Tag Archives: big girl pants

highs and lows…

04 Friday Apr 2014

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this morning I heard about the birth of friends’ first grandchild… they have been waiting for a while now as she was a little bit late… very cute, she looks just like her daddy… my friends are “over the moon” as they start down the path of the new and amazing world of grand parenting… so much more fun than parenting, lol…

at the end of the day, got some very disturbing news as another friend discovered that she has some serious medical issues to overcome… not even sure I heard all of the information, as my head stopped processing at the beginning of the conversation…

daffodils from a friend...

daffodils from a friend…

what can I do for my friends… completely different events, but likely will need the same types of support… listening and celebrating each step of their new journeys, sending prayers and healing vibes…

really, where would we be without our friends…

 

sorting…

03 Thursday Apr 2014

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this morning I put out two large bags and two boxes filled with pass-me-overs…

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it is always so great when you can let go of stuff you don’t need…

I’d been gathering bits and pieces for a few months but hadn’t dealt with the collection… now I feel a bit lighter…

of course there is still tons of stuff to sort and pass along to others…

I hope they came this morning as this afternoon the snow came down again, can’t believe it…

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the depths…

02 Wednesday Apr 2014

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tonight I stopped and picked up some fish and chips, which I have been craving for weeks… didn’t even put away my things when I got home… it was delicious…

have been really down for a while and it wasn’t until tonight when a friend called that I realized what the problem was…

another friend is turning 65 on Friday and tonight their family were having a come-and-go to celebrate…

when the invitation arrived I faced the fact that George would have been 65 last December… it didn’t mean much at the time, but this celebration kind of kicked me in the gut… don’t get me wrong, I’m glad our friend is having a great special birthday, but I’ve been stuck in my own pain…

we were invited to add a note to an online card and include a picture of our family… didn’t know what to do about that either… should the picture be of my family now or what my family used to be… In the end I sent a picture of our group… that seemed to take care of the request, but I am still trying to figure out who my family is…

20140402-211358.jpg things seem so mixed up right now… April second and the garden is filled with snow… I remember the year George died and how we were out working in the garden raking the grass in the middle of March, just a few weeks after…

apparently, you never know what will bring on the pain… as another friend said, likely I will have days like this for the rest of my life… hopefully they will come less often as time goes by…

Junos…

30 Sunday Mar 2014

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well, just got home from the Junos at the MTS Centre downtown…

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there were a lot of people there…

we arrived about twenty minutes before it started and it was easy to get in…

it was great fun to be part of the “behind the scenes” action… to see what happens while the commercials are on… to see the cameras and teleprompters, the people running around after each act, mopping down the floors to be sure they were safe for everyone…

the Jennifer Jones team got a standing ovation when they were announced as presenters… Chris Hadfield was cool and also got an ovation… he sang a few lines of a BTO song before he introduced them…

many performers there whose music I knew, mainly from my driving in the car and listening to the radio…

the finale with a couple of younger bands joining BTO on the stage for Taking Care of Business was a great ending…

then we just had to get out through all the people, but the girls made sure we made it safely… even though we waited a bit, there were big crowds going the same direction as we were…

a memory to add to my collection…

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birthday two…

21 Friday Mar 2014

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four am this morning marked the birth of our first daughter, in 1978…

had barely left my desk for a minute the day before, as I tried to finish up a huge report for one of my colleagues…

we got home and then headed to the hospital, because I wasn’t feeling one hundred percent… expected them to look me over and send me home…

got there around four pm, and she was born twelve hours later at four in the morning…

not too big a deal… except that she was six weeks early…

thankfully she was fine, and for her second birthday present we brought her home a little sister…

