hungry…

20 Sunday Jul 2014

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another beautiful morning in the garden…

watched two squirrels snacking
under the bird feeder while I had an early morning hot tub… the bluejays were at the feeder and there is obviously a baby in their family who was located in one of the cedars, and he was very hungry from the sound of things…

20140720-194243-70963816.jpgfinished the book and watched squirrels drink and a bluejay bath in the pond…

20140720-194400-71040891.jpgcan’t figure out who is knocking over the plant in the pond… maybe a squirrel…

a dragonfly stopped by… quite red… got a good shot of it with one of the fish swimming over…

20140720-200720-72440681.jpgmade supper for the kids and had a nice visit with them… a beef roast with baked potatoes, cucumber in sour cream, salad and zucchini, mushrooms and fresh peas… they brought Slurpees, which was great as it was hot… even now it feels like 33.2…

dragonfly…

19 Saturday Jul 2014

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spent a good portion of the day in the garden…

20140719-200950-72590820.jpgit was lovely and not too hot… another batch of plants are blooming… they could be the same as the purple ones, only smaller… dark pink/red, not sure how I feel about the colour…

first thing this morning a dragonfly landed on the screen and posed for a few pictures…

20140719-201526-72926223.jpgmoved my chair so I was sitting right beside the pond… saw lots of babies… white and red, white and black, and gold ones, which look black in the pond… sadly I’m having issues with algae, not sure the fancy uv filter is doing its job… frustrating because putting it in caused the waterfall flow to be less powerful…

did a bit of weeding and had a lovely nap…

read most of a paper book and also put on my big girl pants and barbecued steak and zucchini, with potatoes, onions and mushrooms…

20140719-202300-73380961.jpgrestful day, but missing my beloved…

storm…

18 Friday Jul 2014

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had quite the thunderstorm tonight…

the clouds filled the sky before the rain came…

20140718-214136-78096495.jpgonly came down for maybe ten minutes but there was a lot of it and it was coming from the south… usually a bad sign for the basement…

once it stopped I ran down and checked and everything was dry… yay…

been giggling off and on throughout the day… middle of the night I opened the window

20140718-214557-78357111.jpgwasn’t till this morning that I realized I had taken the screen off to get some pictures and hadn’t put it back on… amazingly there were very few bugs in the house…

the fish seemed hungry this morning so I put out some food before leaving for work… they were happy…

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surgery…

17 Thursday Jul 2014

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what a difference two years makes… today at lunch we walked to a Farmers’ Market and I carried a bag full of produce back to the office… back then I hadn’t been able to walk much or carry anything due to the size of the hernia…

it is two years to the day since I had surgery for cancer of the uterus and a very large hernia repair…

I was terrified because George wasn’t with me… he had died four months before and I was still trying to work through the whole being on my own thing…

I had set up a schedule so that I had people with me in the hospital and when I got home… only my younger daughter was able to be here and my sister-in-law came from Calgary…

my body does not deal well with drugs of any kind… when I came to after the surgery, I was high as a kite… but not in a good way… it took five or six hours to settle down… the pain meds kept me from sleeping and I was very hyper… twelve hours after the surgery I stopped taking all medication… it was easier to work through the pain than to deal with all of the side effects…

they made a large incision but it was less painful than the one from gall bladder surgery two years earlier, which was at an angle across my abdomen…

my nephew brought in his iPad and got a movie playing to try to help me sleep, but nothing worked… usually the tv works like a great sleeping pill for me, lol…

I have been so blessed with friends and family who have been looking after me since I have been on my own…

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wild things…

16 Wednesday Jul 2014

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Journey to Churchill… the newest addition to the Assiniboine Park Zoo… it opened on July 3rd, but I haven’t had an opportunity to get there, particularly as it has been very busy on the weekends…

the last time I was there was in May and there was still lots of work to be done… the worst thing was the paths as they were filled with potholes and water… we had been going through a very rainy time… the other thing that has been a pain for over a year is that you had to walk all the way around on one side and then retrace your steps and go all the way around the other side… both of those issues have been resolved… the path is great – level and easy to walk on… and, at last, you can walk all the way around the zoo, woo hoo…

it is stunning…

muskox through the rocks...

muskox through the rocks…

the polar bear area is wonderful… there are lots of glass water viewing spots…

great viewing spots...

great viewing spots…

a few places to sit and watch for a while, and a wonderful tunnel under the water where you can see the bears swimming, and see all the way to the sky…

glass tunnel...

glass tunnel…

we found the seals swimming in a lovely spot where they were very easy to view…

seals cavorting...

seals cavorting…

the vistas into the space make you feel like you could step right into the beautiful setting…

vistas...

vistas…

sadly, the early afternoon is often when the bears are napping, but we did get to see Hudson…

Hudson...

