July week one: Quiet and at home

Well I certainly didn’t feel like celebrating our country and freedom on the 4th given the Supreme Court’s radical and horrible recent rulings and the ongoing gun violence in this gun obsessed culture. Sad and frustrated.

But turning my mind and feelings to what I can control, we found things to be thankful for, to get done and to make us smile and laugh. 

The pup is certainly contributing to the smile and laugh part as is our habit of making clever and funny comments.

We continued our dog related spending spree by purchasing a larger crate and mat as he is already larger than our much loved mini poodle and has outgrown her crate and some other doggie hand me downs. It feels like we can actually see him growing!

I slogged through planning, problem solving and paperwork for my club but also accepted an invitation from another board member to go sailing and then to lunch later in the month. definitely something to look forward to.

A close friend and her Hubby got Covid for the first time and had a tough few days. They are feeling better slowly.

We did our usual divide and conquer for grocery shopping at two stores, cooked dinner together every day, got some answers about Hubby’s social security and plane tickets for him to take our granddaughter home at the end of her August visit. 

I made strawberry vanilla almond baked oatmeal for quick, healthy breakfasts. Threw in some blueberries too. I'm enjoying it and froze some for later.

I met a quite nice neighbor as our dogs visited on their walks very early Sunday morning. And we are slowly being able to put furniture and decor back in place as the pup becomes better at leaving things alone. Rather like having a crawling or newly walking baby in the house! We still find ourselves calling him our previous dog’s name, Lola, instead of Coco. I even blurted out a combo name of Cola the other day. The mental habits wired into our brain!

What else? A bit of pruning, reading, balanced the books for June, lunch with a friend, Pilates at home, keeping a maxi dress I ordered as is perfect for around home or out for a casual meal, Our older son and DIL will arrive  Tuesday for a two night stay so I must make myself do some cleaning along with making myself go t through  two bulging files of legal documents for the club. Since the club legally dates back to 1932 when it was incorporated (although started officially in 1910) what a process but perhaps it will produce what we need for very different times.

Dec 5-11: Happiness & Thankfulness

What made me happy and thankful this week?

- Oh my, but Facetime is wonderful! We called to wish our DIL a happy birthday and got treated to about half a dozen little dance and comedy performances by our 5 year old granddaughter.

- I emailed my best friend from junior high-high school after not hearing from her for a long time. I got an immediate response and we are back in contact. I am very thankful she and all her family are all well.

- I helped pack donated homemade cookies for my club’s cookie sale. I made chocolate crinkle cookies and we ended up with a big variety.

- I got all my Christmas cards in the mail. And I gave some of the club sale cookies to a neighbor.

- Our older son and DIL will be at her parents for Christmas so brought us our present early. It is perfect. 4 kinds of homemade frozen waffles (blueberry, eggnog, cornmeal, pumpkin) and two unusual syrups (apple cider and coffee infused maple). I think they will be a month of Sunday morning waffles.

- At our club meeting we talked about holiday traditions and sang holiday songs which triggered some memories that haven’t surfaced in a long time. Especially fun was remembering the year my church youth group went caroling on a cold snowy Illinois evening.

- Grateful for the dog groomer who is so kind and gentle. When I went to pick up the dog she was walking around the grooming area all relaxed and just hanging out with her friends. Tells me she really likes them too.

- My required minimum distribution (first one!) arrived right as requested.

Another week - another death in family, time with friends, binging on Endeavor

Another of Hubby’s very elderly aunts died this week which was not a surprise since she was in hospice but still nearly bringing the end of that generation in both our families. He has one aunt still living who just moved to assisted living and is really enjoying it as she is quite social.

I managed to give the dog a bath in the shower but had to have Hubby bring me a chair to sit on to dry her hair as the tile floor hurt the top of my foot. Still some healing left to do. 

Lovely lunch and long visit with three friends at the home of one of them. Also had a lively book club discussion group on another day. Always good to be social.

