Eftalou

I don't know why but I've been EXHAUSTED the last 2 days. Ok I do know why, I'm 8 months pregnant. But even still, don't I have to be actually doing something to get this tired? Saturday night I was out as you saw but I was home by about 1:30. Sunday I did absolutely nothing but laze around the house all day and fall asleep on the couch occasionally. Yesterday was pretty much the same thing except we had a car to test drive during Antonis' break so we went to one of the beaches in Eftalou for a swim.

I love Eftalou beaches because they always reminds me of swimming at a Canadian lake. Not really sure why, maybe it's the trees or the pebble beach or the really clear, clean, usually cold water. It's probably all of that combined. We don't usually go there because there aren't any beach chairs so you're stuck trying to get comfortable with a towel on the ground, but it's not so bad. It is a little bit hard if you're 8 months pregnant though....good thing I didn't go alone or I'd still be sitting there, stuck on my towel and rolling back and forth trying to build up some momentum to stand up. Like a beetle stuck on it's back. Antonis had to help me up every time but unfortunately he doesn't understand the importance of pausing to readjust a bikini bottom before you stand up all the way (especially when they're just slightly too small because you're still wearing your bikini's from last year) so I flashed a little cheek a couple of times. Oh well. If there's one thing I've learned to get used to in the last 8 months it's that pregnancy is not a very graceful time your life.

Embrace your inner elephant, laugh about it and move on. 

The sooner you learn to accept this, the better off you'll be.

Any dock will do. 

I don't know what that means but I liked the way it sounded

They look like they just can't wait to be taken out for a spin. Kind of like when you ask your dog if he wants to go for a walk and he just stands there staring at you crossed eyed for a moment, trying to figure out if you're serious or not, before he starts jumping and running around like a maniac looking for his leash. 

No? Just me? 

Huh. 

Well anyway, if I were into naming my photos I'd call this one: 

Anticipation

Sounds like a Calvin Klein perfume. 

What am I even talking about right now??

Swollen feet and ankles covered in sea grass. 

It doesn't look as nice as swollen feet and ankles covered in sand but it still feels lovely

Our neighbours.

Here they're our beach neighbours

Back at home, they live next door to us

Life in a small community 

The hubs started a new book today. 

I can't wait to hear what insane conspiracy theory this one's about so we can 

get into yet another screaming match about the credibility of the authors he adores 

have a civilized debate about it.

That's Turkey on the other side. 

I just saw on the news that they had some really devastating flash flooding in Istanbul over the weekend. Crazy since it's so close to us you feel like you can touch it but we're getting nothing but 40 and above degrees here and it's dryer than a (insert one of Nicole's dirty analogies here...and I honestly don't have one in mind but we all know she does)

The beach. Sea grass and small rocks.

We don't get the kind of sea weed or sea plants in general here that we do over in BC. Here you'll just find long strands of sea grass, and not very much of it. For my Greek friends reading this, when you swim in the ocean where I come from you swim with tons of different varieties of sea weed in all different colours and shapes and sizes. It can be a little freaky because you never know what kind of fish or sea animal is hiding in it. 

The difference, I'm guessing, probably has to do with the salt content of the water because there's a lot more salt in the water here. And the higher the salt content also means that it's easier to float, which I'm sure everyone knows already. But it's especially funny now that I'm pregnant because this also helps me float better. I don't even have to move my arms or legs to keep my head above water. I can literally 'stand' straight (not touching the ground I mean, in deep water) and slowly my big round belly will float up and bob to the surface. It's so funny!

Relaxing after my "water yoga" as Antonis calls it. 

I decided that since I've been too tired to do anything active the last 2 days that I should do some kind of a water work out. Not just swimming because that gets boring but some aquasize like the old ladies do at the pool at the gym. And even though I say old ladies, I'm not making fun of it. I used to go to aquasize twice a week in Vancouver and I absolutely loved it. I just happened to always be the youngest one there by at least 40 years. And even though old ladies and pregnant women can do it, you can still count on it to get a really good work out. You just adjust the intensity to whatever suits you but because you're using the water resistance it's much easier on your joints...which is why it's good for everyone. Even women with giant, 8 months-pregnant sized bellies. Yesterday I "ran" for 20 minutes in deep water and then I did some arm, chest and back strengthening exercises for another 10 minutes. 

Not bad for this lazy butt!

I have to confess, other than the occasional "water yoga" session, some really light swimming and a little walking around the village, this is all the exercise I've done in about a month. With the temperatures being so high, yoga on the balcony has been out of the question. I get uncomfortably hot really quickly but most worrying is I get dizzy easily. And this is any time of day. But I think I need to commit to doing more swimming and water yoga (no quotation marks this time...the name has suddenly grown on me) because the lack of exercise could be one of the main reasons why I feel so tired lately.

Anyway, that's enough for today because now I'm not just tired but HUNGRY!! Time to figure out breakfast before I break down and buy a chocolate croissant from the bakery. I swear I can smell them right now....ohhhh this may be a difficult battle....

(UPDATE: I lost the battle. I ate a chocolate croissant. It was delicious)

Bye!