holy moments…

Tags

, , , , , , , , , ,

ordered a spicy perogy pizza and Caesar salad from Boston Pizza for my group tonight, as I was on for food… when I called the young woman was very helpful and didn’t try to get me to order more than we really needed… she was spot on and everyone enjoyed the pizza…

we then checked-in and read a wonderful book titled: Three Wise Women by Mary Hoffman, with pictures by Lynne Russell…

Three Wise Women...

Three Wise Women…

 

we talked about the holy moments in our lives and how we are constantly searching for them…

made me think of how I am trying to live my life these days… being in each moment and taking the time to feel/see what is actually taking place…

we talked about those special conversations that accidentally happen, that you might not even consider as something important… but if you spend a moment you realize that you are in the midst of the holy…

for me it is often nature that helps me find those moments… yesterday morning in the quiet of the hot tub, as the birds flew past chirping like it was spring… the bunny spotted in the garden… the heaps and heaps of beautiful snow, lol…

what amazing women these are and how special the time that we spend together… talk about holy moments…

hot tub…

Tags

, , ,

this morning I headed out for a hot tub… didn’t check the temperature but it was beautiful… it was around -5 with the windchill I discovered later…

felt like a spring morning… once I got out, I put in some chemicals and moved some snow away from the tub… reminded me of a lovely time that Cyndi and I had in the tub while she was here over Christmas… Ron came out and took a few pics…

 

hot tub with Cyndi...

hot tub with Cyndi…

 

I have enjoyed my hot tub for the nearly five years that I have had it…

when the girls were very small George spent some time in Baker Lake and while he was gone I had pool people come out for an estimate… because we had lots of overhead wires and a small yard they could only put in a small pool, which didn’t seem worth it… for about 10 years we would rent a hot tub for our anniversary weekend and we all loved it.. at the time our oldest grandson was a toddler and he adored it… as did all the girls’ friends who were sure to come by that weekend, lol…

got this tub in March of 2009, but we had our first hot tub on Mother’s Day… and since then I have gone in it nearly every day, although for the last few months it has been much more sporadic with the extreme cold… I don’t mind when it is -30 but I don’t really like it when the windchill is below -35…

kids having a hot tub...

kids having a hot tub…

the boys still love it, although someone wants to be carried in and out if it is cold, lol…

although George always said he didn’t like it, he would usually join me and we would have wonderful conversations… always amazing how the darkness and enclosed spaces opens up the most interesting subjects…

thinking of some of those special moments tonight as I come in from another lovely tub… got to enjoy the beautiful weather… particularly after hot water was added this afternoon:-}…

struggles…

Tags

, , , , , ,

thinking about how life changes in the blink of an eye…

interesting as I had been thinking of my dear friend Ellen earlier today as I watched hours of skating on television… she lived next door but was as much family as any…

remember...

remember…

I still remember how she would take the girls when they were babies… they always wanted attention when we were sitting down to eat, whether is was 4:30 or 7… they just knew… she would come and take them over to her house quite often so that we could eat our dinner in peace… for a number of years she and her husband would have dinner with us one night a week and then babysit while we went off to our bowling league… when the girls got older she made them each a cookbook with her special recipes…

we both loved skating and would call one another when something was on to be sure the other didn’t miss it… George was very happy when we got a second television so that he wasn’t stuck watching, lol…

a number of people I know have been struggling with family health issues over the last month or so and it has reminded me of how lucky I am to just have a cold…

I have a warm home – well, now that the furnace people came again this morning and fixed whatever wasn’t quite right from yesterday’s job… I can manage financially and I have my health… I have my kids, friends and colleagues…

truly I am blessed… sending healing thoughts to those who continue to struggle…

fixed…

Tags

, , ,

got up a bit early this morning so that I could get the boxes onto the front steps…

boxes of hand-me overs...

boxes of hand-me overs…

 

thought I heard a whining noise from the furnace, but didn’t have time to go and check it out…

then I drove to work, nearly getting stuck in the driveway… apparently I need a lesson on how to get into Drive 1…

busy day at work and had to leave early to get home for the furnace guys… they arrived about an hour after I rushed home…

different noise when I got here and when the guys arrived they discovered that a motor was dying and one of them had to go and fetch a new one… they worked away for a couple of hours and were ready to leave when I noticed that the furnace wasn’t running… after another fifteen minutes they had it going again…

seems to be working fine now…

heading to bed to see if I can’t sleep this cold off…

 

sunset…

Tags

, , , , , , ,

got this shot of the sunset tonight… nice to see a blue sky that isn’t filled with sundogs, lol… was discussing with someone today about taking the time to enjoy the moment and not just rushing through the day, week, life, etc., and seeing this sunset reminded me of the importance of taking that moment and savouring it…

sunset tonight...

sunset tonight…

day started off fairly windy but quite warm… with the wind chill it was minus 16 Celsius… everyone was very happy… people even walked around without mitts and toques.. and the sun was shining as well for most of the day… it was lovely…

a bit sick that we think -16 is a heat wave but lovely none the less…

traffic has been brutal for the last number of weeks as the icy and rut-filled roads are causing accidents and everything is, and has been, moving at a snail’s pace…

my head is still full of cold, but I am feeling the slightest bit better… which is very good news… sadly there are many around me who are falling ill with this and I am hoping that they will all be feeling better very soon…

missing my beloved today as I gather up boxes of hand-me overs to go out on the step tomorrow… he would have helped me carry them from the various rooms so they would be ready at the front door in the morning, although he might have also wanted to go through them and save some of the items…

headache…

Tags

, , , ,

made it through the day…

felt a bit better around 9:30 thanks to an orange and strawberry smoothie…

by about one was starting to feel poorly again… as the afternoon progressed my head started to ache…

since getting home I have eaten a little bit, slept a little bit and now I am laying down with a cold bag on my head that was in my Christmas stocking…

hope it feels better soon…

 

