A Change In The Weather!

 We woke up to 3 or 4 cm of snow this morning, nothing serious, just enough to stick on the streets and make intersections icy driving and a few small spots on some sidewalks icy.  The temperature wasn't terrible earlier this morning but is starting to drop as the day wears on.  Short bursts of large snowflake flurries have made the day interesting to look at from inside through the windows and it has been a wonderful two days of being goose-free around here.  

I enjoyed the women's breakfast at church this morning.  The dramatic reading and some singing were both fun and the homemade raspberry, blueberry and pineapple coffee cake squares were most delicious, along with the yogurt and fresh fruit.  BUT the best part of the morning was congregating as a group of women to bring items and financial offerings for our Saturday lunch programme that feeds between 80 and 150 or so homeless and otherwise financially distressed people in the downtown core every Saturday at noon.  15 downtown and area churches are involved in the programme that is proving helpful to so many.  After our breakfast and short programme we all grabbed bunches of Christmas cards to write encouraging messages in to hand out to our Saturday guests.  They seem to very much enjoy and appreciate the effort put into our recognition that Christmas celebrating is for everyone, not just a coccoon of well fed and housed church folk.  The generosity of our women this morning as they donated their money and time. (making cards, preparing and serving lunches, setting up the donations table, along with the other churches' volunteers)  It was inspiring to see caring for others in large group action.

My husband's sermon is all ready for tomorrow morning, the First Sunday of Advent.  Since the church Christmas Banquet is tomorrow evening I am guessing it will be a smaller congregation than usual as people who live across the city may not want to brave the first true drive of winter twice in one day.  It just means that Zoom will be very full of people watching the morning service.  I am pleased that my husband has been able to juggle his teaching and preaching commitments wisely this autumn so that he has more energy than he often has at year end.  In another week's time we will be tackling the basement cleaning together, eliminating a whole bunch more "stuff" we don't need to keep.  My husband is so fed up with the whole project that he is far more willing to let go of things than he was even a few months ago....thank you Lord. (and praying friends)

The overnight temperature is going to drop substantially by tomorrow evening so I will have to plug in the in-car heater overnight so I can get to my annual physical appointment early Monday morning.  Here's hoping there are no issues with getting the car started! Amen! 

My friend flew off this morning to visit her parents in Whitehorse, so I am wondering what kind of weather she is flying into and I pray she has a good week there and a safe flight home! A few months ago we were praying for her father who had a heart attack and spent a lot of time ferrying himself between the nearest large city hospital and his home medical services while dealt with some substantial post surgical issues. He finally seems to be on the mend and I pray that my friend finds him in much improved health since the last time she saw him, immediately after his open heart surgery.

I Think The New Exercises ARE Starting To Work!!

 I had a breakthrough with my new sitting physio exercises this evening.  I have been doing those butt cheek squeezes along with hard pressing the top of my operated thigh for about 60 reps per day and tonight a series of short, sharp tingles began occurring in that thigh.  So, to test out what I thought might be happening, I tried a few of the simplest full weight bearing stances and had a happy surprise.  For the first time in the past nearly 6 months of physio, the weight came off my heel as I tried to stand and actually rotated onto the sole of my foot and that foot wiggled back and forth along its full length to keep me from losing my balance too quickly.  It is a near miracle to me.  Those nerves do seem to be responding to the hard hand pushes on the thigh when I am sitting.  I have been mentally willing the sole of my foot, (to no avail until tonight), to get the message that it must participate in keeping me upright but my weight on that leg has stubbornly refused to shift off my heel.  The nerves have not been sending the message down the length of my leg to the foot.  No wonder I haven't been able to stand on that leg very well.  I will take one more day off the standing exercises for the sake of my knee that is taking its time recovering and then try at least half the number of reps of each exercise on Friday and Saturday to see how I am faring after missing a few days.  At least I have been able to continue the seated exercises and they are obviously helping one week into doing them.  It is encouraging! Onward and upward!!

A Happy Pension Day Here!!

 My husband decided this morning that he has waited long enough for a few badly needed clothing items. Since we were stuck at home for most of yesterday while I rested my injured knee, we assessed that today it could be wrapped in a tighter tensor bandage so that I could go along on his shopping expedition.  The sky was foggy and murky with clouds all day, but the temperature was most decent so away we finally went....at about 11am....okay, not an early start, but at least we got out before noon!  

First stop, Cowtown to look at the denim shirts.  After a long search through rack after wrack of western style shirts, the clerk finally located two styles of straight denim shirts with no western patterns on them AND lo and behold, buttons instead of those infernal snaps he detests.  Since the stock was so limited for plain denim, he bought two instead of just one, in two different shades of denim blue.  Yay!  He is learning to splurge on himself a bit more and not buy all his clothes at the thrift stores.  The sale prices on those shirts made him feel better about "purchasing new".  Then it was off to Mark's to look at the gloves and liners for winter wear. He found exactly what he wanted and I found some new socks to replace some old ones that I also bought at Mark's years ago and are just now wearing out.  From there it was over to Cob's bread for his favourite semolina loaf while I went into the Chatters next door to purchase a couple of giant bottles of hair product, then on to RC SuperStore for one bag of groceries and some extra "stuff" to give away at our church's Saturday morning lunch for the homeless this coming weekend.  We stopped at The Open Tap for delicious pub grub...don't let the run down interior fool you, the food is quite good! My husband had a perfectly cooked medium rare 8oz. steak with included fries, Caesar salad, garlic toast and a goodly amount of mixed vegetables for $26.95.  Quite a wonderful special today!  We stopped for a gasoline fill up at the reserve Domo station on Albert north....only $1.19 a litre, as compared to anywhere from $1.29 to $1.32 elsewhere, then finally a stop at Foster's Shoes to get my husband some badly needed winter hikers to take advantage of the opening day of their Black Friday sale. They have such well versed, excellent staff there.  Yup, it was a very expensive shopping trip, but my husband finally has a lot of items he has been in need of for quite some time.  It takes awhile for him to get around to accepting the fact that it is okay to spend money we actually  have on himself, but he surely had a wonderful time picking and choosing and trying on today.  I had so much fun helping him make decisions and watching him grinning as he walked out of the stores carrying full bags of clothing just for himself.  YAY!!  It is such a rare occurrence.  I have as much fun as he does.

Tonight we may just wait to cook the chicken breasts I thawed out for dinner....after our large lunches it seems like too much to have to eat another full meal tonight, so I think a couple of grilled cheese sandwiches and cole slaw are on the menu instead.  

