A weather rollercoaster, a birthday, and a short visit

The storm blew in on Sunday afternoon bringing heavy wet snow and windy conditions. It must have warmed up slightly, as we had ice pellets most of the evening. By morning, there was a crust of snow and ice on the driveway. Neither the son nor I had any reason to go out so I left it, hoping it would melt. It didn't. 

We had a bit more snow overnight into Tuesday, and it remained cloudy and cold. I went out to feed the birds that morning and then went in to the dishes and watch the feeder. It doesn't take long for the word to spread - these photos were taken about a half hour after I was out. Not much later, a squirrel showed up for a feed as well. 

I like how the snow settles on the branches of the trees - though I didn't want it stay, just yet. And it didn't.  

My son didn't work on Tuesday either, he'd taken the two days off as he celebrated his 35th birthday on the 25th. His idea of celebration is sleeping late. Not so different from the weekends. :) I generally don't give gifts or cards for birthdays any longer, but do order in dinner of their choice. C chose pizza; I ordered from Dominos where I could get brownies for dessert. When the delivery I told him, "you even got cake!". If you can't tell birthdays aren't a real big deal. 

Wednesday I went for groceries and managed to stick to my list, except for a bag of seedless grapes, and the budget didn't take too big of a hit. At stitch and chat that afternoon there were just two of us. S had a call from one of the other ladies the night before and their household has been infected with Covid. S's neighbour didn't come either and she hadn't had her lunch yet. We chatted and got to know one another for a couple of hours. She was working on a knitted scarf while I working on knitting a Christmas tree. I'll share a photo next week.

Thursday was a catch up day on housework. While I was running a load of laundry, I even got some sanding done in the basement on the door casings. About time! My thought is to finish off the main room and laundry room next week, and then I'll turn my attention to the new room and my son's old bedroom.

On Friday morning I was out the door by 7:45 for my drive to D's. She dropped Eli off at school, and I arrived shortly after to pick her up. We drove into the next (larger) community for a bit.of shopping. Our first stop was Value Village where D found several t-shirts, a few pairs of sweat pants, and a Halloween silicone mold. She's using the latter to melt broken crayons into Halloween shapes. These will go into treat bags for Eli's class. 

Of course I had to look for yarn. And of course, I found several bags. I walked out with $20 of yarn to add to the stash. There was one skein I particularly wanted for a specific project. 

We made stops at Dollarama and Walmart before heading to her home for lunch. A bit of housework was accomplished before we sat down to watch some television and I did some knitting.  We picked up Eli from school about 3:30. He had no idea I was coming. He was happy, but not overly excited to see me. But by bedtime he was ready for some bedtime story reading. AND he slept in the twin bed with me all night...as a result I was awake many times during the night and by morning, he had pushed me nearly off the edge of bed. Time to get up anyway.

I helped D with a couple of things, watched the Home Alone movie with Eli, and did some knitting before driving home this morning. I didn't stop anywhere along the way to take photos but I can assure you that all the snow was gone. Only the shaded spot on my driveway (where I'd piled the snow earlier this week) still had snow on it. We're going to have a warm Halloween. I only have candy for 45 kids so I suspect I'll be turning the lights off early.

Speaking of which, there is football on the television, so I think I'll curl up on the couch and take a nap. Have a great week ahead everyone!

Wordless Wednesday

 

Running around and catching up

It's been a busy week, with lots of time spent away from the house. The week started on Monday when I met a friend for breakfast. She had driven her daughter back to Regina and spent Sunday night, so we met before she hit the highway for home. We didn't have a long visit but had time to share photos of the grandkids (she has three), catch up on family news, and the social activities we've been involved in. She has a much busier social life than I have, being involved with seniors community in her small town, she's currently part of the committee that runs the building and sets up the various activities.

On Tuesday, I made a run to Value Village and Salvation Army thrift stores to look for a winter coat for my daughter. I scored at S.A. with a Columbia jacket, for just $22.50 after my senior's discount. It should keep her cozy and warm this winter. Her several years old one just wasn't going to cut it another winter and the weather is about to turn.

