Tag Archives: changes

redecorated…

01 Wednesday Oct 2025

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last year, around this time, my housemate decided to redecorate his space…

from removing the fireplace, to drywalling, to putting in new ceiling tiles, to painting the space with two colours, and reorganizing his stuff, he worked hard with help from friends and family…

it came out very nicely…

and he has enjoyed the space…

this fall he has been preparing for an interesting pet…

day-to-day…

31 Monday Mar 2025

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just about every time I walk up or down the stairs to the second floor, I stop and look out the window…

watching the garden change from day-to-day…

maybe a bunny, a cat, solar lights, new flowers, squirrels, birds, so many changes take place if you take a moment to look…

this photo shows a few solar lights, one of which was under the snow, lol…

soon it will be green again… please🤪…

thinning…

20 Thursday Feb 2025

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had a wonderful time at The Leaf on Tuesday…

first I spent time at the registration desk where they had to make me a new card as mine had stopped working… apparently the website has been misbehaving a bit, so hopefully the new card will solve that issue;-)…

then we went through the biomes… there were a number of baskets of orchids throughout the Tropical biome…

very humid, and it was obvious that there had been a serious trim and thinning of many of the plants…

the cacao trees had been cutback and all the pods have been removed…

the koi were very active… while we were there one of the zoo keepers came along and fed them… clearly the fish were waiting for them, lol…

the dwarf banana is just starting with a new set of banana fingers…

my housemate pointed out the difference between the dwarf and regular bananas… the dwarf has the banana fingers coming out of the flower, whereas the full-size banana has a flower at the end and the fingers below…

there are always subtle changes in the Tropical biome each time I visit;-)…

maneuver…

01 Tuesday Oct 2024

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the fireplace is gone…

in 2019 the chimney came down…

currently my grandson is redoing his space and part of the plan was to remove the fireplace to make a bit more room, as it was a corner unit…

it was quite the job, as they had to saw through the pipe where it went through the wall…

then they recruited some additional muscle and rigged up ropes to help with the weight of the unit… quite a process…

it was touch and go as they maneuvered the stairs and just made it through the doorway…

from the door to the garage was a piece of cake, lol…

now it is waiting for a new home… hopefully someone out there will be able to make use of it;-)…

I don’t remember it being so difficult to bring into the house, but that was years ago when my beloved brought it in😊…

50…

15 Friday Sep 2023

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we moved into this house in September of 1973… 50 years ago:-)…

this is rather astonishing to me, lol…

early on, there was a lot of red everywhere, inside and out… then we went to some light pink, gray, and finally to touches of purple…

the garden started out as a grassed square, then a space for a kid swing set, a small pool, a giant sandbox, a two story playhouse, and then plants and ponds…

so many changes, so many memories;-)…

what a life…

iteration…

17 Monday Jul 2023

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the current iteration of the pond is ten years old…

hard to believe that much time has passed…

this is how it looked just as it was completed…

after it was finished, they had to come back and deal with leaking and runoff…nearly all of the plants have changed over time, lol… and I have changed the slate around the edge of the pond for large river rocks…

it still loses water when the waterfall is running and this year I have left if off for a good portion of the time… I also think the fish are out and about more when it isn’t running, lol… I do have a bubbler going all the time…

this year the water lilies are extremely happy… they continue to produce blooms daily, it is both amazing and delightful…

today, I turned the waterfall on and realized that I’d been missing it, and how well it dilutes other sounds in the neighbourhood…

mask…

26 Friday Jun 2020

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yesterday I went for a doctor’s appointment… had arranged to get my car back from my grandson who has been using it while I’ve been staying home…

it was the first time in three months that I have entered a building that wasn’t my house, lol…

this was also the first time I’ve worn my mask and had it on the whole time I was there…

had to manage a few new processes… only one door is used to enter and exit the building… and it wasn’t the one I was used to… got in a few extra steps…

the process for bloodwork is basically the same – waiting… although there are way fewer chairs, the gate is partially closed, and there was sanitizer everywhere…

I did giggle looking at the chairs in all the waiting rooms… to ensure separation, for every chair you could sit in, two or three were turned to the wall… looked like a snake, lol…

the other thing that made me giggle was the fact that my iPhone didn’t recognize me with my mask on, lol… if I am going out more, I might need to add me with a mask on for it to recognize me, lol…

changes…

23 Monday Mar 2020

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I’ve noticed a few things during this time of social isolation…

but I do think that sheltering in place – words used in the US by many – feels like a kinder description, although maybe not as clear for those who are not paying attention to the seriousness of the situation we are all in…

I have been isolating since I returned home from Ottawa in January as I recovered from a very intense final six months before I retired… of course I was still able to go out, but mostly I stayed home…

I did get to see my boys a few times, so that was lovely…

one of the things I’m pleased to see is a family that has been playing street hockey in front of my house a couple of times… haven’t seen kids (and their parents) out on the street getting some exercise for years;-)…

the other thing is about being told to stay at home and how it makes you want to go out… this reminds me so much of times when I’ve been told what I should and shouldn’t eat, and how all I could think about were those things!

when our girls were little I had to have access to the car, although I rarely went out in it… just knowing I could made being at home much easier…

we must stay home to protect everyone…

toy…

03 Friday Jan 2020

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well, I haven’t written a blog at the computer for absolutely ages… usually I write them using my phone…

but, yesterday, I got a new toy:-)… an Acer Aspire 5… it is a beauty… still haven’t connected a mouse to it but that will happen when I get home as I have a number there, lol…

I’ve been thinking about acquiring a new laptop for quite a while and finally made the decision yesterday while I had my son-in-law available to help me choose just the right one…

I had anticipated that it would be much more costly, but there were still sales on and we settled on this type… we had to go to two different locations before we found a store that actually had any as they’ve been selling like hotcakes apparently…

then we spent a good part of the evening getting it set up… the important things, like background and lockscreen, lol… also got my website and instagram connected… going to do as much setting up here as possible, while I have my geeky son-in-law to help…

this is only the second laptop I’ve owned… the first one was hacked many years ago and my nephew took it away to be fixed and never brought it back… it was also an Acer… he loaned me a different machine, but the screen started to go so it wasn’t very useful and I’ve only used it for a few particular jobs since then…

one of my retirement goals is to get caught up on technology as I have been too busy to fit time in to check out what’s new and improved out there… I think this is going to be a great asset in that process…

such fun:-)…

update…

16 Monday Dec 2019

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today I started to make some of the needed changes around the house…

I’ve changed the schedule on my Nest thermostat so that the temperature stays the same throughout the day… previously I had it lower the temp while I was at work…

I am going to update the programming on my Google Home… used to have 2 different set ups in the morning… one provided information for a work day, and the other for “the weekend”… no more work days;-)…

my automatic timers currently turn the lights off at 8 am… going to need to change that too, lol… I cannot get those timers to cooperate no matter what I do…

today I changed from those automated timers to a TP-link smart plug… now I can tell Google when to turn them on and off…

and I finally got the tree lights to respond to commands as well…

next up I am going to check into lights for the chandelier and bathroom that will respond to verbal commands;-)…

so much to do, but lots of time…