Looking forward to my weekly coffee time tomorrow morning with my friend and then seeing friends in the afternoon for a chat about the Beatitudes...one of our retired pastor friends is an excellent teacher and so we are looking forward to his ideas once again on a familiar passage of scripture.  

I am going to give my knee one more day to heal and then on Friday and Saturday, hopefully, it will be healed sufficiently that I can return to my daily physiotherapy for the OTHER leg, hahaha. Honestly....I think I have now managed to injure most every other part of both legs and my rib cage since the June surgery, so I think there is nothing left to injure and I should be able to carry on quite well with my exercises for the next 6 months.

Oh, one other happy thing:  we received an invitation out for Christmas dinner this year.  We are going to check with the family of our host and hostess to find out if they sincerely do not mind our being there in the midst of their family celebration, and if that is the case we will accept the invitation with great joy!   

No Physio, Only A Little Snow And A Huge Gaggle Of Geese!

Unfortunately my knee began to throb as soon as I tried doing the physio exercises after lunch yesterday, so I was forced to give them up. By 3pm I put a tensor bandage around the knee, sighed a big sigh of acceptance about this newest injury, then called my GP and the blood lab to cancel my appointments with them today and tomorrow. I will try again next week. I suppose the 3km walk in the morning didn’t really help, but hey….a chance for a walk on a late November day with enough warmth and dry streets to make it enjoyable? On the prairies? I mean, I had to go for it, right? Of course right! As I walked along I was reviewing our happy phone conversation with our NYC kids the previous evening, so perhaps I was oblivious to my knee? Whatever….it feels a lot better after a good long sleep, but I am going to be gentle with the knee and keep it wrapped for one more day. I will start physio reps again tomorrow.  At least I was able to do the sitting exercises three times yesterday so physio wasn’t a total loss. Thank goodness….

So this morning I am looking out at a bit of snow swirling around and sticking to the passing cars, a heavy coating of slippery frost on the grass and our gaggle of geese who still seem somewhat confused about life in general. As I was walking home yesterday there were several hundred geese performing ever widening circles of test flights and I suspect they will finally be gone by today or tomorrow. I came across our band of merry goosies, still so tiny in comparison to the mature adults, ripping up any remaining blades of green grass on our front lawn, then watched them waddle between the buildings to get to the remains of our parking lot puddle but looking over their “shoulders” as they scurried past both sides of our porch, giving the home of the apparently dangerous red shovel a wide berth, hahaha. I only had to go outside and wave it in the air for a few seconds one time yesterday to keep them off the pathway to the car. Well, what can I say? Of such ridiculous and Non Event events is my retirement life made. 

My early mornings of late have been interesting in a weirdly healing way: for several mornings in a row now I have been remembering specific anger and/or hurt producing incidents throughout my life. Kind of strange, but it has been giving me the opportunity to review the situation, confess to God that rightly or wrongly it created an emotional crisis point for me, ask God for help to forgive me if I have not forgiven yet the other people involved in the situation, then ask for help for me to do that forgiving and for help to let the negative emotions go. I can almost feel those emotions flying out of my head. Days later I deliberately pull out those same bad memories for inspection and find they no longer trigger my emotions, they are just incidents that happened in my life and really have no bearing on anything of importance in my life now; most freeing and I am grateful to God for starting up this process.  

So, no plans now for the next two days. It feels good…..other than having to take another day off from most of my physio exercises. I think I may do some reading, there is a friend’s email from last night I  want to respond to thoughtfully and thoroughly, I may indulge in a half hour of computer gaming, I will take time to plan out and prepare decent meals as we have run out of my husband’s homemade soups and chilis, I will help my husband fill out his call for jury participation forms so he can get them to the Sheriff’s office today….it will be nice to stay home for a couple of days before the happily busy craziness begins again. 

One Last (?) "Last Walk"?

 I had a successful annual eye examination today.  New glasses are ordered even though there was no change in my prescription because...well, because....well, I have a short attention span, have had my current frames for 4 years and, well, dang it, I just want new frames, because.....'nuff said!  I am amazed that there has been no progression with my poor vision, macular degeneration and cataracts. Thank you Lord!!!  Now, if my annual physical tomorrow and subsequent lab work will just go as well.....not sure that is going to happen due to some ongoing symptoms that need to be checked.  We shall see......

This morning the weather is absolutely gorgeous!!  I would never guess it is going to snow up to 4cm overnight tonight.  There was no way I was going to bus myself home or call my husband to pick me up after the eye appointment. So, at 9:15am I was on my way home on foot.  It was a fabulous 3km walk despite having a very painful knee on my non-operated leg this morning. (in the middle of the night I actually fell asleep before completing the procedure of putting a pillow between my legs to lie on my side, so my non-operated leg was being crushed at the knee by the operated leg lying heavily on top of my previously injured kneecap.  Oh wow, was I stiff and sore this morning, BUT walking actually helped the knee to feel better so.....Yup, it did!)

So not sure how this knee issue is going to impact my physio this afternoon, but I will do at least half the reps of each exercise so I don't miss out entirely today.  I will do extra chair sitting exercises for those damaged Glutes nerves instead. Honestly I am reaching "ludicrous speed" with the other previous leg damage issues. After all the vacuuming and furniture moving on Saturday I pulled something around the hardware in my ankle on the operated leg, now I have set off the pain in my knee of my non-operated leg....good heavens!!!  My revised hip is doing better than either of them at the moment! hahaha!!!

My "eye guy" and I both got a bit of a shock this morning when he plugged the cost of my new glasses into his computer once I had decided on a frame.  He tried three different ways to get the insurance company to take a direct claim and it was refused all three times.  He wondered if the company had a change of policy they didn't tell him or me about, then he wondered if they are starting their year end audit early.....anyway, the upshot is that I had to pay the full amount myself up front. Thank the Lord for credit cards at such times!  When I got home I logged into the insurance company website and found several notices of apology that some of their systems, such as the payment authorization, were down for some unknown reason and they are struggling to repair them.  Thankfully I can make a claim online. AS soon as my husband completes his current online meeting he will scan the receipts and prescriptions for my glasses and his compression stockings and we will make the submission.  HOpefully it will be done today or tomorrow: in the midst of trying to complete his sermon for Sunday morning and get his paperwork for possible jury duty submitted to the sheriff's office.  Just found out there is a fellowship group meeting this coming Thursday as well.....three medical appointments for me, daily physio, dinner with friends tonight, another meeting tomorrow morning for my husband, coffee with my buddy later this week, a ladies' pre-Christmas breakfast on the weekend, church.....I am never this busy or have to get up uber early this many mornings in one week, hahaha. Oooh, poor hard done by me. haha! The midweek lab testing requires me to arrive at 6:30am and stand outside in line by the door until they open at 7am if I have a hope of getting in before I pass out from hunger after fasting for 12-13 hours.  I can't get an online appointment before 11am, as I think I mentioned in a previous post, so here we go again....of course it would be happening the day after the snowfall.  Well, maybe we won't get freezing rain ahead of the snow this time?  Where there is life, there is hope!

