Tag Archives: big girl pants

eyes…

24 Wednesday Apr 2013

Posted by in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, ,

been struggling with a persistent infection in my right eye… had it since before Christmas and have been taking antibiotics and a topical ointment and seeing an ophthalmologist 3 or 4 times during that period…

I had been thinking that I should get Crystal to go with me this morning, but then thought I would wear my big girl pants as he would likely only give me another prescription and send me off…

well, how wrong could I be… today, he did a little surgery on it, right in the office… his office is located in the Eye Clinic at Children’s Hospital and there are lots of very small people in his waiting room… my little eye infection is not such a big deal… although while he was working on me, it felt like a rather big deal… it was miserable for quite a while afterwards, but right now I really can’t feel any sensation in it at all…  I am trying to keep my hands away from my face, just to be sure, lol…

eye following surgery...

eye following surgery…

reminded me of George’s cataract surgery just before he died… it was his right eye as well… we went through quite the time with giving him the drops that he had to have in it 3 times a day… every single time I put them in, he would jump, lol… but his vision improved a hundredfold…

George's eye following cataract surgery...

George’s eye following cataract surgery…

amazing the things that our bodies go through…

 

grandparents’ day…

22 Monday Apr 2013

Posted by in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , ,

got the car back so that I could drive to the grade 2 class for Grandparents’ day… George and I had made it a couple of times before, but this will be my first year on my own as last year I didn’t hear about it in time to arrange to go…

put on the big girl pants so that I could figure out exactly where the school was… it is quite a distance from Crystal’s house but I think I got the directions fairly straight in my head… and then I printed out a Google map to get me there…

first thing the little guy said to me when he got here on Sunday was how much he was looking forward to the day…

found my way there, got into the classroom about a minute late and had a lovely time… after watching the kids work on a Smart Board calendar in French, we completed a survey about what it was like when we went to elementary school… there was at least one grandparent in the room who attended a one-room schoolhouse… after that we cut out pictures of things that we do together and pasted them onto a sheet of paper… we also added some words that described what the pictures were…

pictures that show what we do together...

pictures that show what we do together…

finally he read me a couple of French stories… then we went to McDonalds (along with about half of the grandparents and kids who had been at the school) for lunch, then back to school and work…

as we were driving back to the school from McDonalds we talked about how Grandpa would have enjoyed the day and how he wouldn’t have had any trouble finding the school or McDonalds…  we were both missing him…

another milestone…

standing firm…

16 Tuesday Apr 2013

Posted by in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , ,

not long ago I was in a situation where someone was questioning me about something and I didn’t go to the what did I do wrong place… I’ve talked with many women about this place, and how quick many of us are to go there… this has also been very beneficial, as previously I thought I was the only person who could get there in a nano second, and apparently others go there as well…

I remained calm, brought forward the appropriate information and stood my ground on the matter…

path is clear although there is still lots of snow...

path is clear…

not exactly sure how I got to that place… whether I was feeling particularly knowledgeable about the subject, whether I just didn’t care about the outcome, whether I was just too tired, or whether I had just arrived in the place where I knew what I knew and believed it…

it was quite liberating and I hope I can find that place again and again…

a little chilly on the toes this morning...

big girl pants influence???…

maybe it was the big girl pants influence, lol…

visiting…

10 Wednesday Apr 2013

Posted by in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , ,

crazy day at work, and then I put on the big girl pants and drove to the airport, parked, and met a friend who was arriving for a meeting at CCS, my former workplace…

she took me out for dinner at the Star Grill where we had a lovely meal, caught up on each other’s lives and shared lots of laughter…

we have only met face-to-face 3 or 4 times, but I worked with her by telephone on a volunteer committee for a number of years… during that time we had great meetings and learned a lot about websites…

DUCC website meeting...

