16 Saturday Jan 2021
Posted in garden, life, moments, nature, Photography, Uncategorized, weather
Tags
big girl pants, blessed, bunny, garden, hot tub, moments, nature, pictures, tiptoe, weather, widow
I’ve been watching a bunny in the garden when I hot tub … a few days ago I spotted it on the deck…
recently I walked into the kitchen and saw it at the feeder on the deck, so I tiptoed into the living room and got my camera…
quietly made my way back to the kitchen and snuck up to the patio door and took a few pictures….
so cute…
05 Saturday Dec 2020
Posted in health, life, loss, moments, technology, Uncategorized, weather
Tags
beloved, big girl pants, blessed, deck, garden, happy, hot tub, light, memories, miss, moments, nature, Technology, time, widow
sitting in the hot tub last night, remembering my beloved on what would have been his 72nd birthday, I was reminded of all the fun things we have done together during our forty plus years…
I’d been wanting a hot tub since our anniversary many years ago when he rented one for a weekend, but we couldn’t afford one until 2009…
once I chose the one I wanted, he built a deck to put it on, and then a deck to go in front of it… easy to get to, it is now perfect for dips… he never loved the hot tub the way I did, but wanted me to be happy…
when we had friends over (you remember that, right?) for a hot tub, if we needed a drink or towel or anything, we’d bang on the wall of the house and he would come out to see what was required, lol… he’d also take photos when I wanted them…
with the new security light/camera on the garage, I have to go to the side door of the garage and turn off the power so that the light doesn’t keep coming on while I’m in the tub… thankfully the deck goes right there so it is easy to get to and from…
some of our best talks happened late at night in this hot tub… I sure do miss him…
14 Saturday Nov 2020
Tags
beach, big girl pants, blessed, family, flew, Hawaii, hot tub, Maui, memories, moments, nature, sand, travel, water shoes, widow
last night, as I was putting on my water shoes to go out to the hot tub, I spent a few moments thinking of when I wore them in Hawaii…
I have two pair… the others are in perfect shape, but don’t fit as well or feel as comfortable on my feet… even though these ones have holes in the toes, they were the ones that flew to Hawaii…
when I put them on here, it is to protect my feet from the cold and snow… it was my son-in-law who suggested I wear them rather than slippers which could get filled with snow, or might not be in the right spot when I get out of the tub… they work perfectly and I wear them right into the tub and back to the house…
on Maui I wore them to keep sand off my feet and to keep from being burned on the boiling hot sand…
from minus 20 to plus 20 and back…
03 Tuesday Nov 2020
Tags
beloved, big girl pants, blessed, Bresara, cleaning, downspout, eavestroughs, garden, hot tub, icicles, ladders, moments, nature, neighbour, weather, widow
I was still in bed when the doorbell rang…
ran downstairs to find Travis and Wayne from Bresara Window Cleaning here to clean the eavestroughs…
they were getting an early start on this beautiful day… they had cancelled a few weeks ago when the weather turned and everything was frozen, so they were going all out to get their appointments caught up…
they did a great job and now the loose eavestrough is connected so I won’t have to worry that it will fall into the hot tub when I’m in it;-)…
apparently, in the spring, we will have to replace a downspout which has cracked…
maybe there won’t be so many icicles over the hot tub this winter…
and while they were working on my eavestroughs, my neighbour had his ladders up and was installing his Christmas lights on his eavestroughs…
24 Saturday Oct 2020
Posted in health, life, nature, retirement, Uncategorized, weather
13 Tuesday Oct 2020
Posted in garden, health, life, moments, technology, Uncategorized, weather
Tags
big girl pants, garden, hot tub, leak, moments, nature, panels, Technology, water, weather, widow
this afternoon I spent three hours outside with the hot tub technicians while they emptied, moved, opened all eight panels, filled, found two small leaks, repaired them, emptied, replaced the panels, moved back, refilled and turned the tub on… it was cold and windy…
now waiting for the two days it will take to heat the water and hoping that this has fixed the problem…
since then I’ve been trying to warm up… finally, about half an hour ago – after five hours – I don’t need any additional blankets and have taken off my sweater…
26 Saturday Sep 2020
Posted in business, garden, life, loss, retirement, Uncategorized, weather
Tags
airlock, big girl pants, chemicals, cold, garden, hot tub, leaking, moments, pump, service, technicians, waiting, water, weather, widow
have been having some problems with the hot tub leaking for quite some time, but wasn’t certain that the water wasn’t just evaporating with the hot weather we’d been having…
finally it was clear that there was a problem so I called up the company I deal with and made an appointment…
a fellow came out on Monday morning and discovered water dripping from a portion of the pump… he thought it would be about forty dollars for the part which needed to be replaced… he worked for well over an hour and then advised that the entire pump needed to be replaced because the new piece wouldn’t fit in properly as they are now made slightly differently…
we contacted a supplier and my son-in-law went and picked up the new one so that the repair person could return the next morning to hook it up…
sadly, that didn’t happen… I made numerous calls to the store and was advised that they would pass along the message, but no one came… finally I called and asked for an actual appointment so that someone would turn up…
two fellows turned up the next morning and set about installing the new pump… they also fixed the loose jets (with silicone) so they don’t keep shooting the water out of the tub when the water level goes down a bit…
they advised the silicone needed twenty-four hours to cure and that the tub should work fine after that….