 

Are Our Young Goosies Preparing To Leave Us? (Hope, Hope, Hope)

 This morning we woke up to our usual huge band of geese all over the front lawn, but something was different. They were honking and squawking and taking off in groups of three and four to fly in circles overhead.  Each flight they all went a bit higher and expanded the diameter of the circle. So, are they finally feeling ready to prepare for a flight out of here today or tomorrow morning before we get the forecast substantial snowfall tomorrow afternoon?  Not only do I hope that is the case, but I also hope and pray they are strong enough to make their journey, being so much younger than the geese born earlier this spring.  When we got home from church, (and a fabulous lunch at DarBar), at 2pm there wasn't a goose in sight or within hearing, although I will be surprised if at least some of them don't show up again later this afternoon or tomorrow morning.  Once/If they are actually gone we will be able to scoop up the droppings on the front pathway and back yard for the last time until next spring. Again...here's hoping!!  Poor geese...I give them such a hard time.  For two days I went outside when they appeared on our part of the back lawn and waved a bright red shovel up over my head.  That made them suspicious enough of being possibly attacked from above  so that they first of all passed by our back deck very quickly, then began avoiding that expanse of lawn entirely.  After two days they had the hint that crossing in front of our deck may be dangerous and they took wide swaths through the parking lot instead, coming back to the lawn a couple of doors down from us. hahaha  They are not impossible to train to stay off of our part of the lawn, it just takes patience and some time. For the past two days we have been able to get to our car quite easily.  Aaaaah, cleaning up after the pets no one wants, hahaha.

The Wonderful Accomplishment Based Exhaustion!!

 As I await a dinner of my husband's delicious home made chili and toast, I am relaxing and basking in the thrill of accomplishing some heavier duty cleaning in this suite than I have been able to do for the past several months. Thank you God for strength and improved mobility!

I got the lino floors all washed, the dining room table and chairs moved out for vacuuming and then I moved all the living room furniture out of the living room....a sofa, two tub chairs, two coffee tables, a cabinet and my very heavy and awkward recliner.  No problem at all after months of wondering if I would ever regain sufficient strength in my legs and arms to clean my living properly ever again!  After I got the furniture moved and the edges of the broadloom vacuumed, I managed to roll up the 9'x13' area rug, vacuum under it and get it turned around, vacuumed and pushed back into flatness the handful of places where it had bulged out around the furniture legs over the past few weeks.  I was pooped out by the time I got all the furniture back in place, but right about that time my friend Kat dropped in unexpectedly for a visit for a couple of hours.  What a treat!!  By the time we finished our visit I was re-energized and just now completed the rest of the vacuuming upstairs.  

My husband had a most blessed time with our friends and their friends this morning having a church service and sharing communion with them.  He really enjoyed himself.  Performing a church service bring him life and joy. 

Now my husband is making our favourite winter chili....although our football fan friend on Grey Cup day made his most delicious chili that is also a contender for best chili ever.  I am hoping the good healthy chili will make up for my lunch of a cup of home made celery soup, a one carb unit serving of salty Cheezies and a 9 gram of carbs pack of Pocky sticks....sigh....okay, okay, I know....you don't have to chastise me for my lunch choices today. 

I am indeed blessed today by so many things and I am most grateful. 

Physio Help From An Unexpected Source! YAY!

This morning I had a most helpful appointment with my osteoporosis specialist!  What a blessing. He pulled up my surgery x-rays on his computer and compared the hip revision with the previous gamma nail installation and wow, was he ever a great help in explaining what happened at that first surgery, why I didn't get the hip replacement then that I was expecting....it is good knowledge to have! It explains so much to me after having questions all these years.

As I suspected, my surgeon did not receive the approval he was expecting at that time from the Saskatchewan Health Authority to do the full hip replacement. That explains his upset immediately prior to my surgery and his concerns for me afterward.  Thankfully he did NOT tell me that people with gamma nails in their hips can experience not only muscle damage like I had in spades, but also run a significant risk of developing necrosis in that hip joint!!!!  The necrosis destroys the socket and creates a whole new set of problems for the patient and surgeon once that happens.  The x-ray images he showed me of hip joint necrosis told a frightening tale of what COULD have happened to me!!!  I am praising God tonight because I am among the fortunate people who did not develop necrosis from the fracture where the gamma nail was installed.  Whew and thank you Jesus!!!  The osteo specialist told me that my particular surgeon is far too knowledgeable and skilled to have made his own choice to put in a gamma nail and that, knowing him as he does, he probably feels as upset as I am about the gamma nail damage and the months and months of physio and time it has added to my current recovery.  It seems to me that  SHA creates as many problems as it tries to solve in our health care system.  I also found out that for my next bone densitometry there is a 15 month waiting period!!  The Canadian medical systems are falling all apart....so sad.

The other wonderful information I got from the specialist was in the form of more easy to accomplish daily exercises to work on restoring my glutes and helping the damaged nerves in my thigh to heal!  I learned that for every cm of damaged nerve it takes a month to restore its function and I learned some new sitting down exercises I can do while reading or watching tv that involve pressing down on the top of my thigh to help train those nerves to get working again. The fellow was a wealth of information and I am so very grateful to him! I started work on the new exercises as soon as I got home.  

Physio also was encouraging today.  I now have a second exercise where I can stand with full weight on my operated leg for a few seconds without falling over or grasping frantically at the nearest chair for balance.  Only 5 or 6 more exercises to go as far as being able to let go of my grip for more reps than I have been able to thus far.  My muscle tone is slowly returning as well I noticed yesterday.  The message for me is to JUST KEEP WORKING!!

Tomorrow morning my husband will be up and gone quite early to take our car into the shop for winter tires and a brake inspection.  I hope to spend the day getting started on a fairly substantial house cleaning and will try to get half the work done, then do the other half the following day while my husband is away for a few hours doing a Eucharist service and having lunch with the participants.  Not having to work around the presence of someone else keeps me motivated to do my best job!

In mid December we will be going to the Globe Theater to see their annual production of A Christmas Carol at the invitation of  some church friends.  We bought decent tickets so should have good seats and it will be a ton of fun going with our friends.  We so rarely attend any kind of concerts or plays here for some reason...it isn't because it is expensive, it is because we can't seem to get motivated to get out and DO and we aren't sure why.  This may motivate us into the new year to plan activities away from home more intentionally! 

