26 Wednesday Nov 2025
Posted in health, life, moments, retirement, Uncategorized
spent time with the fish and their pumps…
each one was cleaned and the water came streaming over beautifully…
I’ve figured out an easier way to clean them now, so the process is much quicker most of the time… I’ll still need to do the longer process once in a while…
but for now I am happy with this new system…
18 Wednesday Jun 2025
Posted in business, life, moments, nature, retirement, Uncategorized
Tags
APC, Assiniboine Park Conservancy, big girl pants, blessed, learning, moments, nature, orientation, process, Technology, The Leaf, volunteer part 1, widow, zoo
for quite some time my family have been encouraging me to volunteer at The Leaf…
I considered it and eventually decided to apply… the application process begins in March and starts with an online form… I still find it difficult to talk about my qualities…
after a few weeks I was invited to register for an in-person meeting, which I did… I got a message two days before the actual meeting time saying they were expecting me that morning, about 40 minutes from when the email arrived… yikes… thankfully I called and was told the email was an error and my appointment was when I expected… took a few moments for my heart to settle down, lol…
I arrived for the meeting right on time and had a lovely half hour with a volunteer who shared information and also asked a few questions… it was interesting to learn about some of the opportunities that are available…
next was an email with four modules to review and then register for an in-person orientation…
the four online modules were informative and straightforward and once they were completed, I signed up for a three-hour orientation to take place somewhere at APC…
the first one was cancelled due to illness, so I ended up at one a few weeks later… we met in one of the zoo camp classrooms…
there were twenty of us in the class and we learned together in small and large groups… it was a great opportunity to meet with others who wanted to help out as volunteers…
after nine more hours of training, I will be an APC volunteer…
part 2 to come;-)…
04 Saturday Jan 2025
Posted in food, health, life, moments, retirement, Uncategorized, weather
Tags
big girl pants, blessed, delicious, dinner, family, food, happy, memories, moments, New Year’s dinner, prime rib, process, widow
for New Year’s dinner we tried something new…
we had prime rib… for many years we would have steak and lobster with twice-stuffed potatoes…
so this was fun to try… cooking the prime rib was interesting… first, it had to sit on the counter for six hours to reach room temperature, then it went into the oven at 500°F for half an hour, and finally the oven was turned off and it sat inside it for two hours…
quite the process, but it came out perfect for those of us who enjoy rare meat;-)…
there were mashed potatoes, mushrooms, Brussels sprouts with carrots, little Yorkshire puddings, and gravy…
delicious…
25 Monday Dec 2023
Posted in business, food, life, moments, retirement, Uncategorized, weather
Tags
big girl pants, blessed, buddies, car trouble, friends, gifts, happy, moments, Olympia Diner, process, restaurant, time, treat, widow
on Wednesday I had a lovely lunch with my BS buddies… we went to the Olympia Diner and had delicious food, lots of laughs and shared great stories…
it was quite the process for us all to get there as car trouble caused a bit of excitement, but eventually we all made it…
the food is always tasty and the portions are large… I had spanakopita, with lemon potatoes and Caesar salad, and had leftovers for the next day…
parcels were exchanged (which will be opened on Christmas), and one gift was our lunch… a lovely treat…
we always try to get a holiday photo and our waitperson took a number of photos to be sure we had a good one…
these women are so important to me and such a gift;-)…
18 Tuesday Apr 2023
Posted in business, loss, moments, nature, retirement, Uncategorized
Monday another hole was made in the sky…
first thing in the morning a number of trucks filled up the street…
they were there to cut down one of the elm trees… I hadn’t realized that it had been marked…
it took four hours to get it down to the stump… and then they left… about an hour later a few of them returned and ground it down to nothing…
amazing how complicated the process is… it was interesting to watch…
13 Monday Jun 2022
Posted in business, family, garden, health, life, moments, nature, retirement, Uncategorized, weather
Tags
big girl pants, blessed, fasten, flowers, garden, injured, irrigation system, moments, need help, process, Technology, thumb, watering, widow
Saturday, I had an injured thumb…
Friday’s project had been to get the little irrigation system I purchased last year installed…
I read through all the instructions, watched a video, and gave it a shot…
a number of weeks ago we had attached the main hose and run it about halfway, so I finished laying it out so that the newly planted ferns will also get water on a more regular basis…
then I started fastening the feeder hoses… I started with the hanging baskets and then moved on to the perennials in the bed…
connecting the feeder hose to the main hose involves punching a hole, with a very handy tool, and then pushing the connector into the main hose…
this was the difficult part and my thumb took a beating… eventually I stopped because it was becoming painful…
for sure I won’t be working on it for a few days, lol…
08 Friday Oct 2021
Posted in business, garden, health, life, moments, nature, retirement, Uncategorized, weather
23 Monday Nov 2020
Posted in family, health, life, moments, retirement, Uncategorized, weather
Tags
big girl pants, blessed, family, journey, moments, new ways, process, safe, Technology, tires, widow
our new process when the kids come by is that they leave whatever they have brought for me on top of the hot tub, while I stand inside the back door…
then I put the items I am sending with them onto the front steps and come into the house and watch out the front window…
they were here today to put the summer tires into the garage, return some mugs and drop off meds for me…
feels safe and also gives me an opportunity to see them;-)…
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…
21 Saturday Mar 2020
Posted in business, food, health, life, technology, Uncategorized
Tags
big girl pants, delivery, groceries, health, moments, process, safe, Save-On-Foods, shopping, Technology, widow
technology is certainly helping us in these crazy days…
the groceries I ordered online from Save-On-Foods came right at the time they said… the delivery person called ahead to let me know they would arrive so it gave me a chance to ask a few questions…
usually they bring the groceries into the house and have you sign a form…
the new process is that they drop the bags on your front step… once they are back at the truck and see you bring in the groceries they sign the form for you… while he was describing the new process he advised of the substitutions they had made…
I thanked him profusely for providing this great service for those of us older folks, particularly as I currently have a cold which is making me exceptionally careful…
it is a new world we are living in…
herbiggirlpants 