in green, disgusting spit, and making dreadful alarm calls! Poor Alan rather looked like someone had thrown up, green stuff all over him, and with their three stomach's, yuk, it smelt like it too! Alan shouted for me to try and help, but then Bermuda ran towards me, she was just so scared, bless her heart, she knew something was happening to her baby, and she is the most protective mum.

We felt particularly sad as we had worked really hard with Bermuda. She had rather a reputation, personally I feel she has been happy in a small herd and we have really been able to spend some time with her. She eats from our hand and we can catch her quite easily, bless her, she has come a long way.

Eventually Alan suggested we give them a little more food, so we gave them all half an hour to calm down a little, then she walked calmly towards me and ate out of my bucket, I was so pleased. Meanwhile Alan was able to get hold of Santa, and take the bucket off. No harm done, and Alan headed straight for a shower!

Bermuda on a calmer day
Handsome little Santa!

May, the month of fab family visits :)

2010-05-25T11:57:00.003-07:00

The month of May began with a visit from Frankie's partner Chris and his brother Gary. You may remember that Frankie was unable to come as their baby, Kaci's passport did not arrive back in time after it's "random blooming check!" Anyway the boys arrived, and of course we tried to give them the best holiday we could under the circumstances. The weather was very good, not too hot, so Gary could sit in the sun and fry, whilst Chris could keep popping indoors say "Oooh it's too hot for me out there!" Although Chris was not worried about the heat, when he was throwing him self into the pool. We all had a lovely time. We did not do many outings, although we did visit the Cordoba festival of patios, which was absolutely stunning! We certainly must put it on our website as an excellent week to visit Cordoba!

Chris in pose mode at one of the stunning patios

Playtime in the pool!

I was supposed to be having a wonderful surprise.... well it was still a wonderful surprise, but not quite the way it was supposed to be. I was completely unaware that my beautiful little grandaughter Maisie, had been given the all clear to fly, following her heart murmour worries, and Mark and Callie had in fact booked a trip to come over too. I did find out earlier than planned, as Alan had been trying to arrange if Frankie and Kaci would be able to come over with them too, so he had to tell me. They were a little disappointed they could not surprise me, but it was still a wonderful surprise...... if you see what I mean.

Mark was going to hire a car, but the day before we got an email "Mum, any chance you can pick us up from the airport?" It was such a lovely drive, two hours of sheer excitement before seeing Mark, Callie and my beautiful little Maisie again. Apparantly she was a little star on the plane. Once she had thrown up all over poor Callie and did a huge poo, she was all smiles, typical! Apparantly every one getting off the plane before them, was saying how gorgeous she was. Anyway we all arrived home in Montoro and I so enjoyed being a proper hands on nanny for about eight days. Mark and Callie had fun around the pool with the boys. Maisie also had loads of fun in the pool, and lots of quiet times in the big cool kitchen with nanny, wonderful!

My beautiful Maisie tries out her baby pool first

Now in the big pool with mummy and daddy!

BBQ one evening

Little Maisie totally zonked after swimming!

As well as enjoying the great company of Chris, Gary, Mark Callie and Maisie, Alan's mum and brother also joined us for a week, which was great! They came just in time for the fabulous Cordoba feria, or festival. Mike, Alan's brother, had n't been here for about 18 months, so the place had changed rather a lot! The weather was great, so they had a good time relaxing, I hope. Sadly, Chris and Gary had to go home before the Cordoba feria, but the rest of us went. Apparantly it goes on all night, but we dragged ourselves away around 12.30am. I had been flagging rather, and then just beore we were leaving, we passed lots of marquees that had been set up as bars and restaurants, many with flamenco dancing going on inside! Oooooh I would so love to do that! What a great month May was!

Mark, Callie and Maisie at the entrance to the Cordoba Feria

Maisie had a good time!

I love this photo!

Real flamenco, in a bar!

Two gorgeous little ones, dressed for the occasion!

Mike with his best mate, Carlos!

A bit of a blow, poor Miliko!

2010-05-25T11:57:00.001-07:00

I can write this blog today, as I am having a good day, and so is little Miliko, but I'm afraid this is a bit of a difficult blog to write. When we took Miliko to see our local vet, Andres, we discussed with him the fact that Miliko's breathing ability was getting worse, as the weather was getting hotter. He was still coming out walking with us, or should I say running with us! He would run from tree to tree then stop for a rest, then run to the next tree, and so it would go on. We knew when he had his dislocated hip operated on, there had been a problem with his jaw also. Our vet in Cordoba that operated on him, had sadly had to break his jaw during the operation to enable him to get a tube down his throat. He discussed this immediatley after the op with us, and of course monitored it, when he was regularly checking his hip. At the time of the operation, luckily he also took an x ray of his head, to show the jaw problem. Well Andres had booked Miliko in for a castration, but the day we took him, he said he had been worrying about the operation, for a week, since he had done the blood test, and if something was to go wrong he would not be able to get a tube into him. He recommended we saw the vet in Cordoba, to discuss the options with him. He told us that if it was a bone problem it could probably be fixed, however if it was muscular, there was the possibility that nothing could be done.

The appointment was made, with Andres phoning Javier and discussing his thoughts on Miliko. Miliko of course was treated like the long lost puppy, loads of fuss and attention, and they always call him Miliko Miliko Miliko, which has him so incredibly excited his whole lttle body shakes, bless him! We spent aproximately half an hour with the vet, as he showed us books with images of jaws, and explained in great detail Miliko's condition, which was then translated to us by Maria one of the young vets at the practice.