Hey Riders: How About Acting Like The Heroes You Think You Are!

The blue laced expressions of excitement our provincial football team used during their homecoming celebration the other day was about as inappropriate as it gets for a public celebration that included parents with young children and entire classrooms of school children given time away from studies to go out and cheer on our returning Grey Cup champions. Sorry guys, but there is no excuse for using language like that when you are the featured guests at a truly all ages event. Bad form, truly bad form.  For many of us the team has tarnished itself and that is a shame. When you had the chance to truly be heroic, you threw yourselves under the team bus in a big way. Your childish, ignorant behaviour was most disappointing. Get over yourselves and develop some appropriate social skills. 

Now We Actually Feel Sorry For Our Current Lawn Goose Population!

Today we went outside and had a good look at the geese who have taken over the lawns here and we discovered they still have downy feathers in places on their necks.  So, since I checked the lake yesterday and it is not frozen over at all, meaning they could just stay over there, now we are wondering if they are the late born goslings, of which there seemed to be many more than usual this summer.  These birds who should have been born between April and the end of May may be the ones who were not born until late July through mid August, meaning they would not have been strong enough to do a migration flight back south in September through early October when their parents and earlier born comrades would have left our area. So now as well as being ticked off that our perpetually damp lawns are covered in more goose poop than we had in total between the end of February and the end of April, (and cannot be picked up until things dry out...and they likely wont), we are also wracked with worry about whether or not these poopy but SO GORGEOUS birds will survive the winter here in the prairie land of ice and snow. Did they miss out on learning things from their parents they will need to survive? Will they discover the area all the way across the city where the more mature birds who winter over here every year are able to find free flowing water and sufficient food?  Sigh.....me 'n' animals....why do I have to care so much when there really isn't anything we can do for them.  My husband is also disturbed about what may happen to them, but being a farm raised fellow, who grew up in an extremely isolated wilderness area, he is much more practical and able to cope with the realities of wildlife issues.  Sigh....lucky him......

We are very grateful that the rain from yesterday, while it didn't dry up overnight last night, also didn't freeze.  This morning when I rousted myself out of bed at 8:30am it was already +3C and so all of the leftover moisture was still very wet and much of it has dried off the sidewalks and parking lot surfaces. YAY!

Subsequently we used our day to do a large grocery shop that should mostly last us for the next couple of weeks.  Amazing how little five hundred dollars buys these days, isn't it?  Yikes!  We ended our shopping day with a nice meal at Greko's, very inexpensive and quite tasty actually, so that was fun.  We have been home a lot since our gadding about on Sunday, so it was nice to be out in public again, listening in the restaurant to the buzz of conversation around us and enjoying the ambience of a restaurant crowded with busy, chattering people.    

Tonight is the final Taize healing prayer service, so it is going to seem most odd not to be going to that any more.  I have enjoyed going with my friend as much as the services themselves, and they have been very good indeed.  It has been a wonderful time of spiritual life for me each Wednesday evening and I will miss it. 

Tomorrow morning is my annual appointment with my bone specialist....he is very good and has taken excellent care of me for the past ten years. I need a new prescription for my osteoporosis injection meds and he may be scheduling another bone densitometry to see how well the meds are working after being on them for nearly ten years now. There aren't any long term studies yet on how much it continues to work after about an  8 year period, so.....  However I am praying it is still holding my bone density steady as there is not one other new drug available since it came out.  so since I can't take the others on the market due to a severe and scary allergy, if this one isn't working any more I am really in trouble. I am praying that all is well still.  Next week is a busy week of medical appointments as well.  I think I am going to try to move my annual physical and eye examinations forward into a more spring like time of year going forward!   

Making A Plan! (But Sticking To It??? Hmmmmm…..)

 My dear husband, after an excellent start at clearing our basement of assorted “stuff”, mostly his own, a year and a half ago, has reached an impasse. After a six month auspicious start, over the past year he has made minimal progress due to a number of factors, some of them legitimate and the other a bad case of sentimentality. Yesterday I was able to pin him down for a little chat and hopefully progress will soon be made once again. He decided he needs to take a week or two in early December to set aside and “just git ‘er done”! Between now and then he has some teaching commitments that are quite legitimately time consuming and as soon as this month is over he will choose not to take on any outside commitments for that designated two week period. 

Now….will this plan actually come to fruition? It SHOULD, but…(isn’t there always a “but”?)….the success of the plan is going to depend very much on the state of his health. Covid shut him down rather effectively a year ago. He was ill for four months so it took the starch out of him for another couple of months after that. He deals with CFS episodes when he gets too busy and/or stressed. 

So, my prayer is that he will stay healthy enough to get this admittedly onerous task completed, or at least close to completed during the two weeks he has now set aside. He is determined to do his best. He has even said he will allow me to help him with the project and that is a first! He is realizing that until this project is far closer to completion it is useless to seek a new accommodation. 

There is hope!

I Got My Wish! Yay!

 Right around lunch time the rain stopped pouring down.  My husband dropped me off at the church after lunch and returned home to nurse his dietary indiscretion headache while I enjoyed a lovely "snacky" afternoon in the church hall, watching friends show their slides of their recent trip to Greece.  Fun!

Although I was offered rides home by a couple of folk, I opted to risk getting rained on and left for home. What a marvellous afternoon for a walk!!!  It was +4C, the rain had cleared off leaving cloudy but dry skies and there was no wind.  I dipsy doodled a fairly long route home walking along one side of the lake, and just had the most wonderful time. My leg/hip didn't bother me at all. I didn't rush, took nearly a half hour to walk the nearly 3km, stopping to look at the lake and the remaining tree leaves and listen to the loudspeaker over at the parliament buildings for the Riders homecoming event. This may be the last day the weather is good enough to be outside walking until next spring, but if there are any more I do hope to take advantage of them!  Thank you Lord for the healthy, happy walk today, fun with friends, as well as a fairly successful time of physiotherapy. 

Rain, Rain GO AWAY!!!!!!!!!!