cleaned it out and partially filled it to just below the jets and waited for the point where I could finish filling it and turn it on to heat up…
after I filled it up and turned it back on, the pump made noise but the water did not move… I called again and a few hours later the guys came back and fixed an airlock in the pump… then it started to heat up…
I am going out for a hot tub soon;-)…
27 Monday Jul 2020
Tags
big girl pants, blessed, butterflies, camping, deck, family, garden, grandson, hot tub, memories, moments, monarchs, nature, space station, stuffing, time, widow, youngest
my youngest grandson and I spent a few days together… it was lovely as we don’t get to spend the amount of one-on-one time that I have with the other boys…
we did a few chores around the garden and spent a great amount of time with the monarch butterflies…
we planned meals, watched the fish, birds and squirrels, and talked about life… he was even happy to take a selfie with me;-)…
we made stuffing muffins (chicken stuffing put into muffin pans), one of his favourites, lol… we had chicken and mashed potatoes for our supper to go along with the muffins… we made twice stuffed potatoes for our second supper and he reminded me to put in green onions as he likes the flavour they add to food now…
we watched the space station fly over from the hot tub…
we slept out on the decks… he thought it was a very funny thing to do, but got right into it, bringing out his comforter, a blanket and pillows;-)… I slept in the gravity chair, which wasn’t as comfortable as the lounger I normally use…
he played games with his friends on his phone and watched tv shows when it was too hot (and maybe boring) for him outside…
how wonderful it was for me to have these special moments with this young man;-)…
03 Friday Jul 2020
Tags
attach, big girl pants, blessed, family, friend, garden, grandson, hot tub, ladder, moments, process, siding, virginia creeper, widow
my grandson and one of his friends came over yesterday afternoon…
they were here to finish trimming the Virginia creeper and put the piece of siding back up…
it was quite the process as a door was put onto the hot tub, then a ladder on top of the door and then one would climb up and remove bits and pieces of the vine… then they worked from the driveway side to finish… once the vines were removed, they had to do some fancy work to get the siding back up and properly attached…
eventually it was all done and the area cleaned up…
we had a laugh as this particular friend had also helped with landscaping work in the front yard a number of years ago;-)… nice to have him back and helping…
it looks much tidier and more spacious now… after they left I finished cleaning the hot tub and filled it with fresh water… it takes an hour to get it to the top…
it took until around noon to heat it up, although I’ve set the temperature at 99℃ to see if that might be a nice temp for cooling down in this very hot spell we are dealing with…
01 Wednesday Jul 2020
Tags
big girl pants, creeper, garden, grandson, hot tub, light, memories, moments, trim, vine, virginia creeper, widow
my grandson came by today for lunch and to do some trimming of the Virginia creeper for me…
I had emptied the hot tub as we had planned to move it out of the way so that a ladder could go up next to the house…
unfortunately, it wasn’t being cooperative so he ended up climbing onto the tub and reaching as high as he could…
it was a stretch but he was able to remove most of the overgrowth… it already looks much better…
I think the plan is for he and Jeff to come by on Friday to move the tub, make a few repairs to the deck and finish the trimming…
the light is already much brighter in the main floor tv room…
one of the things they will do on Friday will be to put that piece of siding back where it belongs, lol…
guess I won’t be refilling the tub for a few days, lol…
