Back at Last

One or two of you may have noticed that I've been 'away' since June 30.  It wasn't my intention to  take such a long break but life got in the way.  And in our lives, that means another relocation...our 22nd in the 41 years we've been married!  We're counting on this one to be our last...knock wood!

Moves used to be easy...Lloyd's employers would arrange for a moving company to come and pack up our house and move us to wherever our next stop was.  All I had to do was make sure I packed enough clothes for the family to last us until we arrived at our destination, where the moving van would arrive and men would carry all our 'stuff' into the new house and I put it all away. 

Now we do it on our own - hard work at our age - but we've been blessed with wonderful children, inlaws and friends who seem willing to lend a hand when needed.

So we no longer live in Edmonton but have moved five hours south into our home in Lethbridge that we bought 5 years ago and have been getting ready for Lloyd's retirement next year.  We decided to move down now to save on the expense of maintaining a residence in Edmonton while Lloyd finishes up his last year of work.

Our biggest problem this time was what to do with all our duplicate furniture, etc.  Our Edmonton place was fully furnished and over the past five years we furnished our Lethbridge home as well.  Not only with furniture but with everyday stuff like linens, dishes, pots and pans, etc.  That sorted itself out fairly well too with a daughter taking our living room furniture, a son taking our dining room set, another one taking a bed and desk, someone else taking our third and fourth set of dishes, etc.  It's amazing how much stuff a couple accumulates over time.  Yesterday as daughter Jenny was unpacking boxes in my kitchen, I was repacking several more for one of my daughters.    If I'm left with more things than I need, after everyone else has decided what they want, I'll box the remainder up and take it to the Salvation Army or Diabetes Association for resale.

I have a feeling it's going to take me awhile to get everything organized and placed where I want it.  My scrapbooking room will be the last one I organize, and then I'll just stay in it for a week or two and play!!!

The drive down was fairly uneventful.  Lloyd drove the U-Haul truck and I followed him in the car.  I had a passenger though.  Remember the kittens that were born on May 13?  Well, they're more than ready to be separated from their mother so it fell to me to wretch the little brown kitten from the bosom of his family and bring him down here to join my son Mike's family.  The poor little thing howled all the way down.  I stopped once to let him out of his carrier for a cuddle and he calmed right down, but then I had a hard time getting him back in.  As soon as we got out of the car at our Lethbridge home and I let him out of the carrier, he was so excited and happy.  He ran around smelling everything and jumping at critters in the grass and was really playful.  He likes his new family and has settled in really well.

Chip with his new family.  2 year old Hannah was nervous around the cat so
cousin James (front with the big grin) sat in instead.

Jenny and her family had come down ahead of us to help us unload and get settled.  While they were waiting for us to arrive, they all worked at weeding our little patch of flowers along the fence.  Our lilys had been mostly hidden by the tall grasses and weeds.  They did an amazing job of clearing it out.

My little strip of garden - just lilys planted there now.

This pretty one has a new guardian - an owl given to me by daughter Mary for my birthday

They spent the weekend with us. Jenn's an amazing worker and almost single-handedly organized my kitchen while Anders and the boys carried boxes and boxes and boxes of stuff to their assigned rooms. You'd think that five boys would just be underfoot, but these grandsons were great. The oldest, Jonah, at 15 years old is about 6'2" so I frequently called on him to reach the top shelves for me.  It wasn't all work though - one evening Anders, Jonah and I took time out to play Scrabble on my iPad. Those two extremely smart people were humiliated to be beat soundly by their doddering old grandmother/mother-inlaw!!!

But just look at Jonah...I glanced across the table at him and thought I was playing Scrabble with Justin Bieber...only better looking!!!

So that's my excuse for not being around lately - a valid one I think. 

Have a nice week.