Hudson…

he was napping, but right by an open spot where he could see people… there were two interpreters there as well, answering questions… Kaska and Aurora, the two females, and Storm the other male, weren’t around…

great picture of one of the inukshuk’s with some of the group… a bit bigger than the one in my garden, lol…

little break at an inukshuk

little break at an inukshuk

we checked out other animals and finished up at the Shirley Richardson Butterfly Garden…

resting butterfly...

resting butterfly, maybe a viceroy…

we got a group photo just before heading our separate ways…

wild things...

wild things…

a wonderFULL time… I am looking forward to going back very soon to see it all again…

 

 

sandwich…

15 Tuesday Jul 2014

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was talking with someone a while ago about so much illness around us…

reminded me of the switch when the girls went from being the ones we supported to the ones who supported us…

our final parent, George’s mom, died and we were all together at the hospital… we came home and the girls organized pizza for supper…

they then proceeded to see what we needed… how they could help us…

up till that time we had been there to support and protect them…

but we moved from being the protectors to being the protected…

both George and I saw and felt the change and we talked about it quite a bit…

from then on they took on the role of supporters…

we went from being the meat in the sandwich to being the bread, lol…

since then, they have been looking after us…

and now they are looking after me… from checking in and seeing how I am, where I am, what I’m doing, what I’m eating, to calling one another and sharing how they think I am doing…

I am one lucky woman to have such wonderful kids…

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technology…

14 Monday Jul 2014

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seemed like a busy weekend, so when I got home from work I had a little nap…

then I had supper and watched a bit of tv… tried to set up a new Skype address but technology wasn’t working with me… been a bit of that lately…

although I must say that I am really understanding our database at work… a colleague and I were discussing some new information we had received, and we both knew exactly what it was all about… great to realize that we have learned a lot about the system in the last year or so…

had a great visit by phone with one of my BS buddies… we used to go to aquasize together but she moved away and we’ve only gone a few times when she’s home… we just made two dates to go in the next month or so, which will be great fun… she will be back here on a more regular basis and we are looking to swim more regularly… looking forward to that…

when we were out for dim sum on Saturday, I got this picture of the beautiful salt water tank at the restaurant…

salt water tank at restaurant...

salt water tank at restaurant…

 

busy…

13 Sunday Jul 2014

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got up and had a hot tub just before the rain started… I sat there very still as the goldfinches were flitting about, as well as a couple of squirrels running around the fence and into one of the feeders, while the blue jays were flying through the garden… rather busy…

then, while one boy finch was at the feeder I thought I saw another yellow something fly past… wasn’t positive…

girl and boy goldfinch eating...

girl and boy goldfinch eating…

went for breakfast with the kids in St. Boniface, wearing those big girl pants again, and on to a few stores, including one where we got Jeff his belated birthday and Fathers’ Day gift – a new barbeque…

I headed to Safeway for groceries and when I got home and was looking out the window I saw two boy goldfinches at the feeder… yay…. didn’t get a picture, but will be trying to do that in the next few days…

last night the moon was full and very beautiful… spent a bit of time and got this photo…

full moon last night...

full moon last night…

was rather pleased with the outcome…

 

construction…

12 Saturday Jul 2014

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went to IKEA with the kids this morning and they bought a bedside table for me that I’ve been looking at for a while… I saw it online but they didn’t have one put together in the store so that we could see what it really looked like… we’d searched for it last time we were there but couldn’t find it… today it jumped off the shelf as we walked by…

stopped at Rona for a few things for their kitchen and then on to Kum Koon Garden for dim sum with a young friend, who then dropped me at home…

had a nap and did a bit of housework…

20140712-185406-68046126.jpgafter which, this box and four hours produced a very cute bedside table…

20140712-185543-68143529.jpgwoo hoo, way to go me and my big girl pants…

20140712-185813-68293550.jpgthere are many tools in the garage and a couple of toolboxes in the basement, but I used my tools… this hammer, which was made by George in shop class, and a small pink screwdriver that has multiple heads… George wasn’t allowed to use them and so they never got lost, lol…

rather happy with my project… and it fits perfectly…

leaving…

11 Friday Jul 2014

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had a conversation recently with someone about my mom…

we weren’t very close as I grew up… she spent a lot of time in hospital and was on Valium for years which made her confused and disconnected…

she decided to stop taking the drugs when I was about sixteen and she quit cold turkey… not the way most people would stop, but she had made up her mind… it made a huge difference for all of us…

my dad died when the girls were eight and ten, and within months she was sick… eventually they discovered esophageal cancer and moved her to a palliative care facility which was across town from where she, and we, lived…

for four months I spent every day with her… we had the chance to work through all our differences and become good friends… at that time I was a stay-at-home mom and so was able to spend the time…

it was horrible and wonderful… not often does the opportunity come to spend such quality time with another person…

dying slowly is hard on everyone, the person who is dying and all those connected with them… it was a privilege to take that journey with her and know that we had sorted through all our difficulties… there was nothing left unsaid…

over the years George and I have supported a number of other family and friends as they left us slowly and as difficult as his death was, I was thankful that he didn’t go through days, weeks, months of pain and suffering…

if I think back, I can remember the last day, when I climbed into her bed and held her during the last hours… but mainly I remember the good times and how much she loved our girls…

she would have loved all our boys, old and young…

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