Holiday Weekend

Happy Easter Weekend

This week is a lovely bank holiday weekend in the UK, but also my hubby actually has the same holidays as me!  This doesn't happen often as his company is based in Switzerland and follows different holidays.  We have had perfect weekend with a good mix of friends & food!  As I write this I am out on the decking making the most of the glorious weather we are having! Long may it continue - everyone is so much brighter & happier when the sun is shining!

Anyhoo you might have read that one of my goals this year was to Be More Social.  The idea being that relationships are important to feeling happy yet it can be easy to neglect them when the day to day stuff gets in the way.  This year we are making a conscious effort to make those trips to visit people, to have friends over when we can & to get out & enjoy each others company.  And what better way to spend a holiday weekend than with friends.

We had been invited for a meal on Friday, made plans to go to a park with Bailey & a friends wee one during the day on Saturday then have other friends over at night on Saturday, then a lazy Sunday together before our distillery tour for Ken's birthday on Monday!  Jam packed but full of fun stuff for a change.

The food

Friday night was ace.  This was my first time meeting a new couple from the village which Ken had befriended over a love of whisky in the local pub!  A nicer couple you could not meet! We had nibbles & drinks in the garden followed by a tasty cuban curry made to a family recipe.  It had slow cooked meat, aromatic spices, olives & a fried egg on the top.  Never tasted anything like it & I thoroughly enjoyed it.

FUN & GAMES

We then were introduced to a Serbian easter game (our host, W is from Serbia).  This game involves hard boiled eggs that have been wrapped in leaves & boiled in different things from the larder to make pretty patterns.  I found a great post on it here with fab pictures

You then choose your egg that you think will make a good fighting egg!  Me I went with pretty - the one with the lovely leaf pattern & swirly design.  The men went for weight checking each one before deciding on their winner.  However W tapped the eggs gently against her teeth before deciding on her egg.  This made the men rethink their choices & also try this teeth tapping test to make their choice!

The idea is to tap the eggs top to top and the one which doesn't break is the winner & goes on to fight the other winners till ultimately there are two strong eggs which go head to head.  I turned to hubby held my egg as close to the top os possible following W's advice he tapped it with a little force & my whole shell crumbled! No wee dent or cracks that needed an adjudicator to check it was very clear that my 'pretty' egg had lost the battle & was not going to be fighting on - boo :(

It came down to Mr B & our neighbour.  They used good old rock, paper, scissors to determine who would do the tapping as they had both won the same amount of battles.  6 times they both drew the same! What are the odds of that in rock, paper, scissors? lol  In the end our neighbour did the tapping & won!  He celebrated triumphantly with his winning egg beating 4 other eggs to claim the championship!  It was great fun a perfect dinner party game, especially with couples & men who got very competitive.

After our glorious 3 course meal W opened the home brew! W is orthodox christian & was fasting on Friday - yes fasting!  She slaved over all the food for us but had to sit down to her basic allowances during fasting.  I love to try different things from other cultures & although I am not really a spirit drinker, unless it is in a cocktail & masked with fruit & sweet stuff I took my shot of this plum schnapps  called Rakia.  Every family likes to make their own rakia which is double distilled to about 60-70%!  This stuff made my lips tingle, my throat numb & my chest warm!  I didn't quite get through the whole  shot glass but the men in another match of rock, paper, scissor made sure it wasn't wasted by downing the leftovers!

We ate, we drank & we chatted 3 couples just having a good 'Good Friday'!

Beach time

Saturday didn't go quite to plan with our friends' wee one being not well & having to cancel the country park outing - but we didn't waste the early morning start we headed to Tentsmuir beach & had a lovely long walk through the forrest & Bailey enjoyed playing with the ball & a bracing swim in the sea.  I took my first ever panoramic shot!

This beach - no matter how busy the carpark is you always feel like you have it to yourself!

The obligatory dog at the beach photo

We also had a Buffet Night with other friends but that I think is a whole other post!

Hope you are all having a wonderful weekend! & have good company to spend the weekend with!

Did you get up to anything special over the holiday weekend?

Any recipes, foods, games from your culture that you share with others?