July the holiday month.

After a long delay here I am again friends and readers (hello!Are you still out there?)
July and August were the months of my holidays. Schools closed, mum was at the rehabilitation centre and we at the beach house which is closer to the rehab so that was really convenient.
July started with a day with my crafty group girlfriends at Saint Nicholaos near Naoussa.
It's a lovely place, a huge forest park with streams and rivers and lots of grass and trees.

We went there to attend the christening of the daughter of one of the girls in the group Kikitsa, the blogger behind DIY my day!You should visit her blog, it is so sweet!
The christening had all the beautiful girly things one expected from Kikitsa.Sweets,

macarons,

lemonade,

handmade christening favours,

summer decorations....

and a pro photographer, Kikitsa's sister, who took amazing photos of us!

Of course the focus of all this was the gorgeous little Ariadne!Oh yes I attended the christening of a baby named with my name!I am so so happy!

The very next day my niece was graduating from her University in Kastoria.

The highway was decorated in sunflowers!

And here is my niece with my son at the dinner after the graduation.Aren't they both gorgeous?I am so proud!

Kastoria lake was beautiful as usual.

After those two days out we moved to the beach house. Three to four times a week we visited my mum at the rehab. She was slow in her progress but she seemed happy to be there.

Sometimes we took Barca with us and mum seemed to enjoy her visits.

At the beach house things were relaxing and simple.

I went to the beach every day and put my little beach chair under the shade of the clay cliffs.

I enjoyed the sea so very much.

I always took my coffee and snack with me.I especially enjoyed these special edition strawberry Oreos this summer.They had a taste like when I was a kid.

This summer the flamingos were much in fashion. Some of them though died at our beach.

I spotted lots of little creatures this summer. The permanent resident, the green lizard was there of course.

A lovely jelly fish swam around me one day. Later in the summer we spotted a huge one like this but unfortunately we couldn't take a picture of it.

I found sea urchins in the shallow waters and some dead ones on the beach too.

I even found the spikes of a hedgehog.The little creature was missing from inside probably eaten by a cat.

Insects are all around us at the beach house.

And hubby tried some fishing too.

We didn't go much around this summer but we did pay a visit to our friends Areti and Fondas at Posidi. We swam and had dinner out together. The sea was fantastic and so was the food and Areti's homemade ice cream! She was my inspirations for later making lots of homemade icecream in the city.

Another day my friend Elpida and her friend Dimos visited us. We had a great day and Barca adored them. Elpida is the great crafter of  Elpida's amigurumi creations so why don't you have a look at her page? She is now in Sweden working as a teacher there but I am sure we will meet again next summer.

There is a big mall near the beach house now with mainly shops for tourists. There was a marble art exhibition at the time and we saw that hippo there.

We also attended a shadow puppet performance by our friend Odysseas Kanlis at Fokies village.

In July I read some books too.

As you can see that book was accompanied by both hot and cold coffee depending on the weather conditions.

The first three books were excellent.
This summer I just rearranged a few things around the beach house.
I made this candle holder out of an old lamp.

I loved taking photos of my glass paper weights.

I put the sailor and the mermaid on the wall.

The rest of the decorations stayed the same.

I also made a new door number as the previous one was stolen.

I stitched a bit too.

That doggy kit was sent to me by Chiara of The Grey Tail a long time ago as it reminded her of Barca.

It turned out so beautiful!

This summer Anna of In My Closet organised a summer crafty challenge in which I took part. Every week she gave us a theme and we worked on it. Here's what I made in July. Something out of an old pair of jeans.I made a bag for my book for my beach bag.

A toy. I made a Noughts and Crosses by painting on sea tiles and pebbles.And made a bag out of an old bed linen.

And here's a pic of the cross stitch I started this summer. It is a Blue and white theme that I love but unfortunately I haven't moved on much. 

Nature around the beach house was lovely as usual. This is our pomegranate tree.

And that's the view from my back balcony.

We had a couple of flowers too.

But it is so beautiful all around that the neighbours' daughter even did a photo shooting there. Don't they look like fairies in the forest?

The views from the beach house are always breathtaking! That yacht  made its appearance three times during summer.

In July we had a rare weather incident. It rained continuously for 29 hours!It was awful! I admit we don't like staying at the beach house under such weather but we couldn't do otherwise at that time.

I even put on the right shoes to go out.

And hence the hot coffee.

Even Barca didn't enjoy it.Look at that face!

The sea looked awful after that rain storm!

And all the flowers fell from the bushes.

But in the end there was a huge rainbow.

And lots of sea glass of course!

In fact there was lots of sea glass all summer.

Some pieces were especially good.

I even took some photos with my macro lens.

That crab shell is really small.

Barca enjoyed the sea a lot and when there were no people around we put her in too.

She is adorable isn't she?

She so enjoys staying around the barbeque for obvious reasons!

The sunsets are usually the end of a blog post about the beach house!

But this time we will close with some underwater photos I took with my underwater camera.

I hope I will show you some August blog post soon!