Sadly it certainly was not the news we wanted, or even expected to hear. We thought his condition was either operable or not. We were sadly told that the trauma caused to his little body, that dislocated his hip and jaw, had caused the soft tissue in his face to malform. The x ray from around three months previous was noticably much better than the x ray done just two weeks ago. The problem is, if Javier was to operate and for example do a similar operation to the hip dislocation but to the jaw, once again the soft tissue would become even more damaged. Bless his heart, it was rather like being given a death sentence for him. Javier measured the amount Miliko could open his mouth and it was 17mms. At this stage he can eat small pieces of food quite well, but struggles with larger morsels. We have to feed him three times a day to keep his jaw mobile, to see if this helps the condition. We are taking him back one month later. Javier is willing to try and operate, although he knows it is more than likely to be unsuccessful. So we have to take it day by day. There will be a time when he cannot open his mouth at all, but we will love and care for him until this time is closer. We will discuss an operation again, but we will be led by our vet. If he operates and Miliko goes through that ordeal we do not want him to be in the same situation again just a couple of months down the line, that will be no quality of life for him. So poor darling little Miliko is likely to have a short life with us, and we will have the best time together we can possibly have! Below are just a few of my favourite photos of him!

Sitting on Blue, watching TV

Having a cuddle from Arthur

Cuddling Geri

Can't get comfy!

Carlos's turn

The three "little ones"

Probably my favourite!

Frankie and Chris's Nightmare

2010-05-07T13:13:00.001-07:00

Frankie and Chris were planning on bringing my gorgeous grandaughter, Kaci out here for her first holiday in Spain. Kaci's passport was sent for, in pretty good time. In fact when Mark phoned the passport office, as they were ordering one for Maisie, he was told not to worry about paying for a fast track passport as they were being processed and out again in aproximately ten days, and that was in April. Sadly those in higher places, in the passport office, decided that Kaci's would have a "random check" on it. A letter was sent to the lady that counter signed the form and passport photos, regarding her business and then had to be returned to them. Frankie at this point was phoning the passport office daily, often twice a day, desperatly hoping there was something ...... anything she could do to speed up the process, as it was getting tight for time. Friends were suggesting all sorts, going to London, paying for it to be done for an emergency etc. Frankie suggested all these things! Sadly as the passport was already being processed they would not upgrade it, even if the difference was paid for, and an emergency passport will only be issued for a life or death situation, plus a first passport for anyone these days has to go through so many channels, after all my grandaughter could have been a five month old terrorist!!!!! An adult obtaining a first passport these days has to go through an interview! Anyway the plane tickets had been bought and paid for, and Chris's brother was also coming out with them, for a holiday. It got closer and closer then the decision was enevitiable that Frankie and Kaci would not get their holiday :( It was an extremely upsetting time all round. Obviously I was very much looking forward to seeing my darling daughter and having lots of cuddles with Kaci again. Poor Chris had to come, as his brother was coming too. Poor Frankie my heart went out to her! She was told told so many different things by so many different people too. At one point Frankie was told it had been passed by the inspector, then the following day she was informed the inspector had not even looked at it yet! She was given a day that the passport was arriving, and therefore she had to be home all day to sign for it, and the evening prior to this, the passport was already in her post box, and she had not even signed for it. Thank goodness for the internet and we could keep in touch, and thank goodness Kaci will not need another passport for five years

Shearing time again!

2010-05-07T13:12:00.001-07:00

It seems no time ago that we were preparing for alpaca shearing a year ago. We were going to be very thin on the ground with friends/ helpers this year as there seemed to be a shearing curse going around! Our friends David and Di from the gorgeous area of the El Torcal national park were struck by the shearing curse! Our dear friend Di had a nasty accident with their lovely donkey, basically there was a donkey and a rope involved and poor Di, finished up with a broken leg in hospital. She is now part bionic and we do hope feeling much better and on the mend. Then there are our good friends Mike and Linda from near Ronda, and there was an alpaca and a bampoo pole involved, well to cut a long story short poor Mike had to have five stitches in his hand, the day before our shearing, so he was unable to drive up to us. Ginny Cobb had to stay at home and play midwife as they had alpacas due to give birth. Thank goodness Nigel, was coming and our lovley family that were holidaying with us from Holland joined us in a bbq, or we would have been eating Alan's fabby home made burgers for weeks. Actually, come to think of it, everyone was full before burger time, so we ate them for lunch and dinner for the next three days. Anyway I am digressing!

James and Kym Dixon, once again thankfully did the trip to Spain to shear for us all here. It is amazing how their confidence rubs off on the alpacas, and they just allow themselves to be sheared with very little fuss or bother. We had one little wingey baby, Santa! He squealed like a scaredy cat, or alpaca, through the whole experience, then I noticed Kim throw an old towel over his baby manly bits as little bits of wee wee were shooting out now and then, bless him. Well the shearing was done, the animals were all feeling much better, it was time for us all to crack open the beers and relax. It was lovely to have James and Kim stay over too, as they were travelling north from us the day after!

Rafa and the boys

Little weeny Rafa

Eduardo

Eduardo being checked out by Rafa, after being sheared

Marcus

The boys watch Marcus being sheared

Gorgeous fluffy Galaxy

"Careful with me bonnet James!"

Little weeny Galaxy

Cassandra

Lovely Lily

Our big girl Bermuda

No harm done, tucking in nicely!

Dear little Santa

Looking very handsome!

Working towards our first guests

2010-05-07T13:11:00.000-07:00

Well as usual I am well behind with my blog, as we now have our third group of guests here, one day I will catch up again. We had a huge amounts of painting to do once again, but it really had to be left until we were pretty sure the rain had finished for the summer. Our first year here, we had what was known as "The May of Rain" when it chucked it down, practically the whole month. This year thankfully we had very little in May, but by gum we saw it fall throughout the whole winter So we took some photos before our first guests arrived, all set for spring bookings, even with quilts on the beds! They wont last long!