20140108-194019.jpg

sick…

Tags

, , ,

a long day…

my cold has stepped up a notch and my nose is vacillating from running like a tap to being stuffed up… the least exertion and I am exhausted…

furnace guy didn’t arrive until nearly one and he did a number of things and said the furnace needed to be cleaned… showed me where the batteries go in the thermostat… was happy he turned up because the temperature had gone down three degrees… they will be back on Friday to finish the job…

finally got some sleep around 3…

had a bit of supper and am going to climb into bed and hopefully get a good night’s sleep…

took a few pictures of some of the hoarfrost out the window earlier today…

20140107-213915.jpg

brrrrrrr…

Tags

, , , , , , , , ,

today, about 2:30 a cold kicked in and I felt miserable… but it was only an hour and a half until work was done for the day so I sniffled, snuffled, drank water and blew my nose frequently as the time went by…

as we rode home I was dreaming about how I was going to climb into bed and sleep this silly cold off…

walked in the door, took off my coat and went right to the thermostat with my boots on because it was cold.. yes it was… 56 degrees Fahrenheit… put my coat back on and went to check the vents outside to be sure they weren’t covered with snow… there was no snow below them, but one of them had snow in it, so I used a stick and unplugged it…

came back into the house, but the furnace still wasn’t pumping out warm air… called my son-in-law and he suggested I clean out the filter to see if that was a problem too… so then I had to move the small freezer away from the furnace so that I could open the spot where the filter goes… small freezer seems like a misnomer considering how heavy it was… we FaceTimed and he showed me what to do… my oh my, it was dirty, sigh…apparently George cleaned that out now and again and I haven’t thought about it at all…

put a call in to the furnace people to see what else I should do… by the time they called back the temperature had risen about two degrees so the man I spoke with suggested they come out tomorrow as possibly the thermostat, which is wired in, might need new batteries… batteries, who knew it had batteries in it, yikes…

I warmed up some of last night’s leftovers in the oven, leaving the door open, climbed onto my bed with blankets on me, ate, had some hot tea and then a nap…

now, more than five hours later, the temperature has finally reached 70, which I think is about 68 or 69 in the rest of the house… I am going to climb into my bed and hope I feel better by morning, and that the temperature doesn’t go down again…

as I’ve been sitting here the moon has tracked across the top of the living room window… this is odd as it is usually at the back of the house…

moon through the window...

moon through the window at the top of the picture…

moon tonight...

moon tonight, from the open doorway…

those big girl pants can be a bit of a pain, lol…

the tree…

Tags

, , , , , , , , , ,

took the decorations off the tree and moved it so that I could see out the window again…

Norfolk pine in its new home...

Norfolk pine in its new home…

rather funny, because now it feels like there is a gaping hole and the window looks huge…

this tree ended up being filled with a garland of butterflies that Cyndi made, as well as a snowflake with my name stamped on it, and the leftover hearts which she had made as gifts for her friends…

all decorated...

all decorated…

today I gave one of those hearts to a dear friend who stopped by… haven’t seen her in a very long time so it was wonderful to have the opportunity to catch up… she had to climb through some serious snow to get into the house, lol…

footprints through the deep snow...

footprints through the deep snow…

while she was here, Crystal and the boys arrived and Crystal and Kyler shovelled in the freezing cold, while the little boys visited with us…

they got the snowblower going but it stopped after just one sweep of the driveway and so they had to hand shovel the rest… took them ages and they had to keep coming in to warm up…

snow blower quit after one sweep...

snowblower quit after one sweep…

the great news is that the driveway, sidewalk and back are clear and if needed I can take the car out…

shovellers at work...

shovellers at work…

hopefully it will be warm enough tomorrow so that I can go out and put chemicals in the hot tub… although, even I don’t plan to hot tub in these temperatures…

 

shadows…

Tags

, , , , , , ,

a few years ago I took a photography course with a colleague… we had great fun as we would often go out for dinner before the class… she is an artist and it was wonderful to see what she would do with the homework projects…

shadow thrown from the gate which George made to look like the sun and its rays...

shadow thrown from the gate which George built to look like the sun and its rays…

one of the homework projects involved taking pictures of shadows… it was quite difficult as there wasn’t much sunshine that week… I remember arriving home on the only sunny day we had and rushing out to get a few shots… George and I went to the grocery store and I was taking some pictures of the beautiful fruit when a store representative came up and asked why I was taking pictures, yikes…

we also had fun driving around the Park to get some photos…

bunny tracks through the garden...

bunny tracks through the garden…

this afternoon I got a few great shots of some lovely shadows in the back yard…

shadows in the snow and you can see how high the snow is on the pergola by the garage...

you can see how high the snow is on the pergola by the garage…

there is still a lot of snow out there… it is quite beautiful but I am looking forward to my kids coming over tomorrow and getting some of it cleared away… can’t even get out to the hot tub, lol…