 It has been raining all morning; great big drops and the ground is saturated with water. The puddles in our parking lot are very deep and the cars driving down the street are splashing water everywhere.  Fortunately the temperature is just slightly above zero at the moment, but if we don't get a reprieve from the rain, and do get some wind and sunshine, we will end up by tomorrow morning with our ice base for the winter.  Ugh!!!  I know, I know, I shouldn't feel so ticked off about it because it has been a very long autumn with only a couple of days of snow that melted quite quickly and we DO need more moisture if the snow is going to be so late in arriving, but oh.....that ice underneath our feet and vehicle tires all winter long is so difficult to cope with.  The longer I live here the more I realize it is only the ice I dread in winter.  -40C and a foot or more of snow....no problem, but that ice makes for a treacherous five months for me and all others who have mobility issues.  So, I am going to focus my mind on the joy of having an extended autumn weather season and try to think less about the ice that has not yet arrived in any appreciable amount.

I am looking forward to this afternoon's meeting at the church. One of our couples is going to show slides and talk about their recent trip to Greece, so that will be a most enjoyable 90 minutes. There are always yummy snacks and hot tea and coffee, so it is a fun time with other retired folk once a month.  

Physiotherapy is going not too badly thus far this week. For that I am grateful.  I am able to start each exercise now without hanging on for dear life to the edge of the kitchen sink or the back of a chair and even if I can only stand on my operated leg for the first couple of seconds for each rep of the exercise before reaching for something to hang onto, that is progress over how things have been until this past few days.  Another bit of forward progress rather than backward regression is wonderful. I thank you, my friends and family who have been praying for my physical healing and for my mind not to become overly discouraged.  I feel encouraged right now...long may that last!! The tendon is showing small signs of recovery and I am realizing part of the issue is that the glutes have not sufficiently recovered yet from the former scarring to hold me up for more than a few seconds. So, I have added some old exercises into my routine that will not displace the hip hardware, but will work on strengthening those damaged muscles.  Yes, it adds more time to daily physio, but that is okay. I am long retired and winter is coming, so why not extend my home exercise time in the absence of long good weather outdoor walks?  I had my physio all finished before 9:30am today....the up side of waking up at 4:30am after a bad dream that left me angry and crabby even an hour after awakening. Must have been some horrible dream to keep my emotions so UP after it ended!  I was so angry I had to contact a friend to pray for me....absolutely bizarre.  God bless her for being there for me.  Wow....I was so intensely angry it kind of shook me up, to be honest. Glad it dissipated after contacting my friend.  It is so good to have prayer partners and I am blessed with many of them.

I got up for breakfast so early (which is why I was done physio so early) that right now, just after 11am, it is already time to start making lunch.  Fortunately for me there is a small serving of my husband's wonderful chili left in the refrigerator...that with a slice of cheese toast and a slice of dried mango for dessert will make a tasty lunch.  I am most grateful to be married to a cook!!!

Middy's News Today.....

 The news after Middy's appointment with the surgeon today is mixed.  While it is good that a surgery date has been scheduled for two weeks from now, the upsetting thing is that there is no assurance after all that the tumour is benign.  No treatment plan will be able to be put into place of course until after pathology reviews the tumour once it is removed and that will take a couple of weeks.  This begins running the time frame into the Christmas holiday season, so we need to pray that there are no delays for Middy due to the holiday breaks.  As grateful as I am for the good news of a surgery date, I am feeling very badly for the family that they will continue to have so much uncertainty for at least another month.  Praying is what we CAN do to help, so.....

Today I got an email from a cousin who was close to my mom and remembered that today would have been Mom's 98th birthday. Turns out my cousin's grandson, who I have never met, is 34 years old and has had a malignant brain tumour for probably the last 10 years  apparently and recently had a surgery. Only about 92% of the tumour was able to be removed, so.....he is only 34 years old.

My sister in law died when her endometrial cancer metastasized to her brain. Her husband also developed a brain tumour in the course of his own cancer journey. One of our dearest long term friends died this past summer from a brain tumour. Now Middy and my unknown to me cousin have brain tumours.......dear Lord, WHAT IS HAPPENING????

It is all very sad. 

Update On Middy

For those of you who have started praying for Middy! An appointment has already been scheduled with the specialist in Saskatoon tomorrow! 

Now we are asking for dry roads for the several hours long drive for Middy and his mom to get to that hospital. Right now there may be freezing drizzle on those highways. We have it here where we live and I pray it stays away from their connecting roads to the city.

We are pleased that our football team, the Saskatchewan Roughriders, won the Grey Cup tonight. Way to go guys! The party we went to was fun….a small group, but a great group of friends.

We had a most delicious lunch with other friends after church this morning at the Cafe Francais. The menu was more extensive than we thought it would be and the food was delicious! Perfect egg dishes and bacon fried to almost crispy but not over done deliciousness, French Toast that was outside slightly crispy and inside soft ‘n’ melty, a small yogurt and fruit parfait, delicate croissants stuffed and heated with a variety of fillings….it was a very nice meal, made all the more special by sharing it with friends. 

The kids and younger teens did a lot of the church service today. Between 15 and 20 kids took part in the greetings, prayers, music and scripture readings. My goodness we have a great number of excellent readers and from many different cultures whose first languages are not English. They did a great job. Even the youngest ones in kindergarten and pre-school said their parts perfectly. It was awesome.

I went to the pharmacy today to pick up an antihistamine and before leaving the building the Lord gave me the presence of mind to ask the pharmacist if the prescription I ordered yesterday for Monday pickup might just be filled already and it was! It means that when tomorrow comes with tonight’s foggy drizzle turned to a coating of ice all over everything by morning, I will be able to stay home and not have to endanger myself by having to go out. Yay and amen! 

Goosey Goosey Gander, Whither Do Ye Wander?

Front Yard And Back Yard And All Around The Dad Gummed Parking Lot!

Sigh……

We have never been over run with geese in November before. This year we barely had a goose at our complex between the end of April and today! What the heck is happening? We have rarely seen geese here after mid September when they gather to fly south for the winter.

With the outbreak recently of Avian ‘Flu’ resulting in the death of many of our senior geese, we are wondering if these geese are this year’s newbies whose parents died before having the chance to show them where in this city there is open free flowing water all winter after the man made lake near their place of birth, (and also near us), freezes over…..which it has.  Quite a mystery. At the moment we have over 100 geese here pooping all over everything. It is horrible. We can’t pick it up with the shovel any time soon as it is a drizzly, damp day and we have to wait for dryer weather. 

Guess we will have to use my purse flashlight tonight to cross our back lawn from the parking lot when we return from the Grey Cup party to avoid stepping in poop……in mid November….unbelievable! 

Another Beautiful Day!

 We have been so blessed with good weather lately.  Today was another beautiful day: blue, sunny, only slightly cloudy skies, not much wind and above zero temperatures. This will carry on for another few days. By this time next weekend we will be having more seasonal daytime highs in the 0 to +3C range, but that is still pretty wonderful. As long as any overnight rain doesn't freeze too hard to the sidewalks and streets we could be in for another couple of weeks of happy, still able to walk outside in shoes, weather!!  