DUCC website meeting…

it was wonderful to get together tonight and reminisce about the fun times we had… then I dropped her off at another friend’s home and returned here to find that WordPress is working on my laptop (shhhhhh)…

what a great evening…

clean bill of health…

15 Friday Mar 2013

Posted by in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , ,

yesterday I had an appointment at CancerCare for a check-up… last time we were there the wait was over two hours… this time we were in a room within 20 minutes of arriving… waited for quite a while in the room before seeing the doctor… it is hard to feel peeved when you know that they could be giving someone devastating news or have been in an operating room saving someone’s life…

after the check-up the doctor advised that everything was fine and they would see me in six months…  they were pleased that I can no longer feel the mesh that was part of the hernia surgery, as many people feel it for a very long time… I had asked if I could have the check-ups with my GP instead of using up the space in the CancerCare system but was advised that it made more sense for them to see me, at least for the first two years…

made me think back to the few days that I was in hospital in July when I had my surgery… it was just four months after George’s death and two months since discovering the cancer… my time in the hospital was a roller coaster of bad reactions to pain meds and happiness that I had actually survived the surgery as well as huge sadness that George wasn’t there to look after me…

frst night at the hospital...

I have been wearing those big girl pants a lot since then…  when I think back I realize how I have grown in these months…

I think of my beloved every day and the impact of his loss on my grandchildren, my children and me…

and then I remember all the special moments in our lives…

George and Tavin...

George and Tavin…

seeing…

13 Wednesday Mar 2013

Posted by in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , ,

had to rush home after work, jump in the car and head off to an appointment with a new eye doctor … those darn big girl pants…

I had decided to change my eye doctor after my last visit when my eye prescription wasn’t done correctly and was only caught when my contact lens person realized that something was missing…

this young man is quite wonderful… the office had all the newest equipment, as well as some that was likely close to a hundred years old… he knew his stuff and explained as he went including things that I should have known before, but hadn’t…

I’ve been having some trouble with my eyes since sometime in December and had gone to see my GP, who referred me to a specialist, who has prescribed pills and ointment for my eye… the infection still hasn’t cleared up and my vision seems to have gotten a bit worse so I was a bit worried about it all…

much as I had thought, it appears that the ointment is causing the blurring that I’ve been experiencing so that was good news… as well as the news that my eyes are in very good condition… yay…

when I was about 9 or so I got my first pair of glasses… I can remember walking out of the shop and seeing leaves on the trees… before that, they had been a mass of green…

I haven’t been able to wear my contacts for the last few months but am looking forward to being able to use them once the infection is gone, although it has been stubborn…

sometimes it is easy to forget the little things that make our life easy… such as glasses and good eyesight…

taken with my iPhone shows how deep the snow is...

taken with my iPhone in the evening – shows how deep the snow was…

made me think about my recent afternoon with the boys and how they changed the pristine snow covered landscape in the backyard to a very lived in space…

actively used garden...

actively used garden…

heron, nearly run over...

heron, nearly run over…

seeing is a wonderful thing…

quite the week…

08 Friday Mar 2013

Posted by in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , ,

on our way home tonight the traffic was fairly heavy and as we came close to a large shopping mall I was telling my colleague about how there had been a vehicle stuck in the middle of the road, last Tuesday when I was coming home with my kids…

it was at that point that I realized it was just this Tuesday, the anniversary of George’s death, which felt like it had been weeks ago, not just three days ago…

I was shocked…

one of the last pictures I took before George died...

one of the last pictures I took before George died…

it really pointed out to me what a week it has been… Monday night with my BS friends, Tuesday the actual anniversary, Wednesday a staff meeting and running around to pick up items for the next day, Thursday a special event at work, and today a visit to the Legislature to celebrate International Women’s Day…

it really feels like it was ages ago… amazing how our body gets us through some of these things… I have been wearing those big girl pants all week without even realizing it…

no wonder that I was tired as the end of today approached… I have been numb…

I’ve been thinking that although the anniversary was very difficult to get through, it was much, much easier than the happenings of last year…

my beloved...

my beloved…

I have survived the loss of my beloved…

Memories…

24 Sunday Feb 2013

Posted by in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , ,

has been a full weekend… this morning I walked over to Assiniboine Park for breakfast with a friend… I left early because I wanted to get some shots of the gorgeous hoarfrost on the trees…

hoarfrost along the walking path...

hoarfrost along the walking path…

whenever I go there, I remember what fun George and I had when we went for breakfast most Sundays from the time the Park Cafe opened… usually I would walk over and he would drive and we would meet up for a date together and talk about the week and the kids… we enjoyed watching the ducks, or the “zamboni” cleaning the ice for the skaters… we liked to read the memory stones as we walked along the path and often, when the weather was nice, we would walk through the English Garden… the host knew us and often found us a specially good table where we would have a lovely view… then we would drive home together, and often I would take pictures while George would spot something that I should capture…

as we left the restaurant this morning, we walked along the path where two memory stones refer to our family…

stone from Cyndi and Ron to remember George...