20140321-212708.jpg she sent me this picture today as she, her husband and a good friend of theirs were on the train to Montreal to celebrate their birthdays…

life certainly changed for George and I from the moment she was born…

being a parent has been and continues to be a remarkable experience…

waited…

19 Wednesday Mar 2014

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rushed home from work, opened the garage to take the car out to go for an eye appointment…

and found the car was covered in snow from the storm on Sunday, when we had it out to barbecue in the garage…

quickly cleaned it off and headed to the appointment… they had booked it a year ago when I was there, but I was not on their schedule today… very kindly they said they would fit me in, but it did mean that I had to wait… probably for about 45 minutes…

left there about 6:30 and went to get a haircut… when I got there was told there were three people ahead of me… decided to wait, thinking maybe 40 minutes or so…

left there at 8:30…

still hadn’t had dinner…

drove down my street to discover that the plows had been down on their first run, but had not cleared out the driveway and there is a hill about a foot high and a couple of feet deep…

parked on the street and then spent half an hour shovelling an area that I guessed the car would fit through…

didn’t want to leave the car on the street in case they hit it as they were working at cleaning the driveways…

happily I got it into the driveway and parked in the garage without a problem…

finally got some supper and while I was eating I heard the plows coming down the street to clean out the driveways, lol…

happy I had these beautiful daffodils at my desk today… they were a fundraiser for the Cancer Society…

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just this minute realized that I hadn’t closed the garage door… yikes…

green…

17 Monday Mar 2014

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St Patrick’s Day… all about green…

wore green clothes and took a green treat for my colleagues…

was talking with someone about all the steps you have to go through when someone dies…

still wondering how you find someone who knows what you need to do… it felt like I bumbled my way through the process and luckily made it without any huge mistakes…

the list of what to do from the Funeral Home covered a few of the things that had to be done, but was certainly not complete for my situation…

so much of it had to do with another green thing – money…

felt like every organization I was in touch with wanted some…

insurance companies that wanted specific information which had to come from the doctor and which had to be paid for… Land Titles, who needed me to pay them to change the registration of the house… the leasing company that required a safety check so that the car could be put into my name… and so on…

when someone dies, a lot of green gets used up…

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bright…

15 Saturday Mar 2014

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took this picture from upstairs this morning… sun was shining

20140315-213941.jpg you can see how the snow is melting on the deck rail and even on the bench…

went for dim sum with the kids and then we went to pick up a bit more wool and of course we found a few other bits and pieces… I got a ceramic knife and look forward to testing it out tomorrow…

stopped at the mall for a while and when I finally got home I had a nap…

later I had the left over dim sum for my dinner…

last night I had a lovely hot tub… it wasn’t very cold and clouds were floating across the sky while the nearly full moon shone brightly… lovely and quiet as the jets didn’t come on… nice treat…

good day…

13 Thursday Mar 2014

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three things happened today…

found out that I hadn’t lost the form from CPP… apparently you have to get them online now… thankfully my accountant let me know before I had to ransack the whole house…

my insurance broker brought me the documents and card for the new health benefits… nice to have that in place…

 

bathroom ceiling...

bathroom ceiling…

 

I’ve been able to get past the poor me business about the ice dam… water has stopped dripping into the bathtub, and how lucky was it, that the leak was over the tub… the roof is nearly clear of snow, and the water is going down the eavestroughs… once it is all dry I will have someone in to replace the ceiling in the bathroom… will need to have someone check out the integrity of the roof and see if it will last for another few years…

purple hyacinth...

purple hyacinth…

and the hyacinth is opening and it is purple…

all in all, seems like a pretty good day…

taxes…

12 Wednesday Mar 2014

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thought I was ready to give my tax info to my accountant when I realized that I haven’t received the CPP information yet…

now I have to go through everything just to double check…

reminded me of having to get the taxes done when George died…

in the end we had to file his for two years following his death, because of the time he died…

used to be all you needed was a T4, but now there are investment forms, government docs and who knows what else… I guess the good news is that I have investments which we didn’t have for many years…

remembering all the years we owed money and how we would struggle to find a way to pay…

table is covered with lots of papers as I go through everything to see if that one doc might be there somewhere…

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hoping that once they are done I won’t owe money again… and hoping I can find that last document…