Wednesday was vaccination day. I had booked a flu shot for 10 a.m. at the pharmacy and arrived to find a number of walk-in patients in line. However, since I'd booked on line I was first to be called. The nurse asked if I'd had my bivalent booster dose - I said no, because I was waiting for the Pfizer to be released. She suggested I go ahead and get the Moderna as she wasn't certain when the other would be received at the pharmacy. So, after getting my first shot, I got back in line as a walk-in and waited about 20 minutes for the next vaccine. 

I went home with two bandages, one on each arm. After a bit of lunch and a great chat with my friend K (whose birthday was that day), I headed over to the stitch and chat group. By the time I got home shortly after 3 p.m. I was starting to feel very tired. When C arrived from work, I told him he was on his own for dinner. I had some soup and was in bed by 7:30 p.m. and asleep not long thereafter. According to my Fitbit I slept for 9 hours and 14 minutes!

Thursday morning I felt alright, though my left arm (Moderna vax) felt as though someone had punched me very hard. There was a wee bit of tenderness in the other arm too. I had errands to run for D, and I was out of the house again by 9:30. I did some banking, stopped at the doctor's office for some paperwork and made a trip to Costco for some household items she needs. While I was there I found a few pieces of clothing for Christmas gifts for D and C. 

I had ordered items from Amazon last week, and the book for my brother and Eli's gift have arrived this week. Looking at my list of gifts still to be purchased, I'm more than 50% complete. The tough one is my SIL; there is nothing she really needs and anything she wants she can purchase for herself. I'll try to find a book she might be interested in, and the niece and nephew both get gift cards. That just leaves small gifts from Santa, and whatever I decide my son is giving his sister and nephew. :) Those will wait until next month as my budget for gifts has reached it's limit this month.

Friday was a much quieter day, spent at home catching up on housework, knitting, and watching curling, baseball, and football. The sports didn't start until noon, so I had lots of time to get things done in the morning. It was a cool'ish day with the temperature reaching a 12C.

Today we're expecting rain to start later in the day, with snow to follow. Yuck! I noticed the birds were hovering around the bird bath and feeder; with the expected weather, I felt they needed both. I'm pretty sure in the 1/2 hour since I filled the feeder they have pretty much emptied it. 

No photos from this week, except this oldie that I received this morning from my high school best friend. I'm on the left, my dad in the centre and A on the right. We're standing in front of her parents' garage in the small town we grew up in. I've no idea why her mom took the photo and I'm pretty certain I've never seen it before. I'm guessing we were between 16-18 in the photo as those were the years we were the closest. We've since drifted apart - I'm not even certain where she is living these days, but I'm sure her family, children and grandchildren keep her very busy.

Time for some lunch and an afternoon and evening of sports watching, and finish up the sleeves for a baby dress I started a week or so ago. Maybe I'll continue on Eli's sweater too as I got back to it earlier this week. 

Have a great week ahead everyone!

Friday Funny

 

Wordless Wednesday

 

Ups and downs, and fair to middling

If you've been around this blog for awhile, you know that I love to travel. My first foray into international travel happened in 2007, when a friend I did an all-inclusive vacation to a resort in the Dominican Republic. While there, we went on a tour of a local village including a tour of a house and a nearby cocoa plantation. By the way, we knew it was a typical Dominican house because it had a sign that read, "typical Dominican house". :) Despite the fact that this home obviously was better outfitted than many it was eye-opening moment for me. I haven't found the photos, otherwise I'd share a picture of the sign.

Trips to Cuba and Mexico followed in the next few years, and then another friend introduced me to cruising in 2011. We did a fourteen day Southern Caribbean cruise, which took us to a variety of countries. One island that stands out for me is Grenada. We walked up the street from the pier to a local Anglican church and the caretaker gave us a tour. The church itself had been damaged by hurricane Ivan in 2004, and restoration was on-going. On the nearby island of St. Vincent, we hopped into a van and were treated to a 'round the island tour by a local. He stopped at various points to allow us to take photos and shared a lot of information about his home island. We live such different lives here in Canada and those experiences provided insight and perspective. 

