I've spent much of today trotting around town with my camera. There was a 'fotomarathon' in Paphos - not a particularly huge affair but a fun way to get out and actually look at the fascinating place we live. The idea was to take pictures on 4 themes, and submit one unedited image for each. It was quite challenging because the themes were 'Self Portrait', 'Back to the future', 'Urban Moment' and 'Multicultural City' - it'll be very interesting to see the winning shots - they definitely wont be mine! 
Back to something I can do well. The class this week was the largest we've had this year so far, we welcomed back even more people returning from holiday, or on holiday, and managed to find room for everyone to dance. The atmosphere was great, which meant the microphone had to come out ... I will never complain about how well everyone gets on, but it does turn the volume up! Sets were 'rotated' to fit, but they all worked very well until we reached Muirland Willie, which came as a bit of a shock. He's not reappearing on this week's programme, however I will bring him back at some point so don't relax too much, it's not a difficult dance if taken slowly but, of course, it's not slow... good for the brain, but maybe it will work better earlier in the programme, we shall see.... Jx

My mother has just flown home after a 7 weeks visit and (despite being more than 1/2 way to 90), she has attended every class I've held while she's been here. Not only the Tuesday sessions but all the others too. Last week was her final class for this visit, as well as time to say goodbye to several other friends as they head home for the summer like swallows in reverse; it should have been a slightly sad affair, but as usual it was so much fun there was no room for sadness, and it was great that everyone left on a 'high'. Everything has a balance so as well as people leaving we also had people returning; it is lovely to have them back with us. It was a night of achievement too, more than one person successfully tackled dances that a little while ago would have been too much of a challenge - very gratifying for everyone - without the tolerance and encouragement of more experienced dancers it is very hard for the less confident to get up and dance - but that is the only way people learn, and if they don't, we gradually run out of dancers. Hopefully that doesn't look like happening any time soon - See you next week Jx

Down in numbers but definitely maintaining quality we had a really good night last Tuesday with lots of laughter and some excellent dancing. We still managed 2 sets for virtually every dance and a new Strathspey to the class 'S-Locomotion' was voted a winner by those who attempted it.
A slightly different room layout was used to enhance the space available and although it was a surprise to people, who initially had to be discouraged from rearranging it back again, it gave the place a much airier feel and when necessary should allow room for another longwise set, in an area at least as large as the 'front of stage' area in the LPH (in fact it might be slightly bigger). 
The only problem with the evening was the state of my voice, although at that point still in existence, it was impressively gravelly. Luckily for me, my throat was not feeling as bad as it sounded, but even I didn't want to hear it on the microphone so it was just as well numbers were down and the usual class background buzz was minimised, hopefully by next week normal service will be fully resumed because we could easily double our numbers in a single bound - I look forward to seeing everyone again, have a good week in the meantime  Jx.   

I’ve just realised that I’ve not had a proper blether this week – and last Tuesday’s brilliant class seems such a long time ago but should have a mention, however I’ve also just returned from an excellent Sunday class, we just managed a set and although I was not at my best the class itself did really well (My struggles were partly due to sleep deprivation – we live inconveniently close to the church and although it is lovely to hear the bells, the Easter ‘crackers’ went on into early morning managing to explode just as you nodded off). The Sunday class was based around dances with an 'Espangnole' formation and so we learnt ‘The Braes of Strathlene’, the wonderfully named jig -‘Breeks are loose and Buttons Awa’, and finally the challenging strathspey ‘Foxhill Court’ which also contains the aptly named ‘courage reels’ though in fact it was other portions of the dance that took a while to sort out, however, once sorted we danced though it with no problems so given my level of confusion at times the class should be complimented.
Going back to last Tuesday, we welcomed many friends back to the class and our numbers finally topped 30 despite holidays and sickness still keeping other regulars away. 4 sets were up dancing at one point which is the maximum we normally managed at the LPH - although I still miss the elbow room there was no real problem fitting that number of sets in. A new dance was introduced 'the Bramble Bush' and it went well, others that hadn't been danced for a while such as Kangaroo Paw made people think but ended up with a positive score. See you next week.