Apartment living room and kitchen

Bedroom 1
Bedroom 2

Bedroom 3

We have new Spanish friends :)

2010-05-02T02:48:00.001-07:00

One evening Alan came in carrying a carrier bag, he said it was hanging on our gate. Inside the bag was a letter written in excellent English, from a young lady. Apparantly her auntie and uncle live fairly close to us and her auntie loves the alpacas and were interested in "buying one" First of all alpacas are herd animals, and are happiest in a herd of at least three, plus we thought her family would probably think there were around the same price of a goat....... er no! However if we were not able to sell any animals they would love to meet us.... yikes! Well Leonore left her email address, so we emailed her that same evening, and explained about the cost of alpacas, and some other facts for her to discuss with her auntie and uncle. Leonore emailed us back almost immediatly and said her family would love to meet us. She was actually going back to England two days later, where she was working, having finished university. So a quick date was fixed!

The following day Alan and I had a short drive to Leonore's uncle and auntie's olive farm. We were told the kilometre sign where their house was opposite, and we had a welcoming commitee of seven people waiting outside for us. We were welcomed as long lost friends and immediatly taken inside from the heat, into a very rustic, but beautifully cool room. It had very old trinkets and other interesting items hanging on the walls, and from the ceiling, and even a gun that the "auntie" had found in the garden.

Well the drinks were drunk and it was time for us to meet their many animals. We had only met Willy the miniature Yorkshire terrier, and their were twelve other dogs to meet, for a start!

Soon to be a mummy!

We were given fresh eggs to take home

Their piggy family

Loads of land for their goats

Having shown us there loving and cared for animals, it was now time to be impressed by their amount of land! A huge amount it was land too, the sum total of over 5000 olive trees, and an area of 400,000 square metres, which is 40 hectares, which is 400football pitches, how mental is that!

Right to the top of that hill!
Yes that hill!!!

Awww baby kittens are born!

2010-04-18T07:18:00.000-07:00

You may remember that last year our little wild cat, Barb, gave birth to a litter of kittens. At one point we had a fairly large family so we named them. Mum was Barb, dad Jim, we also had the kittens R Denise, Anthony, Baby David and Twiggy. The little family stayed with us all through then summer, then most of them vanished one day, apart from Barb and our pretty little R Denise. We guessed that maybe all the boys had gone off in search of pastures new. Barb and R Denise remained very close, and little Denise became more tame as the months progressed. A few weeks ago we noticed Barb was looking a little on the chunky side,we had not noticed any other cats around, but guessed she had had a one night stand! I followed R Denise one evening as I went to feed them, and noticed two little round things extremely close to her tail....... oh my goodness she's a boy! I'm afraid she will always be R Denise to me!

We knew the kittens were imminent, Alan and I were working in the casita when we heard Barb howling! I wondered if she was in labour, struggling. I crept into the barn where the noise was coming from and there she was in full sight of us, having made a little nest with three beautiful kittens. I think the photo below they were just a few hours old!

One week old and Barb looks happier

Musical alpaca's day!

2010-04-18T07:17:00.000-07:00

We needed to have a day to spend time with the alpacas and give them injections. Nothing drastic, just ivomec which we vaccinate them with, to control parasites. We felt it was also a good day to play musical alpacas and move them around. Alan had planted oat hay for the girls in a new paddock, and they were about to think it was their birthday! The girls and their cria had been close to the house, so we could keep an eye on their babies through the winter, they were moved to were the boys were "hanging out!" The boys came back up to where the girls were prior to giving birth!

As the girls were in a small paddock, we used to let them roam and eat weeds in our outdoor areas. Silly them going to waste. I think they thought they were escaping and loved it!

Santa could not find his way out the first time!

Alan carried him to his mum

The girls have a munch on some weeds

The girls love their new paddock

Lovely weeds for the boys

It's all about Miliko

2010-04-16T11:27:00.000-07:00

Little Miliko was unaware he was due to be castrated, poor lttle guy. So he was his normal cheerful little self. Alan and I had taken him the week before to our local vet where he was given a blood test leading up to his op.

One particular day, a couple of weeks ago, we were spending time with the alpacas, as I shall explain in my next thrilling installment. Miliko can see the alpacas when he climbs onto a wall, which slopes upwards on one side, but has a drop of about two and a half metres the other side. We cannot stop him, or Carlos climbing onto these walls, so we tend to try and ignore them and not make too much of a fuss, when we see them towering over us. Often both of the boys are running along the wall together. To my horror, I heard a slight squeal, and in a fraction of a second, I looked up and felt that Miliko had fallen, rather than jumped, off the wall. I shouted "Oh my God," and he hit the ground, with a thump, on his back!

I was so scared, I thought he had badly injured himself. He is a boney little boy, who had so recently had a major operation on his hip, and had just been discharged from the surgeon . He rather carefully manoevered himself to sit on his bottom, and then he shook from head to toe, as did Alan and I! We carried him into the house and cuddled him for a little while. Apart from, I'm pretty sure being fairly bruised, there was no great harm one. Little Miliko is like a cat with nine lives!

That same evening we took him to the vet to plan his castration, and we were informed his blood test showed up a liver problem, so the operation was on hold. He is now on liver protection pills for a month and then the blood test will need to be redone! Poor little Miliko, he does go through it!

He has n't learnt his lesson!

What a blooming palaver!