It took a couple of episodes but I got hooked on binge watching Endeavor although I never like the show Morse. Then I moved on to the UK version of Professor T.

A friend emailed me that she had lost her ambition. I think it is in hiding with mine lol.

Thankful for - 

Having another new member of my service club. I am already enjoying her company a lot.

My younger son calling us to just chat. Same with the older one and DIL.

Our granddaughter getting her first Covid shot on her 5th birthday! We have all been looking forward to this except her of course.

A week at a time - dog bed, drum set & health

Another calm week except for the weather which ranged from highs in the mid 60s to 92 and from dense morning fog to hot dry wind. Most of the time our weather is boringly the same.

I found a 10 minute stretch and leg workout to do each morning if I am not doing something longer. Check it out (Morning stretch video). Got to love YouTube.

It took me 3 days and a nap the 3rd day to adjust to the time change. Why does this continue!

Did bits of house cleaning each day rather than trying to do a large amount at once.

Lots of “to dos” for my club including our monthly lunch meeting. Our speaker was a no show so we spent our time sharing stories of veterans who had touched our lives. Pictures and touching tales about men and women.

Very pleased with how far I can walk comfortably now but quite a ways to go still.

THANKFUL for:

- Lots of dog snuggles especially on the cooler days and as I write that I’m listening to her snore snuggled in tightly lol. I treated her to a new bed for in my office. It is doubling as camouflage.

- How excited Hubby is about his new upgraded electronic drum set and that he is giving the beginner set to a music program for kids

- That the proposed needed dental work for 3 teeth has been reduced to just one tooth needing work and the mole I had removed was benign 

- Scientific advances that enabled me to have a brand new treatment on my eye that will hopefully help my vision stay stable.

Ups and downs this week but thankful anyway

On Monday I passed my foot x-Ray and no longer need to use the walking boot, knee walker or sleep with the compression stocking on. Major progress. On Tuesday I found out there are no open PT appointments for over two weeks. I scheduled them but darn!

We still haven’t made a decision about what to do now that our health system including the local hospital and Anthem Blue Cross (secondary insurance for us) have parted ways. Darn!

Since we gathered at a relatives home last week I have been trying to come up with better ways to respond to their insistence on bad mouthing another relative over not doing even more than was humanly possible while his wife was dying and he was working and raising small children. I really struggle with the insistence of anyone on judging and constantly revisiting perceived shortcomings of others from the distant past. In my view we all do the best we can at the time and if it wasn’t right or otherwise could have been better then all we can do is learn and do better in the next situation.

On the plus side, I am back to being able to do some cooking and made our favorite blueberry muffins, chili, 

Also a plus is that I know how to make progress with flexibly and walking while waiting for PT to start. It’s also a plus that PT is right next to our favorite brewery which has great pizza so I scheduled a couple of sessions to end in time to go enjoy both outside.

I’ve persisted with the arm exercises and am making progress. Also making progress walking in regular shoes.

March Week 2 - Club Meeting, Fixing Things, Cancellations & Closures

As the month goes on my routine scheduled socializing thins out. This week I did have the March meeting and luncheon for my service and social club and it was fun as usual. I made honey glazed roasted carrots with 10 pounds of carrots for 26 people who RSVP'd! No drop off in attendance from the Coronavirus pandemic so far, but I expect that will change as the number of identified cases in our area rises.

The program was "The Harvey Girls" about the Harvey House Restaurants that employed young women in the late 1800s. The speaker's Aunt worked as a Harvey Girl starting in 1930.

And I was officially nominated to be the club President for the next 2 years. The outgoing President seems way too happy to not continuing LOL.

Otherwise, definitely too much time at home and an increase ahead I am afraid. Cancellation of interesting activities has started here. The local OLLI program has cancelled all classes for an unknown time period. My HOA closed our little gym. We are discussing whether or not we should have our April club meeting if we can figure out how to put more space between people.

I will do what helps protect others and flatten the infection curve based on science. Wish we had enough tests to actually know what the real infection with symptoms rate is!