I enjoyed getting out today to head to the pharmacy and grocery store. Picked up the fruit, veggies and less healthy snacks for the Grey Cup Party tomorrow and arrived home to a phone call from church friends who want to go out with us for lunch tomorrow after the service.  Hopefully the service will be over in time for us to have a RELAXING lunchtime and visit before we head off to the football party.  What a happy day tomorrow is going to be.  Thank you Lord for a nice weekend of friends and food and getting things done....I have been doing laundry all afternoon and that feels GOOD!  Thanks to having a washer and dryer in our hotel suite during our recent trip, I was able to wait for over a week to do laundry here at home.  All the up and down trips on our two flights of stairs is making up for this being a day off from physiotherapy exercises. We have a week of nicely spaced commitments coming up and then the following week is filled with annual medical appointments and tests.  Always a "fun" time of year around here....what will the tests show this time?  Ick!!! I am determined not to over think these medical appointments in advance this year....please, oh please Lord, may my determined good intentions come to fruition!!  Amen!

The Best Sort Of Dinner Guests Are….

 ….the ones who arrive at the door bearing the dinner! 

It was our joy to be on the receiving end of a sushi meal and miso soup brought to us by out of town friends. They wanted to eat together here at our house prior to them attending a concert happening at a venue just down the street. What fun we had! Over the years my husband and I have enjoyed being the founders of the feast a number of times, taking the meal to someone else’s home, so tonight we got to find out how delightful it is to be on the receiving end of this deal! Wow! Fun! I’m glad that in the past we have provided this much joy to others! hahahaha (Over the years we had a part time ministry to seniors, providing meals and groceries to several seniors who were incapacitated in various ways and unable to grocery shop or cook for themselves on a regular basis. Now that we are not in that official ministry, we kind of miss it, so we still do that occasionally as needed.)

Tomorrow is laundry day. All the stair climbing will be great on my day off from physiotherapy. We desperately need to go grocery shopping but Saturday is a very crowded day in the stores so my husband went for a walk this afternoon my husband walked over to the the store for a couple of items to keep us going until next week. Bless his heart!

Please Pray For Middy!

A friend just let me know that the preteen child of a mutual friend has just been diagnosed with a 6cm brain tumour.  While it not likely cancerous, any kind of brain surgery is dangerous and terrifying.  Mom is in shock and I can only imagine how scared Middy is.  Please, as you feel so led, could you pray and ask God to clear the way for the surgery at the hospital in Saskatoon.  Please pray that the surgeons will be able to remove all the tumour and that no cells would be left to regrow a tumour at a later date.  Thank you so very much.  It breaks my heart to thing of a child that young facing such an horrendous diagnosis.  I was just visiting with Middy and his mom about a month ago and I can hardly believe this news. If I am this shocked what on earth are mom and the rest of his family going through???   

Allergic Rhinitis....What A Nuisance!!!

 So.....a full week after returning from Vancouver and experiencing the allergic reaction to the new cleaning products used at our hotel for the last 2 days we were there, the rhinitis continues to get worse.  My head feels thick, my eyes are puffy, my sinuses are dripping on and off....oh my goodness it is has been years since I have had a case this bad to start the winter.  I was hoping to have it under control prior to my annual physical exam in a couple of weeks, but it appears I am going to have to ask the pharmacist if he is allowed to prescribe anything without me having to make yet another doctor's appointment in the next week.  Aaaaaargh!  I went out for coffee with a friend this morning and something in the restaurant set both of us off.  She was snuffling on the way back to the car and my own head, which was starting to clear out a bit once I left home and got active this morning, got all stuffy and thick feeling again.  Dang it!  Guess, since the condition usually relies on an application of corticosteroids, I am going to have to go see the doctor prior to the physical.  Well, she is going to be my "best friend" by the time I add in all these appointments on top of the several I just had with her before our trip.  

Yesterday when we were out of town I did very well. By the time I got to my friend's house, after a miserable night with my sinuses, I was feeling quite alright again and we had the best visit and a wonderful lunch at her local art gallery cafe. Chicken almond sandwiches with spinach salad are the best....and the lovely slice of dark gingerbread and lemon sauce we shared for dessert topped it off so nicely.  Yum!!  Then I wandered over to another restaurant a few blocks away to join my husband and his work colleagues as they finished up their lunches post meeting and was able to enjoy a nice visit with them as well.  The weather was perfect for an autumn drive....warm and breezy with no snow or ice on the roads or sidewalks.

I knew I was going to be late for a monthly evening group meeting because I was determined to see my friend who I attend the Taize services with and go to that meeting first, but I didn't realize just how late I would be, hahaha.  The priest was really wound up last night and incorporated a lovely candle lighting ceremony into the prayers.....of course it would be MY candle I couldn't get lit, so my wonderful friend stepped in and lit it for me, bless her. Then the priest gave an extended personal testimony. Then at the very end as I was about to put on my coat and leave, the priest decided that God had given her a word specifically for me!  Okay then.....  It was a good word and one that meant something to me, and has inspired me to continue on in a spiritual direction I have neglected for some time, BUT some of the things she said made me wonder if she has an incorrect perception of me.  It was both a good and also confusing word, but I am sure it was inspired by God...mostly. AND my dear friends and family, although I did check my watch a couple of times I did NOT freak out about the service going on so much longer than usual.  I relaxed and enjoyed it and my friend was swift afterward to take me over to meeting number 2! Bless her once again!!! 

I was feeling badly about being so late for meeting 2, but I needn't have. One of the other folk was also late as he was called to an emergency meeting at his place of employment.  About the time we thought he wasn't going to be there at all, he texted his wife and she left the meeting to race off and pick him up so he could join us as well.  He hadn't been with us long when a call came in to one of our hosts that a person she is helping to care for had missed a committment in the building where she lives, and others could not locate her. She didn't answer either her door or phone, so our host and the fellow who had just arrived from his meeting went racing off to see if they could help the missing senior lady.  Short story....they were gone for about a half hour. When they arrived at the lady's house, expecting her to have fallen (again) or to have passed away, she wasn't home!!  Where the heck could she be? Fortunately she arrived home after they had been there a while and her absence was quite legitimate and she was safe.  She just hadn't thought to inform "her people" that she was doing something unusual that evening. hahaha So the host and friend returned to our place of meeting. By this time my husband realized he would not be preaching his scheduled sermon and was actually very relieved as when he checked it over before leaving home, he realized it needed some work he had missed doing on it before he can really present it properly. hahaha What a crazy night!  We have scheduled the next meeting in a few weeks' time and hopefully this time we will all be together at the same place and for the same amount of time as scheduled.  The visiting the rest of us got done around the late and missing members was also very valuable as we have not seen each other for quite some time. Getting caught up was very important and edifying for the group.  