2010-04-10T10:17:00.000-07:00

I had forgotten to share with you a slight bit of panic that arose, the night before I left England. Frankie, Kaci and I had a lovely time with Mark, Callie and Maisie until I had to say my "goodbyes," and balled like a baby, oh I hate goodbyes! Anyway, we were picking up Chris from work when I had a text meassage from Alan, saying "Can you phone me immediatley!" Well I wondered what on earth could have happened! Sadly when one of us comes away, something awful tends to happen, so I was pretty worried! I phoned him straight away, and he had just had his wallet stolen, from outside a service station, whilst filling up with petrol to collect me from the airpot the following afternoon. It's a large service station, on the auto via from Seville to Madrid, although just about fifteen minutes from where we live, so luckily we are regulars there.

Apparantly Alan had missed his pocket, and his wallet landed on the forecourt. He realised this about a minute on the road, when he patted the pocket, where his wallet should have been. He of course went straight back. As we are regulars there, they straight away looked at the cctv tape and saw exactly what had happened. A sneaky person, to keep it polite, had seen what Alan had done, and kicked Alan's wallet under his car, to enable him to pick it up when he thought no on was watching. Although this was seen, sadly the number plate could not be.

Of course the real worry was credit cards that were in the wallet.

I do totally understand security must be put into place, but Alan had not enough credit on the phone he had to phone and cancel the cards. We do have a contract phone in case of emergencies, but I had that in England, so the plan was for me to try and cancel the cards. I was able to tell them every password, what colour pants he wore, any other details they may want to know, or even better, could they phone him!!! Would they help, no bloody way! So we had to hope and pray the cards would not be used until I got back to England, and Alan could phone them from the contract phone. Surely there should be some sort of help to be organised in these situations?

Our good friend David took us to the police station the following day, not in Montoro as they seem to be doing work on the building, but to the tiny town of Pedro Abad, in fact where the service station is. There was a tiny office with three police men in, one of which was smoking away in a corner whilst on a pc. The policemen already knew of the incident, I told you Pedro Abad is small, and they just needed a few details from us. They also has seen the cctv tape and did not recognise the "baddy" . They shook our hands when we had finished, and off we went, really not expecting to hear any more about it, but Alan needed to report his driving license missing anyway.

About a week went passed, and we were in our local post office, where we collect our mail. The gentleman that works there told us he had a phone call from the police station in Seville. Some one had picked up Alans abandoned wallet in Seville, and took in to the police station. Would you believe they wanted our address to post it to us, amazing or what. Well I'm not sure that would happen in England. Of course the cash was missing from inside in but everything else was intact. So although a little lighter, all was well in the end!

Actually since publishing this blog entry, Alan said I was a "big fat liar".... no, no not really, as if he would dare, I had however got some facts wrong. Alan did not wait for me to come home the following day but contacted David and drove into Montoro. He kindly allowed him to telephone the credit card companies, so the panic was over slightly earlier than I remembered, sorry about that!

Another wonderful trip back!

2010-03-25T06:36:00.000-07:00

I could not believe my luck! I was going to become a nannie, for the second time in approximately four months. The big question was once again, would the baby hang on in there, until I arrived!

I arrived in Brighton on Tuesday 2nd March, the baby was due a couple of days prior to this. I knew that having a few days with Frankie, Chris and the gorgeous little Kaci would be wonderful, leading up to Mark and Callies baby being born. So we spent loads of time together, and waited and waited! What a difference four months makes, from the two week old baby, I had tearfully left in November. Kaci was chatting away, and she told me lots of stories that only her nannie could understand ;) She is a very expressive little girl who loves to make faces, and gurgle away. It was such a joy to be with her. Obviously I miss the family loads, but the more she grows and becomes a real little person, the harder it is!

Kaci with my dear Uncle Charlie, he's 89 years young!

Kaci with Uncle Marky

Kaci's first swim

New hat!
A lovely family photo!

Well eight days after Callies due date, they took her into hospital. Poor Callie and Mark have gone through rather a lot for this little baby, and it was almost time to meet him or her. Well my Mark being a fairly typical bloke did not really let his mum know what was going on, but I forgive you Mark :) Callie was induced around midnight of Monday 8th, and sent back home again... as they do because they feel you will be more relaxed at home. If it was me, I think I would just curl up on a bed and refuse to move. I remember when Frankie was in labour and us trying to concentrate on "This morning" and "Loose Women". But I am sure they are right! I am so pleased that Becky, Callie's mum was with them, as it was so wonderful for me to be with Frankie and Chris, and share their miracle! Mark did say he would have gone to pieces without Becky being there as support. I won't go into too many details but we got a phone call from Mark at around 3.30pm on the Tuesday. He sounded extremely emotional as he told us he had a little girl. She had actually been born at 1.36pm but Callie was very poorly and had to have an emergency blood transfusion. I don't think Frankie or I knew what to do or say, we just wanted to cry with what they had been through, but also in sheer delight that everything was ok now!

I was more than happy to give the new little family a day or so to enjoy being together, especially as Callie was so poorly, although I could not help being over the moon when Callie phoned us a few hours later, and said we could come up to see them. Kaci was fed, like the speed of light, and we drove at top speed as we knew visiting hours were nearly over. Frankie was almost skipping hehe!

Well what a little dolly, Maisie Rebecca Penfold, all wrapped up and sleeping soundly. Callie looked amazing, and Mark..... well he was white and shaking! "Never again" he said!
How difficult to see someone you love, go through what Callie had. Frankie and I felt pretty emotional after seeing him, we had never seen Mark like that before, (sorry Mark, I'm not doing much for your streed cred hehe) but I am doing wonders for your credentials as a loving partner and daddy :) I was lucky enough to see Maisie every day before I went back to Spain, Becky, Ross and Maisie's Uncle Jack always made me very welcome, thank you!

The proud parents

Mark still looks in shock

Beautiful, just beautiful!

Cuddling daddy

Little cousins!
Callie looks amazing!Proud daddy!

