– we took a couple of days to explore évora, a place for which i have a soft spot that i can’t quite explain… it’s just nice. i enjoy walking up and down the cobbled streets in the town center, eating nice food (and sweets!) and just looking around the old facades, the churches and the roman ruins. speaking of ruins, we drove to the cromeleque de almendres, a nearby group of menhirs placed in a circle, from around 6000 ac. although not all stones are still around, it’s really impressive that so many of them are. what were our ancestors thinking?

– new birds! we checked out a couple of new spots on our way to évora and struck gold at the lagoa dos patos, where we saw a black stork and swamp hens (and later northern lapwings and corn buntings). the black stork has been a kind of “wishlist bird” for me, and when we rounded some trees and it flew away from us, i could barely speak in my excitement! :D we need to go back and check out the many duck species around there too, which are all still new to us.

– a friend’s baby turned 1 year old, and we had a little happy birthday singing on zoom, which was sweet. i hope we’ll soon be able to cover those cheeks and belly with kisses!

– inspired by a postcrossers’ post on the forum, i’ve tried my hand at making silly stitched postcards, and it was so much fun! with the pressure of making something perfect (or even good) completely off, i just went for it and laughed at the result. i had the perfect “polaroid-card” cover for it too, which made it look like proper art and added an extra layer of silliness to it. i see more of these in the horizon!