19 Monday Oct 2026
Posted in health, life, moments, nature, retirement, Uncategorized
Tags
big girl pants, blessed, dark, lit, moments, nature, plants, solar lights, widow, window
was walking past the dining room and spotted the solar lights across the three plants that are in the window…
they only stay lit for a few moments so I often don’t see them…
what a lovely treat 😊…
05 Monday Oct 2026
Posted in family, garden, life, moments, nature, retirement, Uncategorized
Tags
big girl pants, blessed, garden, housemate, inside, moments, orchids, outdoor, plants, pots, switched, trimmed, widow
spent time a few days ago moving plants and rearranging furniture to make space for those coming in from the garden…
first up was getting the maples into the front window, and then I put a number of small plants into the second basket planter…
ferns came in and the divider was rearranged to make space for the grow lights…
my housemate built a shelf to go under the dining room window… it is just the right height and currently holds three of the bigger plants that have come in…
then I spent time with the orchids… they have been struggling and I have kind of ignored that 😳…
I realized that a few had been planted in moss and clearly they didn’t like it… roots and dead leaves were trimmed, and pots were switched…
all of them have gone onto the shelf in the den and they look much better…
we will see how each plant feels about its new spot in the house🙂…
25 Friday Sep 2026
Posted in business, garden, life, moments, nature, retirement, travel, Uncategorized
Tags
big girl pants, birds, Butterfly Gardens, moments, nature, plants, pond, stick bugs, turtles, variety, widow
after two days at the Butchart Gardens, we visited the Butterfly Gardens which were close by…
the first thing you see is an area focussed on stick bugs and poisonous frogs… there were a lot…
then we moved into the Butterfly area… just as we arrived a keeper was letting a box of maybe 50 butterflies out… there were all types inside and one landed on my daughter and climbed up her, lol… another one, a cracker (one of my favourites) landed on the front of a man who was beside us… it stayed on him the entire time he walked through the garden…
besides butterflies, there were a few types of fish, a variety of turtles and tortoises, a flamingo, many parrots and other birds… part of their mission is to take in injured creatures…
they also have some butterflies in all their stages… from eggs, to caterpillars, to the butterflies… that was exciting to see…
the space is very large and it can be difficult to spot the butterflies, although there seem to be more in the front area… but many types and also different ways to display them…
it was fun to see so many creatures in one spot😊…
30 Sunday Aug 2026
Posted in garden, life, moments, retirement, Uncategorized
Tags
big girl pants, garden, hibiscus, mandevilla, moments, plants, pots, reorganizing, widow
spent a little time in the garden reorganizing the plant pots on the steps…
now the hibiscus is much more visible, as is the new mandevilla😊…
27 Thursday Aug 2026
Posted in business, life, moments, nature, retirement, Uncategorized
Tags
big girl pants, eagle eyes, fun, lizards, moments, nature, plants, The Leaf, tiny, tropical biome, widow
one of the fun things about volunteering at The Leaf has been seeing how many little lizards we can spot on a shift…
one of our colleagues has eagle eyes and knows all the spaces where they might be… that has encouraged many others to search for them as we move through the biomes…
I had a great day recently and spotted six, all in the Tropical Biome 😊…
the last one is teeny tiny and I’ve spotted it a number of times…
and a colleague spotted a cute frog the other day🙂…
18 Tuesday Aug 2026
Posted in food, garden, life, moments, nature, retirement, Uncategorized, weather
Tags
big girl pants, blessed, garden, mistake, moments, morning glories, nature, plants, purple beans, scarlet, scarlet runner beans, widow
I am really pleased with the new arch we installed in the spring…
the scarlet runner beans have made it to the top on one side and the morning glories have made it on the other side…
so far I’ve had three cucumbers and two feeds of purple beans from it😊…
the one thing I did wrong was plant too many seeds on the one side, lol… I will use less next year…
07 Friday Aug 2026
Posted in garden, life, nature, retirement, Uncategorized, weather
Tags
big girl pants, blessed, family, garden, goldfish, koi, nature, overwintered, plants, tiny, water lily, widow
the water lily that had overwintered in the house had been nearly completely eaten by the fish, likely the three koi…
I divided the lily into two and put them in little pots and sank them to the bottom of the pond…
one has been pulled out of its pot and eaten…
the second one has finally begun to send up teeny tiny leaves…
pretty sure there won’t be any flowers this year…
03 Monday Aug 2026
Posted in garden, life, loss, nature, retirement, Uncategorized
Tags
big girl pants, bitten, flowers, garden, growing, moments, nature, plants, rosebud, squirrel, widow
I’ve been watching this little rose for a number of days… it was very close to opening…
when I went out this morning, the rosebud was no longer on the plant… but bits of it were on the table…
I’m guessing that a squirrel bit it off, and then didn’t even eat it🥺…
but it reminded me that I enjoy nature in the garden, lol…
30 Thursday Jul 2026
Posted in garden, health, life, moments, nature, retirement, Uncategorized, weather
Tags
big girl pants, blessed, deadhead, garden, moments, nature, plants, trimmed, unbearable, virginia creeper, water, weather, widow
up early on Wednesday to tidy the garden and water everything… even gave the new grass a dribble…
started with the hose and gave big drinks to all three pots in the front yard, and those in the garden…
then, while the irrigation system and drip hose did their thing, I filled a bucket with overly eager virginia creeper and did some deadheading…
finally, the cushions came out and I was able to sit, read, and enjoy the garden before it became unbearable outside…
29 Wednesday Jul 2026
Posted in business, family, garden, life, moments, nature, retirement, Uncategorized, weather
Tags
big girl pants, blessed, dwarf morning glory, envisioned, family, flowers, garden, nature, obelisk, plants, widow
I planted these morning glory seeds that my daughter sent to me from Ottawa as part of my Advent Calendar…
I didn’t read anything about them and envisioned they would grow up this obelisk…
apparently, they are dwarf morning glories…
and that means they don’t climb, lol…
