Mystery, memories, and passing time

 It's Friday as I start this post and I cannot tell you where this week went.  I know I walked every day, I did some housework, I stitched and knitted, and watched hockey, basketball, and a whole of NCIS. My cable provider has a free preview of the channel that the latter show airs on, so I've been bingeing it knowing that it will be gone at the end of this month.

The photos I shared on Wednesday were actually taken on Saturday afternoon after I posted for the week.  R had called and told me the colors were at their peak and we were expecting wind for the next couple of days, so I needed to get out there.  He and his family were at the lake, so I had the place to myself.  I climbed the trail closest to the house as it is least steep, though I didn't make it to the very top.  The last climb to the ridge is almost straight up and I wasn't trying that on my own.  I had visions of this roly poly body doing a Jack and Jill down the hill.

Relating to my blog title, late last week, I was contacted by a distant cousin (grandson of my maternal grandfather's brother) because he was looking for information on my grandpa's family.  He had apparently found me through someone from my home town.  But his initial e-mail went to my spam folder, and I generally delete these items so didn't see it.  He was able to contact my cousin H, who reached out to me.  After a couple of e-mails back and forth, I was able to provide some photos I found in a couple of old albums to him.  In my search I also located the  book from Grandpa's funeral in 1976 in my box of memories for mom and dad.  

Grandpa passed away when I was 17 and suffered from stroke-related dementia for several years prior.  I didn't recall a whole lot about his family, other than I had met one of his brothers, Dave and his wife Clara when I was a kid.  It turns out, in fact, that Grandpa was one of nine children (!) and also had an adoptive brother as well.  On Sunday I had quite the conversation with K, learning more about the family history. K told me he had been able to complete much of the family history, with the exception of Grandpa's side of the family.  It left me with more questions, especially about the relationship, or lack of one, between Grandpa and his siblings.

Something else K was able to tell me was that my great-grandfather is buried in the old cemetery in my hometown.  He passed away long before I was born in 1944, but I cannot recall my mother ever speaking about him or her grandmother, although she would have been a teenager when they passed away.  There is some uncertainty as to where my great-grandmother is buried too, either in my home town or somewhere in Manitoba.  I've promised K to visit the cemetery the next time I'm in the area and will try to find the graves and take photos of the markers if there are any.  Mysteries of the past!

On a different note, I spent some time out the yard this week too.  The lawn was mowed for the last time this year, and the mower moved to it's winter storage in the garage.  I miss my shed... the small playhouse on the deck holds a good amount of things and I might have squeezed the mower in, but that would have meant hauling it up onto the deck and I did not feel like doing that.  I did some weeding and Friday I cleaned about half of the containers of the annuals. It is going to get cooler this weekend, but the forecast is still above freezing at night for at least a couple of weeks. I've left about half the containers since the plants are doing well.  The ones I yanked were getting leggy and beginning to discolor.  I did bring in all the garden ornaments and most of the solar lights. I've left the chairs and tables out on the front patio and back deck.  Sadly, I found two birds on the deck that had flown into one of the sunroom windows, both dead. :(  While I would be lost without my sunroom, sometimes I wish it wasn't all windows.

While on one of my walks, I caught sight of this very active critter.  Once it settled in the tree it was quite happy to pose for my camera.  Check out the length of that tail!

I love all the colors in these shrubs.

The number of ducks are definitely far less than they were earlier in the month. While the geese are still thronging to the pond, the numbers are starting to decline.  One day I was without my camera and spotted two "things" swimming on the pond, diving every so often. They never came up above the water like the cormorants so I'm assuming there may be a pair of muskrats there.  I tried zooming in with my cellphone but they were just too far away to be certain.  Of course, the next time I had my camera they were nowhere to be seen. 

I made a trip to Costco one day, and picked up a few non-food items including another Christmas gift.  I stopped at Peavey Mart on my way home for birdseed but they did not have what I was looking for so I ended up at Home Depot.  I still did not get what I wanted but close enough.  I've started feeding the birds again, so you can expect to see photos taken from the sunroom soon.  While I was washing dishes on Friday morning, I laughed to see the birds using the bird bath, spraying water every which way.  

I'm getting closer to finishing Eli's sweater. The one on the left doesn't look much like a sweater, does it?  But when it is folded over, it does.  One more sleeve and then I'll decide whether to make the hood or a collar.

D and Eli will be here next week so I'll try it on him before I make my decision.  It's going to be big, but he'll grow into it. 

This morning, it was definitely cool out there, about 7C (45F), and breezy but I dressed for it and went out for my walk earlier than normal.  I didn't want to get caught out there if it rained. (It hasn't yet!) I'll end the post with a couple of photos from today.  

Take care everyone and stay well!