Happy International Women's Day!

Pedal Power

Dun Laoghaire Rathdown Libraries presents a special video for International Women's Day

It's 10 minutes long and a great watch......and you'll even catch sight of me on my bike with Bones in the basket!!

Freedom Machine

As a woman, cycling gives me freedom to get around quickly and conveniently. Coined as the "Freedom Machine" by Susan B. Anthony, I certainly feel free when I ride my bike!

Click here to see my account of cycling in to the city to attend a birthday party - what could be more free than that?!

School Day Cycling

Watching this video reminded me of how great it was to cycle to school when I was younger, being one of about 10 girls who cycled in a school of about 900 girls. My twin sister and I were always late for school and we needed to cycle fast to get to assembly on time. We must have looked a state with our gaberdines flying around as we cycled furiously in our uniform. Our uniform was a skirt and it may have been preferable to cycle in trousers and then change when we arrived.......but sure we never were on time to do that!!

Our best friend Alice was a cyclist too and we used to cycle home together. We pushed our bikes to Alice's house as she lived closest to the school and dawdled and chatted on the way to her house where we stood at the driveway and chatted some more......until.... Amy and I realised that we were going to be late for swimming classes if we didn't leave straightaway.  You can see a pattern here! And then it was off again, cycling home quickly to get our swimming gear and head down to the pool - on our bikes again!

I'm glad that my parents encouraged me to cycle as a child because as an adult I can now see the worth of forgoing the car and enjoying the bike. Cycling is great for my physical and mental health and honestly it makes my spirit happy and I feel young at heart when I am on the bike.

If you haven't cycled in years now is the time to get back on the saddle and enjoy the thrill of the ride!

Saturday in the Charity Shop - Green clothes for St Patrick's Day

 St Patrick's Day - 17th of March

As we are approaching St Patrick's Day, I thought it apt to show some of the green items for sale in the Cudeca Charity Shop that I volunteer in on Plaza de Merced, here in Malaga.

If you like the look of any of them, make sure to get down to the shop first thing on Monday morning to buy when the shop opens. Particularly if you plan to wear green on St Patrick's Day!

Keto Lemon Poppy Seed Loaf - it's zesty!

 Keto Lemon Poppy Seed Loaf

I decided I'd change up my Keto bread (see recipe here) and add lemon juice and poppy seeds to see if I could make it more of a cake instead of a bread.

Well it worked out beautifully and tastes great. Lovely, lemony and zesty!

Biomilanes

There is a little organic vegetable shop in Malaga that has a great selection of organic eco foods. I got both my lemon and also the essential poppy seeds in this store after not successfully finding poppy seeds anywhere else (but am sure I could probably find them in Corte Ingles).

This loaf was a hit and I'll definitely make it again......but for the moment it's going on my plate along with a few slices gone in to the freezer for another day.

Sunday Museum visit to see Spanish greats Picasso & Barceló

Picasso Museum Malaga

The Picasso Museum here in Malaga is open until 5pm on Sundays with free entry in for the last 2 hours. Normally there would be a massive queue for this attraction during most of the year but with reduced tourists numbers in the city, due to Covid, we were able to rock up at 3pm and head straight in to the permanent Picasso exhibition and the newly opened Barceló exhibition.

Singapore - PIGSY Art!

In PIGSY art news, I can report that there are now PIGSY's in Singapore. See here for details of The Ireland Funds Singapore "A Sense of Ireland 2021" Festival.

PIGSY Solo Show in Spain

In addition to the above, we are working away on PIGSY's next solo show which is coming up at the end of March in La Casa Amarilla, Ciaran is finalising the art work selection and getting pieces framed and stretched. While I'm working on the promotion end of things, writing press releases and getting press packs together.  All a lot of fun and very exciting for PIGSY to have an art exhibition here in Spain!

Saturday in the Charity Shop

Volunteering

On Saturdays I volunteer in the Cudeca Charity Shop on Plaza de la Merced here in Malaga.

Today there was the most beautiful vintage Barbie for sale in the window. Last week there was a different two (see my blog here) but I have to say I really liked this one. It would look perfect at the top of most Christmas trees - yes, that's what I like to do with Barbie dolls!

This is the "Starlight Waltz Barbie". She is absolutely fabulous! I love the sparkly hair accessory and her earrings and amazing full skirt. What a stunner!

She didn't sell today so if you are interested, get down to Cudeca early on Monday morning.

Mannequin makeover

So I did a yellow on yellow clothes display. However, it looked like a bit too much yellow so I switched it up and added a blue scarf and a hat with a blue decorated band. 

Not too sure which one I prefer. Let me know what you think!

In other news, we had a keto friendly dessert of strawberries and cream last night - with more cream than strawberries as you can see!

It was so good and lovely to have after dinner.  We are having it again tonight!

PIGSY Press

 Irish Abroad: PIGSY in the Irish Times

Very exciting to wake up to an article in the Irish Times about PIGSY's art and our life here in Malaga on our "year out" otherwise known as a career break.

Click here to read the full article

Busy Art Day

With the article up online, I spent the morning promoting it on social media and updating the PIGSY website with the details on the Press and Media section. It was quite incredible the amount of traffic it sent to his website and all day he was receiving texts about the article along with emails and of course lots of instagram messages too. A fun busy day for sure!

Discount Code

For a limited time - get 10% discount on a PIGSY face mask using coupon code "IRISHTIMES10"

Click here to go to the PIGSY store

Helvetik - a newly opened café in Malaga

Helvetik in Malaga

Great to see a new café open here in Malaga. It's Helvetik and is located on Calle San Juan (in what I think was formerly an ice cream shop). I look forward to trying their coffee!

Almond Coconut Chocolate Keto Bark (with sugar free Valor Chocolate)

So for the first time ever I made Chocolate Bark! 

I had seen this sugar free very dark chocolate by Valor in my local Carrefour and wondered what it was like and what I could make from it. Valor is a famous brand of Spanish chocolate and when I looked closer at the packaging I saw that it was made with Stevia in place of sugar. I'm intrigued by Stevia and wondered what it would be like in the chocolate.......oh and I also love dark chocolate!

In order to make the bark, I melted two bars of the chocolate (it broke up so beautifully with an excellent chocolate "snap" sound) and then added roasted and salted almonds along with a small bit of shredded coconut. I then sprinkled the top with a bit of salt for more flavour.

Here is how it turned out

This is the packaging of the sugar-free chocolate - look out for it in your local store, or you can probably buy it online

Here's the nutritional info for the chocolate (per 100g)

Energy - 568 kcal

Fat - 49g (31g of which saturates)

Carbohydrate - 19g (o.5g of which sugars)

Protein - 11g

Little Treat

It tasted absolutely delicious - we had a little bit after our OMAD dinner yesterday evening. A really nice treat and there is a big stack in the freezer now so we can have a little bit every time we want a little treat.

Check this out!

I like the look of these Peanut Bars.  Peanut flour is a new one on me. Have YOU heard of it?!