As the baby was late, I was lucky enough to be in Brighton for Mothers Day. We all spent a lovely afternoon together plus I even managed to catch up with Alans mum, brother, granddad and Jennie. Some lovely family photos below!

Terrible floods!

2010-03-22T07:53:00.000-07:00

All through the winter this year, the rains have been beyond belief. When I arrived back from England in November until the middle of February we had aproximately 5 good days. I would say houses in the UK are built to withstand wind, rain, snow etc. Where as houses here in Spain, well certainly in the campo, are built to keep them cool, thick stone walls, tiled floors. We have no central heating, or carpets, we don't even have mains electricity. The winter has been extremely depressing! Everyone here has been feeling the same, although we know we are very lucky compared to some parts of the world, of course! I have posted some photos below!

Our track, we could n't drive up it for two days

The River Guadalquivir in Montoro

It burst it banks, you can see the tops of the olive treesAnd below

The Lake Arenoso is about 10 minutes drive from us

In November the lake was approximately 30% full, now it is over 80% full

RIP Marybelle

2010-03-01T13:51:00.000-08:00

The beauty of the snow gave way to great sadness. Whilst wandering round admiring the beauty of our surroundings, we found Marybelle. She had passed away! The day before she seemed fine, she had eaten her dinner and we saw no cause for concern, so it was a great shock for us to find her. She is sadly missed. When we walk the dogs we would see her sunbathing or sheltering from the heat under an olive tree. Even when we go shopping I miss choosing her favourite fruit. We miss her!

Snow? Really? Yep!

2010-02-28T08:52:00.000-08:00

Alan and I were sitting watching the TV one wet day, as had become the norm, it was also feeling extremely cold, I looked out and remember saying to Alan, "It looks like snow, but it can't be!" I guess the thought that it would snow here just had n't really entered my mind. Sure enough it was "the white stuff" and it started falling thick and fast. We have since heard that it also snowed here in 2007, and has snowed 20 times in the last 105 years..... a bit of usual trivia for you! At least it only lasted for a day, and looked rather beautiful. Poor Arthur did get a little upset, he ran around barking, wondering what on earth what happening on his beloved territory!

Snow covered Arthur

Our pool area

Gorgeous view

No sun brings another worry!

2010-02-28T08:24:00.000-08:00

Santa unfortunately had a little set back! Alan went to check on him one morning, and he came back and said he was very worried, he felt his back legs were very weak. I popped my wellies on over my jim jams and prepared myself as well as I could. In actual fact when I saw Santa I was n't too upset. We felt and still feel it is a Vitamin D deficiency. The poor little boy was actually strong apart from his back legs that had seemed to go bandy over night! He was bright, alert, trying to get away from us and feeding well too, so we did not actually feel he was ill. We have a "paste" that we got from the alpaca futurity that contains vitamin AD & E, so we gave him that straight away and even the following morning we felt we could see a slight improvement. So the good news is he is still doing really well! We now give all the alpacas the paste, especially as they seem to have taken up being indoor animals now, well if we would let them!

Santa, looking like he's try to soak up those rays!

Looking just adorable!

New Year!

2010-02-28T08:14:00.000-08:00

January began with torrential rain, in fact it has been pretty much raining every day since I returned home from Brighton, and the end of November. We thought December and January were bad, but that was nothing to what we have experienced in February!

Well back to January:

Its awful because of course we can't wash any clothes, there is not ever enough solar to use the washing machine, as of course we are not on mains electricity, and even if I hand washed, we would never get things dry. Poor Alan is having to go out and turn the genny off in the dark about 12, or whenever we want to go to bed. We are mopping constantly, and everywhere is filthy dirty, and smelling damp. I can't wait to have a few days dry and be able to clean up, and have some clean clothes.

The poor alpacas are still in the stable, where we put them when little Santa was born, sometimes we shut them in there as there is a huge puddle outside it and we dont want Santa to sit in it, poor little thing! To be honest now the alpacas will not even come out, we have to entise them out with food, they are not silly!

It's Christmas!!!

2010-02-28T07:42:00.000-08:00

Well we set the alarm for 8am Christmas day, when it is just getting light, and we put on our wet gear and walked down to the stable, I was so nervous of what we would see. There he was alive and well beside his mum, a weight was lifted from my mind, well for now! We checked on him on and off all day yesterday, Christmas Eve, and he seemed to be doing well, he is alert and seems to be feeding quite well now. Thank you God! We phoned Andres Christmas day morning and Alan had to go the surgery to get some antibiotics for Bermuda and the baby, and some anti inflamatories for Bermuda. Then the only other hicup of the day was going indoors one time and finding blood on the wall and on the door, Miliko had chewed his stitches whilst we were out! We patched him up and phoned Andres again, hehe, he said not to worry, keep cleaning it, and if it does not stop "blooding" take him to the surgery and he would give him an injection to clot the blood a little!

After realising Miliko was ok, and our little Sunshine Santa was also ok, we enjoyed our Lidl chicken very much! I even had a glass of wine. Thank God both Santa and Miliko are both doing well.

Merry Christmas, especially from our dogs that allowed us to put hats on them :)

Arthur

Carlos
Blue

Sorry we have been offline!

2010-02-28T07:17:00.000-08:00

Crikey I have so missed catching up online with all my friends. Our gorgeous dog Blue unfortunately was sick on our lap top YUK! She drinks water by the litre and sometimes she does a little belch and out it pops! We have a new laptop now, thank goodness, so I shall endeavor to get you up to date!

A worrying time!

