Back from Spain
By balcony
16 comments
You will have noticed my absence for the greater part of this month. Well my wife & I went to Spain on Nov 5th to be present when our first Spanish granddaughter was born. The doctors had given our daughter-in-law the 7th Nov as the probable birth date but she took her time & wasn’t born till the 9th! They had known for months that it would be a girl & they also had a name for her as well long before she was born. They had decided to call her Ainara. We had never heard of this name before but her parents told us it was a name from the north of Spain & meant something like Dove or Swallow.
Let me present my wife with Ainara in her arms. I’m Quico. Our English granddaughter couldn’t pronounce the Spanish word for granddad so she transformed it into Quico (sounds like Kiko) now both our English grandchildren call me Quico. We expect Ainara will also call me Quico!:
Quico & Nanny with Ainara at King Cross Kafé
The birth was quite straight forward & without complications & took about 8 hours. Mum & babe had to spend the weekend in the hospital in Cuenca, the city in central Spain where our son & his wife (and now their daughter!) live. It is my wife’s home town & where we met & lived for the better part of 30 years. They returned home on the Monday & the babe is doing well!
Proud Dad with Ainara at King Cross Kafé & mum in background:
We got home on Wednesday evening 21st around 9pm. I started up my computer & downloaded MS updates & the computer was working OK but on Thursday morning the monitor refused to start up so now I’m having to share my wife’s computer till I get a new monitor.
Thursday morning our daughter brought her son for us to look after during the day. As I got up just after 7am & we expected our grandson around 8am I didn’t turn the PC on. When we went to their car to pick him (James) up they said they had a few things for us & gave us a flat screen monitor for my computer. I’ve wanted one for years. They also gave us a keyboard (brand new, never been used) & a mouse, also new. There is nothing wrong with my current keyboard or mouse, nor was there the day before with my monitor!
Before switching my PC on for the day I thought I would connect the new monitor. I disconnected the old one but when I went to plug in the new flat screen monitor I discovered that the cable connecting it to my PC’s tower was missing! When we told our daughter she said they didn’t have one as her partner’s brother had given them the screen & keyboard & mouse. They said they would get in touch with him & see if he had the cable. He told them it was a universal connector & we should be able to pick one up for a couple of quid on eBay. We have had look but can’t seem to find the kind of cable we need. I shall have to visit a couple of shops here in Huntingdon to see if they have the kind of cable I need, till I get a cable I’m more or less disconnected from the internet. :-((
I’m sharing my wife’s laptop but it obviously doesn’t have all my photos or contacts & all the other bits & pieces we all gather along our journey around the internet & our computers.
I also have a smartphone that allows me to read my email & write emails but it is a slow, tedious task! I can read anything on the internet but again it is extremely frustrating having to enlarge webpages that quite often shrink to be come almost invisible if you put a finger in the wrong place while you are scrolling through the page!
I could write on it but it is so slow & tedious an operation that I prefer to wait till my wife’s laptop is free for a couple of hours. I’m nearly a month behind with the 3 gardening forums I write on as well as my own forum. Even though we took the laptop with us to Spain much of the time over there we were away from home & in places without internet connection. The son with whom we stayed has broadband as well as the other one. My mother-in-law doesn’t have internet nor even a computer.
Our youngest son, whose 1st daughter we went over to see being born, has opened his own cafeteria, King Cross Kafé this year but struggles to find help he can afford.
King Cross Kafé in Cuenca, Spain:
So we spent several hours with him most mornings & again most evenings. He doesn’t have a Wi-Fi hotspot yet though he says he would like to set up one next year – if his business is still running! So again we couldn’t use the internet!
The weather over there was almost as bad as here! We also had a lot of rain & some very cold days!
27 Nov, 2012
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Comments
Many congratulations Balcony, how lovely to have been there for the babies birth and I`m pleased all is well with both mummy and baby, such a pretty name as well, they are lovely photographs.
It was good of your family to give you the new monitor and suchlike but very frustrating to not have the cable, my hubby gets all our new cables from the web, Cables4U, they have all sorts and are very quick with deliveries, usually cheaper as well.......
Just checked it out for you Balcony, the UK equivalent is called Cables2U.......
27 Nov, 2012
What a little treasure and such a lovely name,,
Hope you get back on the air soon......