This afternoon we were supposed to be heading off to see some friends and share lunch together and a bit of a Bible study, but my husband got a call from a former parishioner to ask for help with a family member who is suicidal.....since being a pastor is not actually a job a person can retire from, my husband is happy to assist in any way he can, so we cancelled our attendance with our other friends and he will be free to do what he needs to do this afternoon.  The up side for me about the cancellation is that I will have plenty of time to get my sinuses back under control with some OTC products so that I can do my physiotherapy properly this afternoon before I am too tired to do much at all. Rhinitis is energy draining....along with the sinuses draining.....yawn....it also makes me sleepy! 

More Local Culinary Changes...Sigh.....

 I am kind of disappointed tonight to discover that our favourite restaurant, Fancy Fork, has moved from out east at Emerald Park to Victoria Avenue here in Regina, not that far from our place, but much, much more difficult to find parking at.  At first I was excited that the restaurant would be so much closer to eat at during the winter when we can avoid the drive out of town in the icy snow, but then I checked the menu at the new venue and most of the dishes that made them special for us have been taken off.  The fancy fish dishes we so enjoyed are no longer on the menu, my charred salad option is gone.  It seems to be more of a steak and burger place now, although there are other lovely mains still on the menu. Darn it.....no doubt they will make more money here in the city, but we are going to miss their menu items that set them apart from all the other run of the mill restaurants in this city.  Guess we will have to try it soon and see if we can find things that are still sufficiently different from anywhere else here that peak our interest.  Perhaps the restaurant taking their space in Emerald Park will be okay?  It is moving up from Weyburn and is called Main Track.  The name is most off putting to me, sounds like some kind of red neck burger joint, but the menu looks okay...some of the mains look like fairly good quality NON-burger dishes.  Guess we will have to find out one of these days.  Well, we thoroughly enjoyed the Emerald Park version of Fancy Fork, but maybe we will enjoy this one just as much.....IF we can ever park near enough to it that it isn't a big hassle for me to access.  I'll report back in a few weeks after we have had a chance to give it a try.

Today was a good day around here: my husband was happy to get back to his Tuesday morning breakfast out with a couple of guys from church and I was happy to have that couple of hours to do my physiotherapy where I saw slight progress on another weight bearing exercise.  I got another walk in before lunch and spent the afternoon tackling a large stack of paper shredding that I have been putting off doing for a couple of months. All done at last....yay!  

Guess since it is nearly 11pm I had best get to sleep.  Up and at 'em early so I can eat my breakfast sufficiently early to accommodate eating lunch out of town right at noon.  I will be going with my good friend and am very excited about it. My husband has a work related meeting, including lunch, and I get to enjoy my own visiting.   It will be nice to go for a bit of a drive on a nice, warmish looking day. No snow in the forecast so that is wonderful...nearly the middle of November and it is still possible to have a few days for driving without fear on the highways.  Amazing!  Every late autumn day without snow is one less day of winter misery!

Back in the afternoon in lots of time for me to do physio, go to the Anglican Taize evening prayer and healing service with the Anglicans....the second last one as these services end when Advent begins.....so I will be a few minutes late getting to meeting number two tomorrow evening with some Baptist friends.  I like being busy!!! 

Getting Readjusted To Being Home Is Going Well

We gave ourselves permission post trip to take as many days as we needed to recover and get used to returning to the same old same old weekly routine and it was great spending the weekend doing nothing other than going to church on Sunday morning.  We lazed around all weekend, eating the leftovers from our dinner out with friends on Friday evening, making one brief grocery run only for what was needed immediately and otherwise catching up on recorded tv programmes, reading books and other idle, relaxing activities.  

By this morning I was ready to get back in the groove. My husband returned to his Monday morning Zoom meeting with his retired pastor friends and I spent most of that time returning to my proper physiotherapy routine. While I haven't made a lot of progress of late, I did so much walking in Vancouver that I am now at least aware of some returning muscle response happening in the operated leg and I have been able to fully weight bear for a few seconds for a couple of more exercises where I wasn't able to weight bear at all until this morning.  So, slowly the wheels of healing turn, but about the time I want to completely give up, there is some teensy encouragement that there is still hope for recovery.  

This afternoon I went for a decently long walk around several blocks of our neighbourhood, stopping just long enough at a nearby community library box on the way home to pick up 3 new novels to try.  They are probably just junk, but I think I will be able to fend off the annual winter depression better this year if I stick to a few weeks of brainless reading, unlike last year where I was reading theological and philosophical texts and depressing myself something silly over the present world social and political crises as a result. I need to stick to the "good stuff" during the sunny spring and summer months when the weather and activities at those times of year serve to distract me from realities I can't always handle really well.  

Early this morning I "bit the bullet" and set up appointments in a few weeks' time for annual eye appointments and a full physical examination with my doctor.  I missed it completely last year for a number of reasons and that is very unlike me, but sometimes the stars don't align around here.....certain of you will remember what happened at that time.....but this year, I will get myself checked out and try to address whatever health issues turn up. YES!

The weather warmed up considerably around noon today, so by the time I went walking mid afternoon most all the snowfall from Friday and Saturday had melted, leaving long stretches of dry sidewalk interspersed with a few puddly ones that no one had shovelled over the weekend.  NO ice at all, YAY!  It was lovely being outside in Regina nearing the middle of November.  Apparently we have a few more warm days this week and I hope to take advantage of that and go for a walk on every single one of them!  Physio in the mornings, walking out of doors in the afternoon...for as many days as possible!! So grateful for days like today!

"Purty" West Coast Flowers Still Hanging On in November!

I love coming across still blooming plants in November like the ones we saw around Vancouver, particularly in parts of Stanley Park.  If you live in a wintery climate right now like what we are experiencing here in Saskatchewan, here are a few photos of some of those flowers to cheer you up.  I can't identify most of them, I just enjoy the aesthetic experience of seeing them:

 

Holly with berries....at least I do know this one, hahaha.

These leaves look like the brush strokes on my son's paintings.

A Few Trip Photos

Picture taking is not our forte, but these photos will at least give those of you who were asking a bit of an idea of some of the lovely scenery we encountered in Vancouver during our time there.

We call Vancouver in the autumn The Land Of Trees and Falling Leaves. Here's why:

Outside our hotel living room window.