2010-01-26T06:17:00.000-08:00

Now of course, having lost the alpaca baby, that was born when I was in England, we are of course very paranoid, and the plan was to give the baby blood plasma introveniously within the first few hours of its birth, as extra protection. So when the baby was born on Christmas Eve, firstly the plan was to give him the plasma, however also I was very concerned that he did not seem to be feeding sufficiently, that old paranoia creeping in again! We phoned Andres, our vet, who was at a very noisy party, at around 4pm. As he was away, he suggested we took the baby to the vetinary hospital in Cordoba for the plasma to be given. Well we thought we did the right thing in asking Nigel and Ginny Cobb to phone ahead and tell them we were coming, but they said they had no one there that could do it, they only had large animal vets there at that time, which is crazy! I am sure if we had just turned up they would have had to have seen us and dealt with little Santa. Anyway they did arrange for a horse vet, that was on call, to meet us Cordoba football club in the car park!!! Yes you did read that correctly!

Well Juan the vet turned up and we expected him to say follow us to the clinic, oh no! He said is the alpaca in the car? Er yes........ so he put on his green vet gear on and set to work getting things ready from the boot of his car, the plan was to put the drip in whilst the alpaca was in the car, we could n't believe it! Well to cut was is already a very long story just a little bit shorter, alpacas are notoriously difficult to get a drip into, their jugular vein is "hidden" from predators and the veins in their legs are just so very tiny, they are both very hard to find, and even harder to insert a needle into. Well after about half an hour of trying, Juan eventally managed to get a needle into the vein, but the bag of plasma with saline would not go through the "tap thingy" So we then had to follow him into Cordoba city where he has an animal ambulance to get another bag and tap. Unfortunately during the journey, the needle had moved out of the vein even though it had been taped down. At that point we felt the baby alpaca had been put though enough, he had already been away from his mum for over 2 hours, with almost an hour journey home, and we were then worrying if we were doing more harm than good and we all decided to call it a day! We had to accept that we were taking him home hoping that Bermuda would become very maternal seeing him again and help him feed. Nature had to take it's course!

Well we arrived home at about 11pm, Christmas Eve night, and took the little boy straight in to a very loudly humming Bermuda, she was making a wonderful clucking noise and pretty soon was feeding. After about an hour of standing in the cold and rain, we went to bed, and I don't mind telling you,

I said a few prayers!

Christmas Eve and a baby is born? BIRTH SHOTS!

2010-01-24T08:12:00.000-08:00

Christmas is a difficult time for me. I know many others are having far worse things in their lives, but I only have a very small family and we would not be together. So Alan and I were going to try and make the most of things. It had been an emotional time. We had lost a baby alpaca, and Mark, Callie, Chris and Frankie and my beautiful grandaughter were all hundreds of miles away. We were relaxing watching television as a Christmas treat, as the genorator has to be on, if the weather is not good. The weather had been awful, raining non stop for days. The paddock was thick mud, and the alpacas were muddy and miserable, as were we! Bermuda the alpaca was due to give birth mid January, so we were already on tenterhooks, checking her regularly. Alan popped round to the paddock around 3.30 to check on her. Alpacas rarely give birth in the afternoon, so I was gobsmacked when Alan bellowed "Bermuda's having the baby!" I rushed out with camera, and towel in hand, grabbing the antiseptic spray for the cord, on route. To be amazed with the wonderful miracle of birth taking place!

My first view, a little white head!

A little further on!

The baby is born, soaking wet mud all around
We decided as it was so very muddy as the rain was just continuous that we would move the alpacas to an indoor stable. Their is a smaller outdoor area, but at least the cria and mum would be dry! So I picked up the cria and of course the alpacas all followed, then we could watch and hope all was well!

Settled in the warm dry stable

Little Miliko's op

2010-01-12T08:22:00.000-08:00

From the moment little Miliko came into our lives, we new he would have to have an operation on his hip! It had been completely dislocated and the only way it could be "fixed" was to remove a piece of bone and re attach the muscle. Poor little boy would always one one leg shorter than the others, but it would stop him from having any pain. So of course we had to go through with it. The operation was scheduled for December 23rd, we were not doing anything wild for Christmas anyway.... we wish! There was a little concern when the performed an ECG as he had an unusual heart rythym. The decision was made that if there were any worries they would stop the procedure immediately. The actual operation was much simpler than Geri's so Miliko was taken off of us and was made wave a paw. We had to return two hours later!

When we returned the operation was nearly finished, so we sat and waited. Thank goodness Maria one of the young vets in the practice speaks fluent English, she said to us there was a problem that surgeon he needed to speak to us about..... oh no! He asked, though her, had we noticed any problems ever with him regarding his mouth, did he eat properly etc. We said no, he had no problems eating, why? He told us he could not get the tube into his mouth whilst he operated, sadly whilst forcing it open, his jaw broke. He had taken x rays to explain and show us. We then put two and two together! He yawns with his mouth turning into a smile, instead of opening it (you know a bit like when you are bored, and don't want to show it!). Also when Andres our vet gave him a pill once, he had a terrible problem, getting it in his mouth,but we thought he was just strong! Plus he has a funny little bark, I guess because he does n't open his mouth! It was something we would need to keep an eye on, but hopefully it would settle down. The surgeon felt that probably the accident that caused his hip to be dislocated, probably broke his jaw too, and it had fused back together incorrectly. Sadly he had proably been hit by a car!

Anyway we got him home, and what a nightmare he was. He would n't keep still, unlike Geri that loved being pampered. Alan and I sat up for hours, trying to stop him from jumping about. We put him on the sofa where he normally sleeps, as we felt sure he would try and jump up anyway. Eventually we went to bed and slept very lightly! The following morning we woke up early, as soon as he heard us he stood up and jumped, all be it in slow motion, onto the floor and ran to get a drink. The next few days we tried so hard to keep him still, without much success. Thankfully he is doing just great and the vet is very pleased with his progress!