27 Nov, 2012
Congratulations to you all, a beautiful addition to the family.
27 Nov, 2012
Many Congratulations to you and your Family,Balcony..lovely name for a lovely baby..:o)
27 Nov, 2012
Another member to your dynasty , Balcony , congrats .
It seems to be baby boom time .
27 Nov, 2012
Awe what wonderful news Balcony congratulations to you all.
28 Nov, 2012
Great news and lovely photos, Balcony. Hope your son's 'Kafe' goes from strength to strength, I don't know if it's the same in Cuenca, but here people treat a certain cafe/bar as their 'local', much the same as pubs in Britain, and are sometimes suspicious of a new concept. I hope your son has time for his 'new concept' to become a flourishing 'local.'
28 Nov, 2012
congrats to all the family.
28 Nov, 2012
Lovely blog Balcony! Congratulations and good luck with your new computer!
28 Nov, 2012
Thank you all for your lovely comments & congratulations! :-)) We are very happy with Ainara & hope to see her again in 6 months time. She had her eyes wide open when our son came out with her in his arms to show all of us who were waiting! She had hardly any red nor was she sort of wrinkled like many babies are when they are born. We did notice that she has very long hands & feet!
In Spain as many family members as they like can be present in the hospital while the mother is giving birth. So Ainara's 7 cousins, from about 10 to about 20 years old, were with us in the waiting room as well as her parents & two of her 3 sisters. Just before she was presented to us the 3rd sister was able to make it along with her husband & the husband of one of the other sisters. Our other son & his partner were also there with us.
Ainara's Spanish grandmother was also in the hospital as a few days before she had to go in to have some metal rods in her hip removed. Unfortunately she developed an infection & had to stay in longer while they gave her a course of antibiotics. We heard a couple of days ago that the infection has cleared up & they are all hoping she can have her hip replacement & be home before Christmas.
Our son opened his "Kafé" in July this year after he was made redundant from the cafeteria where he had been working at the beginning of the year. One of his sister-in-laws is a qualified architect & she designed the "Kafé". It is based on Kings Cross station in London. The name "King Cross Kafé" is a play on his surname & the train station!
As for my computer my old monitor is working again. I had it plugged into the onboard graphics chip which it seems has stopped working. Fortunately I had installed a more powerful graphics card a few years ago but the monitor wasn't plugged into it. I must have plugged the monitor into the the old graphics port at some time without realizing it. Anyway it is now plugged into the graphics card I had installed & is now working perfectly again.
Thanks, Lincslass, for that link. I've been along to visit their page but there are so many cables to choose from that I don't know which I should get! In the coming days I will have another look but there is no longer any urgency now that my old monitor is working again.
28 Nov, 2012
You are welcome Balcony, I`m glad to see you are up and running again.......
28 Nov, 2012
Great blog Quico....Congratulations to you and your family on the birth of beautiful Ainara....:>)
28 Nov, 2012
Congratulations Balcony on the birth of you gorgeousr new Grandaughter, nice to meet you and your family ;0)
28 Nov, 2012
welcome home Balcony and glad you enjoyed your hols, beautifull baby girl and i love the name and meaning to, bet you cant wait to see her again, congrats to you all :o)) x
29 Nov, 2012
Thanks once again for your congratulations! :-))
Lincslass, our daughter is going to ask her partner's brother about the cable again as he is going to visit them today. They intend to have eBay's webpage open so he can show them exactly what cable I need for my flat screen monitor when he arrives. Perhaps next week I'll be able to change monitors. (There is nothing wrong with the old one I'm using).
Thanks very much, Motinot, for your congratulations! :-))
Pansypotter, the photo of myself is not the first I've posted on GoY, I have one where I'm standing alongside my Amaryllis in the living room. It IS the 1st where my wife is also with me & certainly the very first of our lovely granddaughter, Ainara!
Thanks, Sandra for the welcome home & the congratulations! :-)) Ainara is beautiful & as you say we are looking forward to seeing her again - in 6 months time!
30 Nov, 2012
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Hello Quico ...
Welcome home ... :o)
Many congratulations to your family on the birth of Ainara ... such a lovely name !
I hope you're able to sort out your computers soon !
.. and I hope the Kafé in Spain is very successful !
27 Nov, 2012