FIXING & CLEANING THINGS:

I'm calling him The Handyman Hero for this one. The washing machine wasn't moving on from running water to fill up at the start and had an error code. He figured out it was a filter where the water enters the washer that was clogged up. He cleaned it, put it back and the washer is working fine again thank goodness!

I happened to look inside on of our grocery bags and realized how long it had been since I washed them. All done now.

The dog also needed cleaning so she got a bath and was quite happy about it.

Finally scheduled the carpet cleaning for next week.

Saw the Podiatrist only to find out I need to schedule bunion surgery on one foot. No answer as to how far in the future it might be safe to do that and/or not cause capacity problems. I'm thinking end of May or June?

AND OTHER STUFF:

$209.30 is the amount the dentist's office say the overcharged us and need to refund. Strange as we are there every 6 months so they could just apply the amount, but we will take the refund.

Got my $100 of Amazon gift card for turning in exchange for Southwest Airlines miles.

Completed the census online and was disgusted that they still ask for "race" and then require you to enter something for ethnic origin. I should have put American LOL.

March Week 1 - Weather swings, happy hour, family dinner, club activities

I'm hoping our weather settles down so my sinuses can only care about all the pollen blowing their way! Perhaps the two are connected as the uncommonly warm weather may be causing more blooming at the same time? I'm sneezing and coughing a bit which makes me feel like I am back in Atlanta. The dog also coughs and has runny eyes this time of year. She doesn't complain though and I do LOL.

Then there is the trying to figure out what to stock up on and how to prepare otherwise for a possible quarantine and/or infectious illness in the family.  Adding to our basic pantry of food, paper goods including paper plates, bowls and cups as well as toiletries to extend the time we could manage without shopping. Also adding over the counter medicines, health aids like gloves and disinfectant, and foods we don't normally eat in quantity but would if sick and had a very sore throat, etc. After discussion with Hubby that came down to juice, applesauce and soups. I might get a couple of boxes of instant pudding for me.

TAXES: We owe the IRS some taxes for 2019 and of of course our first estimated tax payment for 2020. I am hoping this is the last time we owe money as it was probably caused by under withholding for Hubby's final inherited IRA payout. We had a tiny refund from the state. This year's taxes should be very simple and I will do them myself or use the AARP tax help service there in my community.

YEAH!
- Hubby made me happy by going to Home Depot, getting new weatherstripping for the front door, and installing it. No more visible gap!

- Our problem window panes were replace or sealed. Yeah!

- I found out you can redeem Southwest Airlines points for gift cards. $100 worth of Amazon cards are in the mail to me!

FOOD: I did another stock up shop at Vons. Now I will try alternating Vons and Trader Joes every other week and see how it goes. I know I have to track how much we actually use of perishables in a week so I made a grocery list to note each week how much is used and what we need. I may be making more work for myself rather than less at least in the short run.

We are eating well. Dinners were:
- Sunday: Pork chop, roasted cauliflower, green salad
- Monday: Homemade veggie soup, garlic bread, oranges
- Tuesday: Thai take out
- Wednesday: Sausage with sauteed onion, peppers & cauliflower and salad
- Thursday: Veggie soup and salad
- Friday: Turkey burgers, potatoes, zucchini
- Saturday: Turkey dinner at son's house with us taking wine and apple galette

VOLUNTEERING: Against my better judgement I agreed to be nominated to be President of my service & social club which means almost surely that I will be in that role for 2 years. At least this has given me standing to say yes or no to the rest of the slate. Election is in April so we will see.

FUN:
- Our DIL's parents have escaped the upper Midwest tail end of winter and are staying in Pasadena. We went over for dinner with all of the above one evening and it was fun even for the dog.

- Went to lunch with a group of women friends after our club board meeting. Great conversations.

- Had my club book discussion group meeting which was interesting and fun as always. We all read what we want and then share the highlights and lowlights as well as book.

So please share what you have been doing!