Not really ill, just trying to keep him still!

Showing Blue his scar
We had to keep re bandaging him

The new boys arrive!

2010-01-12T05:17:00.000-08:00

The beginning of December brought some much needed happiness to our farm, with the delivery of two mates for Rafa, thanks to Nigel Cobb. We had chosen two super little grey boys that really are a lovely temperament, from our friend Jane in Gaucin. Immediately they were eating out of ours hands, literally! The new boys are Marcus and Eduardo. The three boys come running to the gate to meet us whenever we go to see them, and watch with great intent when we walk the dogs past their paddock. We are just loving having them here, they will be such an asset to our farm!

Rafa in front, with Eduardo behind and Marcus on the right

The boys meet Galaxy

Eduardo, with his fringe on the left, Marcus on the right

Whilst he was here Nigel took the opportunity to get hands on with Galaxy, he's a sprightly little lad!. He was approximatley two months old in the photos below, and Nigel struggled to hold him!

Nigel thanks Cassandra for letting him see her gorgeous little boy!

A bit of sadness! - NOVEMBER

2010-01-12T05:07:00.000-08:00

The morning after my little grandadughter was born, I phoned Alan to chat about everything being wonderful in my life when he also had some very exciting news. Lily the alpaca had given birth to a stunning little girl, our first girl! It was a bit of a surprise, she was early. According to mating dates we were expecting Lily to give birth aproximately a month later, when I was home and we could panic together! A couple of days went on and she was looking good, and all in the world was looking wonderful!

Sadly this was not to last. When the little baby was four days old, Alan went to check on her early, as he had every morning, and he was extremely worried. She was very weak, and seemed unable to stand. Andres the vet was brought in, by our good samaritan friend Ken. He also came back later, in the afternoon, although Alan had decided by this time to take her to the vetinary hospital at Cordoba University. Our very good friends Nigel and Ginny came up from Ronda, a drive of over three hours, to bring Alan some blood plasma to be given intraveniously, and of course to be of great support to him, as he was going through this alone. They met at the hospital although sadly it was too late, the little girl did not make it. Yet another sad day at Alpacas el Sol.

Someone up there is really testing us!

Lily with her gorgeous little girl

I was devasted! There I was in England, with my gorgeous new little grandaughter, and so proud of my daughter, and I knew that Alan was dealing with this nightmare all on his own. My heart was so divided. A huge part of it, full of happiness and love for my family I was spending time with, and the other part was broken hearted, knowing we had lost a baby alpaca, but mainly that Alan was having to cope with this on his own. I discussed things with Frankie and Chris and I made a decision to cut my holiday with them short, just by three days. Of course they understood and were supportive. We have another cria due in January, it's going to be a worrying time!

The most special trip!

2010-01-03T05:57:00.000-08:00

My trip back to Brighton for the most special occasion, had been planned for months, and fingers had been tightly crossed that I would arrive in Brighton before my grandchild was born! I arrived into Gatwick on November 12th, the day before the due date. I was met at the airport by Callie so Frankie did not have to do the drive, which gave us plenty of time to catch up which was lovely!

Baby was due on Friday 13th November, so on that day we decided to have a little trip out, nothing worse than sitting waiting for exciting things to happen. We popped into Brighton and Frankie walked my legs off me, round the town, and we finished up in the famous Brighton Tea Cozy, tea rooms, run by David, a regular on Brighton Beach Patrol. We probably spent about two hours in there, enjoying a beautiful cream tea, and chatting to David, a larger than life character, that actually deseves a medal from the queen. He and his partner have shared their lives and home with people that really needed them!

I can't wait to go back!

Frankie with David, at the fab Brighton Tea Cozy, tea rooms

The following day we thought we would take it a little easier and have a little wander round Lewes where Frankie lives, once again she walked me off my feet, hopefully the baby will come soon at this rate, or I will be exhausted!

Well the special day arrived, I am sure Frankie and Chris will not mind me sharing it with you.

Frankie came into me at 3.50am saying she had been having pains for a while, and she thought her waters had broken. It rather took me back to when I was expecting her, and I sat with my dear mum, and we timed the contractions together! When we had a pattern emerging she phoned the hospital. Frankie was told to wait until she was having three every ten minutes and lasting nearly a minute. So around 7.00 am Chris phoned the hospital and said we were on our way. The midwife said she was only just starting to dialate and gave Frankie some pain killers and a sleeping tablet and suggested she went home. So rather glumly that's what we did!

We sat and tried to get into Jeremy Kyle............ vile, and This morning......... much better, half way through Loose Women..... which I love, and we were on our way back, it's awful to see your baby in such pain and crying, but you know it is all going to be worth it! Back up to the delivery Suite and poor little Frankie was only 4cms. Sadly Frankie had to have some pethedine, which she did not want to do. Within minutes it was making her sick! She was moved downstairs to have a sleep, which did not really happen, and then back upstairs two hours later when things thank goodness had gone up a gear.

The plan was never really for me to be in the delivery room when Frankie gave birth, I felt it was a very special time for her and Chris, but I did say if she wanted me, I would be there for her. After they moved Frankie. I called in to see how she was doing, and I guess I just stayed. Things had started to move quicker thank goodness, and Frankie was offered gas and air. How funny, my normally wonderful, funny, enthusiatic, spirited, sometimes dare I say it..... short tempered daughter was in the most amazing spirits. She was so lovely and funny, inbetween contractions, of course! All the midwives were saying "Is she always this lovely?" Chris and I echoed "NO!"