 

Looking out from our Juliet balcony one direction.....

...and t'other on Denman Street.

Leaves on the trees on West Georgia Street.

Leaves on the sidewalk on Haro Street.

Leaf imprints on Robsonstrasse

Leaves on the path around Lost Lagoon.

And bulrushes too!!

Opening night Artists' Talk at Catriona Jeffries Gallery with Catriona Jeffries, Jessica Stockholder, sculptor and Eli Bornowsky, abstract artist

 

Jessica and Eli curating their works together. "Vertical Lifeline" 2025, Jessical Stockholder and "Anisometropic (Structural adjustment programs administered by the IMF have), 2025, Eli Bornowsky

 Sculpture: "Vanishing Point", 2025, Jessica Stockholder and "the quantum of happiness enjoyed by a country's inhabitants and the means of its future improvement", 2025,Eli Bornowsky

 

The materials used to create these works are listed on the images page of each of the two artists on the Catriona Jeffries Gallery website.

"and what new comedy will emerge from the mannerisms of bodily posture?...once one understands how far all the mannerisms are different, heterogeneous, above all how no common measure can be applied to them (Aprocta)", 2025, Eli Bornowsky

 

 

Father and son day at Cedar Falls #1 The fellow who lives in the Concrete Jungle looks happy to be out and about in the green forest.

#2

The aforementioned Father and Son

Along with Happy Mama back in the city.

The Coal Harbour walk near our hotel. Seein' the sights!

Yup, nothing quite like it here at home...big sigh of longing....

So, that is a very quick overview of the sights we enjoyed this trip.  Unfortunately some of the even more interesting photo ops were missed completely due to the laziness of the photographer(s).  Oh well, at least you get the general idea of why we love going to Vancouver in the "off season".

So, Here We Are Back To Reality.....

Unfortunately, as of early this morning that reality includes 7cm of snow on the ground outside!  Shoot....

Ah well, it IS winter on the prairies so it can't be helped AND we flew home prior to the snowfall, so we arrived on dry ground and no need for winter boots until today.  Fortunately the temperature is to start rising from last night's -10C and we should achieve middle to high single digit temperatures by the middle of next week, for a few days at least.  No complaints about that, fer shur!  

After a full day of lollygagging around yesterday getting my allergic reaction to some new cleaning products used in our hotel a couple of days before we left under control, (all flights on time, all connections made and a wonderful airport meal in Calgary at The Burger Federation...best burgers I have had in some time now), friends contacted us and wanted to take us out for a "welcome home/thanks to my husband for work done at their house recently"  dinner at Ginger Garlic.  The food and fellowship were a most appreciated welcome back and we also received some email welcomes from other dear friends...what an amazing welcome home we have had!!  Thank you one and all!!

We spent a fair amount of time today as well just resting up from all the walking we did in Vancouver and with some OTC treatment my allergy sinus reaction is greatly reduced and I will be all ready for church tomorrow morning. I am wondering if perhaps the sidewalks will be dry enough for us to walk, as it is only 3.5 km, the average distance of many of our Vancouver walks. Since I took the last 3 days off from physiotherapy, a decent walk will be very good for me. Here's hoping the weather cooperates so I can pull it off.  

My husband and I are determined not to submit to the temptation to be depressed about being back here on the prairies for yet another winter! Determined, determined, determined~from our mouths to God's ear!!!! 

A Celebratory Lunch Before We Leave!

We decided we should go out for lunch today to push us through the depression that hit us this morning over having to leave. So we trucked off to Guu With Garlic and had the perfect meal: a shared salad with mixed greens, cress and pickled onions, okonomiyaki and chicken karaage, with a teeny slice of vanilla-chocolate cheesecake for dessert. We wanted a meal small enough that we could finish it with no leftovers that would have to be thrown away; small (if pricey) Japanese sized portions, so it was perfect for us.The rain was spitting but not pouring so it was a pleasant walk there and back. Now at mid afternoon the sun is peeping out from behind the clouds so it is most pleasant here in our suite as we pack our bags. In a couple of hours we will head out to the gallery with our Safeway sandwiches to consume for dinner prior to our son’s talk with Dr. Christopher Mole, Professor of Philosophy, Chair Programme of Cognitive Systems at UBC. Should be a fascinating discussion. Really looking forward to it! Then a short sleep until the alarm rings at 4:30am. Aaaaaand then away we will go!

Our Last Day Of Surrounding Beauty.

 Today is our final day to enjoy the west coast. We are going to go out in the rain and wander about a few more lovely treed and flowered streets, have our last restaurant meal at lunch time, pack everything up for tomorrow’s departure and head to our son’s final artist talk later this afternoon. 

“Mommy, it’s OOOOVER!” Rats….

A Beautiful Bye-Bye To The Water Kind Of Day!

 We pottered around our suite all morning writing emails, chatting and lazing about, but around noon we decided we must take advantage of our last consistently sunny, 🌞 warm, windless day and get outside. We walked around Lost Lagoon and hooked into the pathway to the Stanley Park Brewery and Pub where we stopped for a late lunch burger 🍔. The food was yummy and we were seated beside a young couple from Seattle and their 7 month old baby, 👼 who was a smiley, love everyone type of gal. We enjoyed her and her parents very much. 

My husband was able to snap a few photos of the still blooming flowers. 🌺 Unfortunately the winter blooming rhododendrons are just budding out, so we’ll be gone before they open up in all their glory. It was a much shorter walk back to the hotel, but I was able to add in a few extra blocks by running a couple of errands then, instead of waiting until tomorrow. 

After today’s more than 3 km walk, I am feeling more content about returning home in a couple of days. Yes, it is time to go, BUT to be able to take advantage of the last forecast dry, sunshiny day ☀️for the next couple of weeks was a super duper party pooper treat! Since we are apparently returning to several centimetres of fresh snow on top of a possible freezing rain base, 🌨️ today was extra special for us; thank you Lord for such a wonderful blessing! 

After dinner tonight we donned our jackets and sat on the rooftop patio here at the hotel. 🏨 The lights emanating from the many high rise apartments around us made for a pretty scene. We watched aircraft ✈️ of various sizes as they flew in and out of the airport and one of the boats ⛴️ moored in Coal Harbour set off a few fireworks 🎆 to add to the feeling of blessed unreality that enveloped us up on that roof. The memory will have to sustain us through the flat, ugly, icy prairie winter scenes to come. 

I hope I can have another 8 hour sleep tonight like I had last night. 😴 Since we have to be up and on the go before 5am the following day, I want to take advantage of our last chance to sleep in and not set the alarm.⏰