stone from Cyndi and Ron to remember George…

boys with their stone from Auntiy Cyndi and Uncle Ron...

boys with their stone from Aunty Cyndi and Uncle Ron…

later in the day I made french fries for the first time since George died… he always made the best french fries and we would often have pickerel and french fries on Tuesday night when I would get home from swimming… I have not had the heart to make them, until today… those big girl pants…

lovely memories…

Garbage…

21 Thursday Feb 2013

Posted by in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , ,

our garbage day is Friday… so every Thursday after work I put on my big girl pants and  gather up the garbage and recycling and put the bins outside the gate in the lane…

when the system was being tested, they used our neighbourhood and our garbage was picked up every week without any problems…  well, they did destroy the back of one of my trees when they collected in the winter, but I have gotten over that…

we’ve had the new system for a while now… besides collecting garbage in the big bins, they also collect the recycling the same way…

so, since the program was outsourced, t my garbage has rarely been picked up on the proper day…  did I mention that my three neighbours have theirs picked up every week… I have called every few weeks to let the city know that it hasn’t been picked up and they have arranged a special pick up every time I call… I haven’t called every week because I don’t produce that much garbage all by myself… I have also asked for instructions if I need to do something differently, but have not received a response to that request either…

my grandson usually brings in the two bins when he’s here on Sunday and, of course, this Sunday the garbage was still there…  I didn’t call until last night when Skippy, the nice man I spoke with, advised that the garbage collection people put on my file that there were no bins out last Friday behind my house…  I advised that the bins had been placed out there on Thursday but Skippy had to take their word for it and put another note on my file advising that I said it hadn’t been picked up…

its not so funny anymore…  so, tonight I had a brilliant idea…  I typed up a note on the computer and taped it to the front of the bin, along with a pencil, asking why they weren’t picking up my garbage…  I duct taped it to the garbage can and took some pictures…

see…

note on garbage can put out Thursday, Feb 21, 2013 while it was still light out...

note on garbage can put out Thursday, Feb 21, 2013 while it was still light out…

so, you are all my witnesses… if they say the garbage can wasn’t out there tomorrow, I have proof…

next step may be to contact a TV station or the newspaper…  I wonder how many other people are experiencing similar problems…

garbage and recycling bins out while still light Thursday, February 21, 2013...

garbage and recycling bins out while still light Thursday, February 21, 2013…

we shall watch for results and I will keep you posted, lol…

 

 

The Garden…

20 Wednesday Feb 2013

Posted by in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , , , , , ,

it was a long day today… I woke up with a headache and felt out of sorts all day long…

have just come in from a restorative hot tub and as I was getting into the tub I realized that the headache is finally gone, thank goodness…

as I was sitting there looking out at the snow covered garden I thought back to the 10 weeks I spent there this summer as I was recovering from my surgery… it gave me time to think about all that had happened since George’s death…

the garden is a sanctuary where birds, animals and people come to rest and recuperate from life’s events…  this year we had our largest crop of spring poppies ever… Crystal thought her dad had something to do with it, lol…

poppies

poppies

I had been hoping to have the pond redone, but that didn’t end up happening…  the weather was quite lovely for most of my recovery time and as soon as I was able I was out on the deck and once I could manage the steps I moved to my favourite spot at the back of the garden beside the biggest pond…  we were visited by a leopard frog again this year, although we hadn’t seen any over the last few years…

of course there were lots of birds… actually an amazing array…  we had purple finches, goldfinches, nuthatches, chickadees and a variety of sparrows… one day I looked out and found at least 5 male goldfinches at the feeder…

goldfinch at the feeder...

goldfinch at the feeder…

the garden has always been a healing place for me and I found that spending time there helped with the grieving process, not just for me, but for many of those who visited me over those many weeks…

right now, I can’t even see the pond from the hot tub because there is so much snow…  we haven’t had this much in many years…  after work tonight I went out and shoveled to the hot tub so that I would be able to walk out in my slippers later on…

had those big girl pants on and was thinking of all the times George would be sure to shovel the area to and around the hot tub so that I would have an easy walk to get there in the evening…

I sure do miss him…