I was hooked: cruising means unpacking once and waking up somewhere different every morning (sometimes a day at sea). Cruising has taken me to seventeen Caribbean countries/islands, the Bahamas, a couple of Central American countries, a few New England and Canadian ports, several European countries, and most lately, Alaska. There are several locations still on the bucket list. 

When I was still working, I realized that travel may not be an option when I retired due to the associated costs. So, I started saving money and put it in a separate investment account. While the investments have taken a beating in the last couple of years, I still believe I can manage a trip a year until I'm 80...which was the goal when I started the fund. When I'm searching for travel opportunities, I generally look at the itinerary first and price second. Places I haven't been yet are definitely more desirable, but I'm also happy to return to ports that I enjoy visiting. Some people have said that I don't get to actually see these places. I disagree, as I often find excursions that allow me to see some aspect of the island life. There are places that I don't venture out but stay on the ship or near the pier - usually for safety reasons. 

Changing topics, here's a weird but true story for you. In an earlier post, I whined told you that I had misplaced my mom's mitten pattern. I spent a few days looking for it, in containers and shelves, and any bag I might have tucked a project into and could not locate it. On Thursday, I did a quick run to Value Village to find pj's for the grandson. While there I checked the yarn supply...and found some absolutely good stuff and came with three more bags of yarn (about 12 skeins) for just over $12. Definitely a bargain! I wandered around the store and did one more circle before heading to the check-out. As I did so, I found a plastic bag containing several knitting pattern books - the top one was a pretty sweater, and I could see there were at least three or four more in the bag. At $2.50 for all, I picked it up. Imagine my surprise, when I got home and opened the bag, to find a book of mitt, hat and socks patterns identical to the one my mother had owned. The only thing missing are her notes. It was all a bit surreal but oh, so welcome.

One other item of note from this week, was an issue with my credit card. (No I wasn't hacked, thankfully). I always review my statement in detail - it's the bean counter in me - though that wasn't entirely necessary this time. I was shocked at the balance when opened up the account as I had already paid off the cruise portion. I realized the cruise amount had been charged to the card, twice! I called my travel agent, L and she made contact with Princess. They checked their records and could confirm they had received only one payment. So I made a call to the credit card company....the wait time on hold was 2 hours and 57 minutes. I explained the issue to the young man who answered and he assured me that Princess had gotten two payments. I asked him how he could be sure, did he have access to Princess' account? No, but he could see the two charges to my card. Sheesh, that's only one side of the situation. In any event, a dispute has been filed, and within 72 hours the charge had been reversed so I suspect someone somewhere figured it out.

Now, I don't believe the rep from the credit card company that there is an issue with Princess. I suspect, based on the hours long wait time (it would have been four hours or more later in the week - I checked), that there was a glitch in the system and transactions on or around that date were duplicated and the company is dealing with many, many upset customers. I've been a customer of this credit card company for over 40 years. I'm seriously considering switching cards as a result of this situation. As I told the chat rep - if this is due an internal issue, the fact they are not being transparent with the customers is a bad look. Of course, neither the telephone or chat rep addressed that with me. I suppose I'll never know for sure. 

In other more mundane matters, I'm continuing to knit, watch baseball, football, and now hockey. My review of family history is also on the go. The weather has turned down right cool here, and windy. The other day we had gusts up to 90 km. an hour. Almost all the neighbourhood trees have lost their leaves, though my cross the street neighbour's tree is just changing color.

Oh, and before I sign off for the week, the photo on Wednesday is misleading. The silver vehicle wedged in between the two vehicles belongs to my brother. He spotted the car with the wisdom plate - the driver had parked into the next space over, so the brat maneuvered his way into the spot and took the photo. Yes, he's skinny enough to be able to get out of his car door. 

Have a great week ahead everyone!

Friday Funny