Tag Archives: memories

laurentien…

17 Tuesday Nov 2015

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there has been this new thing where adults are colouring in a variety of adult colouring books…

was talking with my grandson about colouring… asking if he might like one of these types of colouring books… wasn’t sure if he would find them too complicated… we were looking at a number of them… he thought he would like one of them… he usually uses markers on his projects so we talked about how he would need to use coloured pencils in these books… he thought he could do that…

since then I’ve talked with a few people about coloured pencils…

my daughter and I were talking abou what type to get if I was getting some for a present… she said not to get anything but Laurentien Coloured Pencils...

  
in a conversation with someone else, we were talking about when we were kids and getting a new package… and how special it was… usually you got them at the start of school… 

sometimes you would get a twelve pack, but if you were really lucky you might get the 24 pencil case… reminded us both of how much fun we had with them… she was flooded with memories just talking about it…

  
I checked in my craft box tonight and found this… they are still the best…

might have to get me one of them colouring books…

halloween…

31 Saturday Oct 2015

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had a sleepover at the kids…

this morning I took a picture out the living room window of the front of their house… 

 

ignore the bloody footprints, lol… so much brighter with the cedar tree down…  

and now you can see the beautiful birch tree…

this morning we headed out and about to look at tiles and countertops which was great fun… but now I am rather worn out, lol…

this is the front of the house very early on Friday…

  

put out some pass-along boxes, yay… having a box on the dining room counter to pop items in has become a great habit… whenever I get a call from an organization who wants to collect stuff I know immediately if I have enough to pass along, so I’m not running around like a crazy person trying to find stuff… 

this was the front of the house tonight just before I turned out the lights…

  
plastic pumpkins looked cute… didn’t have the energy to put out the usual Halloween decorations… not sure what that was about, although it was much more fun to hand out the goodies with George, lol…

ended up with a total of 17 kids… fair amount of candy left which will need to get out of the house so I am not tempted to eat it…

here’s my final Halloween picture… my youngest grandson admiring the pumpkin his mom had carved with a drill… he was really enjoying the process this year…

 
busy day with lots of fun memories… 

together…

22 Thursday Oct 2015

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was recently reminded of how your life can change in an instant… one minute someone is here with you, and the next they are gone, sigh…

  
was a beautiful sunny day as we arrived at the office… the light was shining on this tree at the corner of the building… lovely colour and the highlights where the sun was shining on it were wonderful…

  
walking by these piles of leaves on my way home reminded me of some fun times with George and the little boys… they spent lots of time raking leaves and jumping and hiding in them…

I particularly think of a day we were at the park and the boys were very little… they decided to gather leaves and spent ages collecting them with grandpa’s help and then getting covered up and popping out of them, to our surprise, lol…

they were so small when he died… the littlest one barely remembers him… 

I heard his voice in a short video on Facebook the other day, and was brought to tears… how quickly we forget… it was really a treat to hear him, even if it was painful…

such excellent memories… I have been blessed… we had an amazingly wonderful life together…

forty-five…

01 Saturday Aug 2015

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forty-five years ago today I married the love of my life… we had a wonderful journey…

this is the fourth year that I have been on my own… doesn’t get much easier, but I have spent the day with my daughter and grandsons and focussed on the many memories of fun times…

there was horseback riding… for some of us… one young person decided they weren’t going so I climbed down off my horse and waited with him…

  
miniature golf… for all of us… George had enjoyed playing this course…

  
and go-cart racing… not for me, lol… I did think about the last time we came here when I squeezed into the little second seat and screamed all the way around the course while George laughed as he drove…

  
supper out topped off a great day…

last night I slept under the full (blue) moon on the deck… good thing I did because it looks like it is going to rain tonight…

  
barely any mosquitoes:-)…

to my beloved…

  

sardines…

04 Saturday Apr 2015

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busy day… out and about early to get groceries and a few things for tomorrow’s dinner with the kids…

picked up sardines for lunch with some lovely herb and garlic bread…

made me think of my dad… he loved sardines and would mash them and put them on crackers…

he died on Good Friday in 1988… interesting that I would be thinking of him today…

 he was a very special person… in my entire life I never heard him raise his voice to anyone… you knew if he used a certain voice that you were in serious trouble… 

he looked after my mom who struggled with depression for the greater portion of her adult life… and he looked after us for many months of the many years she was in the hospital… 

I still remember driving him to and from work every day as he became more and more affected by emphysema…

he taught me that every individual ‘s effort should be celebrated… he had been a great athlete in his early days and we spent many hours at the arena watching sporting events where we always cheered for everyone’s performance… 