She was nearly there and baby was well on its way, but the final stage of labour was taking for ever, four hours in fact! At 10.16pm a little girl was born. As she was born the midwife said, "No wonder she took so long!" The cord was round her neck and under her arm! My poor little girl. I had a beautiful grandaughter!

Frankie, Chris and my beautiful grandaughter about

5 minutes old!

Proud nannie!

Frankie came out of hospital the following day, and was thrilled to find their little flat covered in banners and balloons from Mark and Callie. I had given them the keys when I met them in town that morning. Frankie and Chris and their beautiful little girl settled down to family life!

November 20th was Marks birthday so he and Callie came over to Frankie and Chris's flat, and we all had a lovely evening and a take away plus lots of baby cuddles, and of course took loads of photos!

Proud Uncle Mark

We had such a lovely time, with friends coming and going, below are a few of my favourite photos!

Mark and Callie
Ella, Ashdon and Tily with Kaci
A very excited Auntie Lulu!
Lizzie and gorgeous baby Freddie
Mairead
Handsome little Chase

Alans auntie and nannna

A surprise Visitor - OCTOBER

2010-01-03T05:12:00.000-08:00

Alan and I were on our way out one morning, we were surprised to see the alpacas all in a row, obviously extremely inquisitive about something going on. This was our rather gorgeous visitor, at the gate!

We had the pleasure of this young donkey being outside for quite a few days, we gave him water and there was plenty of grass and other yummy things for him to eat outside. I was quite sad to see him go. Alan saw him being ridden up the track one day, hopefully by either his original owner, or some kind animal loving Spanish person!

Poorly Miliko

2009-12-30T05:09:00.000-08:00

We were only aware that our little Miliko was poorly when he was very sick one evening. Being as dogs are often sick, then run around like nothing has happened, we did not really worry too much about him, at first. The following morning however he got himself positioned under a chair and just would not come out. He would not eat or drink and was still being sick. A trip to our vet Andres was in order and he immediatley blood tested him, the results were ready in 10 minutes and he was given some anti sickness medicine and antibiotics. The worrying thing was he was due to have his hip operation a week later. Within the next week Miliko went to the vet a couple more times and was blood tested each time. tThe worrying thing was as the poor little pup had literally arrived over our, or under our fence one day he had never had any vacinations. The decision was finally made to be patient, allow him to get completely better, then give him his vaccinations, and then arrange his operation after that! Poor little boy!

A poorly Miliko

Frankie's 21st Birthday

2009-12-29T09:56:00.000-08:00

Obviously I made a trip back to Brighton for a lovely week for Frankie's 21st, what a wonderful time we had. I also saw quite a bit of Mark and Callie too. As the girls are both pregnant, it was all fairly low key, but still had a great time. On the day of Frankie's birthday poor Chris had to work so we had a great girly day. We started off at the Pier, meeting up with our mad mate Micklos who was dj 'ing in the karioke bar, then moved back down through the pier, gambling on the 2p machines onto the fish and chip shop. It was a lovely day and not too cold so we enjoyed it outside.

Frankie with our friend Micklos

Mmmmmm chippie time!

Unbeknown to Frankie, Chris had arranged for Frankie to have a "Dior"make over, which was really done beautifully. Half way through it a lady came up to Frankie and asked her name, and then gave her one the most beautiful bouquets of flowers I have ever seen. Chris certainly was the hero of the day, and all the girls in "Boots" were clucking around him!

The next stop was a lovely family get together at the Thai Elephant. Poor Mark looked rather exhausted after doing an 36 hour shift!

Mark and Callie

I had arranged on the Sunday, a special girlie afternoon and a party at the wonderful choccie wokiedoodah's. Callie was great at pretending to look interested in practically every shop in the Lanes, as we were running a little ahead of schedule, and the plan was that Frankie's friends would be in there before us. Frankie was very excited looking in the window of choccie wokie's and I said "Let's go in!" Frankie was adament there was no seats available, as we had booked the boudoir, so we just needed to get her in there. Just at a great moment, some of Frankie's friends happen to look out and catch her eye! Frankie was just ecstatic at this and could not work out how this different friends from school, and the dance world would know each other and be watching for someone having a party. At last the penny clicked, and Frankie actually shed a few tears...... that was it, I was off again! What a really lovely time we had, it was so lovely to catch up with friends again! The food was gorgeous, but next time, and yes I would love to do it again, I won't talk so much and eat more chocolate!

Frankie and her friends

Montoro's annual Feria

2009-12-29T08:22:00.003-08:00

The second weekend in October is the annual feria, which causes huge excitement in town, with decorations and lights, and many people that have left the town come back to see family and friends and enjoy the festivities. We went along about 10pm at met up with our Spanish friends and ate together, then watched whilst their children enjoyed all the rides. At midnight we saw their great fire work display, we are rather getting into the Spanish way of life, and left about 1.30am, would you believe people were still arriving!

The bull ring square

I love the way the Spanish dads get involved

Play time for David and Jesus

Firework Time

Two mates for Rafa

2009-12-26T11:18:00.000-08:00

Alan dashed out, running towards the paddock, one morning, muttering something ineligible! He had spotted Rafa having a very good attempt at mating with his mum, who two weeks previously had given birth to Galaxy. As Cassandra was at her most fertile, even though Rafa was young we could not risk him making her pregnant, therefore a quick trip to Gaucin was decided on, to see our friends Jane and Juli, and to chose a couple of boys to be mates with Rafa, who sadly could not be with his mum any more for the time being. We had a lovely time down there and chose two lovely boys!

Our two boys we chose are the greys

After visiting Gaucin we called in on our good friends Nigel and Ginny Cobb for a bite of lunch and a good old catch up! After us all having a nightmare time with our alpacas it was lovely to see some of their gorgeous new babies!

Ginny with two of her new babies