I still love to watch many sports on TV, lol…

lovely memories…

warm…

05 Thursday Mar 2015

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I’ve been wearing slippers for the last number of months because the kitchen floor is cold half way into the room from the sliding doors…

this is quite unusual as I rarely wear things on my feet… I wear sandals all year round at the office…

what I am missing is the heated floor in the bathroom… can’t feel the warmth through the slippers…

when we put in the heating wires under the tiles we thought the heat would radiate out from the pad, but it didn’t we learned, so the space right in front of the sink is cold…

the day has gone by gently… messages and calls from family and friends… flowers from the kids, lunch with colleagues… surprise supper out with some of the kids…



I am home, cozy in my bed, thinking of my wonderful life…

had some great moments when people commented on Facebook about pictures and memories of George… warmed my heart…

it has been healing in a way… 

installation…

12 Thursday Feb 2015

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the art installation is complete… it was finished on Saturday… we got the last of the twenty-nine framed waterlily photos up… and when I say we, I mean my friend, while I passed the odd thing to her…

she did an amazing job… not only are the pictures even and square, there are stickies in the bottom corners so they stay level, lol…

when I described a wall of water lilies she was thinking it might be a bit, shall we say, boring… now that it is all finished she agrees it was the right choice for me… I love water and the lily flowers too…

every time I walk down the stairs, I see something different…

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this one reminds me of a walk through the Leo Mol garden with George in the summer of 2011… the ducks were a complete surprise in the pond… had never seen them before or since…

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this one brought back my time at the Butchart Gardens in Victoria with my kids, just before they moved from Vancouver Island… we had been on the cruise to Alaska, and spent time in Seattle… finished off with a wonderful day in the Gardens and had tea at The Empress… so many memories…

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this one was taken in October of 2011 when we spent ages sitting on a bench admiring the pond… might have been one of our last walks in the Park…

last night my daughter gave the installation her stamp of approval… phew…

wonderful to have these different memories as I move up or down the stairs…

memories…

13 Tuesday Jan 2015

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had a conversation recently about someone who had lost their partner a few months ago…

brought back all kinds of memories…

thought about the requirements that had to be sorted out… the documents I had to complete… the money grabs that seemed to be part of the process… the feeling of drowning in paperwork and worry…

for the last few months I’ve been thinking about getting the house in order… getting rid of stuff that I don’t want or need… I want to make it as easy as possible for my girls when the time comes for them to deal with my stuff…

I sure do miss my beloved…

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memories…

04 Thursday Dec 2014

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a good day… very few rough moments, which was lovely… birthdays have always been special in our family so marking George’s is important…

started the day by taking the last of the antibiotics, yay… been using George’s pill container as I need to take the pills with my breakfast now…

last of the antibiotics...

last pill…

Crystal and I walked over to the Burger Place and picked up burgers and milkshakes for our supper…

moon through the trees...

moon through the trees…

made her hold everything while I took the picture on my phone… met up with all the boys at home and then FaceTimed with the kids in Ottawa… they had picked up burgers and milkshakes at McDonalds… we had apple pie in both places as well…

supper was busy and we shared various favourite memories of Dad/Grandpa… from reading every word of a very long story to the little boys, to always starting a new conversation when someone was trying to hang up or walk out the door, to working with the boys around the house and a love of the garden and ponds…

he would talk to any and every person he came in contact with… and he would know lots about them afterwards… just today I was mentioning how that is one of the most difficult things – not having anyone here to share with…

it was good to all be together, even if it was over the airwaves with the iPad… we continue to talk about him so that we won’t forget how special he was…

all of the kids...

all of the kids, some being naughty…

today’s Advent gift was a bottle of Baileys so I had just a little bit after everyone left… it will be interesting to see what that does to my blood sugar, lol…

what a gift to have met and married my beloved, and spend over forty years together…

traditions…

13 Monday Oct 2014

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for the last few days I’ve been preparing for tonight’s dinner…

this year I made two new things… the first was the dressing that my grandson wanted… apparently there wasn’t enough sausage in it so he didn’t like it…

the second was a turnip puff… a friend wrote about it in a blog and it sounded interesting so I checked it out on Pinterest, liked the look of it, and made some… two of us really liked it, the other not so much… my mom and dad felt that gravy just wasn’t great without turnip water in it, so I’ve cooked turnips as part of our celebration dinners for at least thirty years…

had a good time setting the table… included plates and bowls from our elders…

IMG_8816-1.JPGduring dinner we talked about the various items and where they came from…

had also put one of the candelabras from Crystal and Jeff’s wedding on the table… during dinner we thought of people who were missing – those who’ve moved on from this world and those who are just not close by – and we lit the candles as we thought of them…

before dinner the boys went out to find some leaves to go on the plate with the pumpkin… then they spent some time tree climbing…

IMG_8819.JPGlovely day and great dinner… so much to be thankful for…