The Next Chapter

Good Morning! There is a cool breeze wafting in through the open windows. When the alarm went off I got up and opened the office window and went downstairs and opened the living room and kitchen windows. The house is filling up with the coolness of the morning air. Today is supposed to be +29 but I think it may surpass that number. The sky is a brilliant blue and the sun is up and shining upon everything it reaches. I am grateful that I can work from home most of this week. YAY.

Yesterday morning I was up in good time but not as earlier as Saturday. I had a real lazy Mother’s Day Sunday. There was even a nap in the afternoon and that is likely the reason that I could not fall to sleep last night. It was a long night. After supper I walked with Alejandro, Eddie & Bruno. Bruno seems a bit better than he was a few days ago. His Mom comes home on Wednesday night, late. Both the pups will be happy to see their Momma.

I tried my air fryer out last night making french fries. Lesson learned better to do one potato at a time. They did crisp up or at least most of them did but some did not. It was easy to do. Will have to try something else. I will have to make some of that yummy rice pudding with my handy dandy Tupperware pressure cooker. I have two small appliances that I can use in this heat. Not a good time to be turning on the oven.

This will be short as I did not set up my workspace last night and am feeling that I need some COFFEE this morning. I also need to take some of my plants outside. Will try and find a place that will not be in the burning sun. Likely will end up moving them about throughout the course of the day. My deck faces south and there is no cover from the heat of the day. My daughter is going to bring me an umbrella which will help with some shade.

I hope that you keep cool on this Monday. Be safe.

Wishing and praying that moisture extinguishes the wildfires. Keep the animals and humans all safe.

Continuing to live this life with kindness, respect, compassion, patience, love, laughter, understanding, gratitude, focus, possibilities, coffee and forgiveness.

Always, Carol & Alvin (My Forever Angel)

The Next Chapter

Good Morning! Well here we are once again at Monday morning. The sky is partially overcast and we are all hoping for rain. The ground is so dry. The forests that paint a lovely picture of our dear home “Alberta” are desperately dry and need some moisture. There are still many wildfires burning out of control. I fear that the loss of wildlife and domestic farm animals will climb with every moment the fires burn. Spring is the time of renewal and of birth. So many babies will never have a chance at a life. Very sad. My heart breaks and hurts for this unnecessary loss. Most of the fires that are burning are man made. Some idiot either threw a cigarette out of a window while driving, or was burning trash or something. I know that many wildfires burn as a result of nature. Lightning strikes are a big one. Sending thoughts of moisture to extinguish the fires. Seems like everyday they are placing another community on immediate evacuation. I keep checking with my daughter to see how they are doing. They have bags packed to leave on a moment’s notice. I am glad that they are taking this seriously and are prepared.

Last night in mid evening (for me), I saw a little bird with a piece of fluff in the tree. All of a sudden the piece of fluff or cotton fell. The little bird quickly dove down to the fluff and picking it up in its’ beak tried to lift it up once again. There was nothing that I could do to help. The bird gave up and flew away. Was it trying to make a nest? I am thinking that this may be late for that but I am not a bird. Perhaps the little bird has had trouble finding little things to make a nest. Poor little one.

Thankfully the wind has calmed down this morning. Hoping and praying that the winds remain calm from here on in. That would be nice and would help the fire situation greatly.

Yesterday morning I baked a pumpkin cake and made a cream cheese icing. The chocolate banana pumpkin loaf that I had made Saturday night was not quite the way that I like it for someone else to eat. It is edible so I will munch away on it but not to take for friends to eat. The pumpkin cake was a yummy. So glad that I decided to try a new recipe. I did change up the icing though. I had a great visit yesterday afternoon with my dear friends Gillian & Signe. Always great to catch up with these ladies.

Time to head downstairs and make coffee and have breakfast. My mouth is still a bit sore. After the pushing and pushing (not pulling), I think it will take awhile for it to feel 100% relief.

Wishing you a great Monday.

Continuing to live this life with kindness, respect, compassion, patience, love, laughter, understanding, gratitude, focus, possibilities, coffee and forgiveness.

Always, Carol & Alvin (My Forever Angel)

The Next Chapter

Good Morning! Welcome to Monday morning. Wow, that was a quick weekend. We had mostly a relaxing one me and Cookie. Yesterday I did small chores and also baked a triple batch of chocolate chip cookies. I am taking some with me to work this morning. The sky is partially overcast with rain in the forecast for this morning. Does not look windy for my vantage point. Miss Cookie is downstairs. She runs up and down until I go down. Cookie cuddled beside me this morning before we got up. First time.

I decided that I would leave the blockade off the stairs as on Saturday she pushed it over while trying to get up there. So I will leave all the bedroom doors and then office door closed. Will place a pee pad on the landing upstairs, just in case. That way I don’t have to worry about something falling on her. She is so fast and does not take “no” for an answer, she reminds me of another pup, Kobi. She was fast than lightning and she never gave up. No, was not in her vocabulary. Cookie is older than Kobi but they have the same mindset.

Alvin was much more chill. He was more into food. If there was food upstairs then he would have broke down the gate and whatever blocked his path. No food, he did not care. He loved to look out the window just as all the pups seem to do. She does come when I call her which I just did. Thought I heard a noise down there. OMG. Hopefully all is okay. She is here but what did she do?

Time to head downstairs.

Have a wonderful day.

Continuing to live this life with kindness, respect, compassion, patience, love, laughter, understanding gratitude, focus, possibilities, coffee and forgiveness.

Always, Carol & Alvin (My Forever Angel) and Miss Cookie.

The Next Chapter

Good Morning! Dark outside at this moment. I am up, bed made and had a shower, bit of makeup on and dressed. Yesterday was another productive and even had time to relax. Taxes done for another year. I did some cleaning and went for a nice walk about mid afternoon. Looking forward to this long weekend. Planning to get some “major spring cleaning” accomplished. Washing walls, baseboards, blinds etc. and going through the office/library and reorganizing and going through that closet. Lots to do but I would like to have it all done so that I have time for other things. It will not be too much long and I can start figuring out what to plant. Picking out flowers is so much fun especially if I am with my girl, my daughter. I always have a hard time deciding on which flowers and usually buy a lot. I am sure that they love to see me coming. Planting flowers is so much fun and I love to see them grow and fill out the pots and the flower beds. The front flower bed has always been a bit of concern for me. Some years the flower choices are good and others not so much. I have from time to time had perennials until the lilies had those dreadful red bugs and I ended up pulling them out although if you do not take out the bulb, they will come back. Last fall I thought of getting small ornamental bushes and I may this year. Depends on the quality and pricing. Time will tell.

Seeing as though we are talking flowers, I am going to post some of my favourite flower pictures from over the years. Oh, I can see it beginning to get light outside my office window.

For Mom

Flowers

More Flowers

A proper Gentleman

Photo Shoot

My Flowers

Flowers

Impatiens – for you Alvin

Temporary bedroom

Perfection

I just had to add some photos of my boy. He loved the flowers and to be out in the middle of me planting. Sniffing and watching my every move. I shall miss him dearly this planting season.

I hope that you have a wonderful Monday. Be safe and be well.

Continuing to live this life with kindness, respect, compassion, patience, love, laughter, understanding, gratitude, focus, possibilities, coffee and forgiveness.

Always, Carol & Alvin (My Forever Angel)

Last Half 2022 – September

Good Morning ALL! Well I super slept in this morning. It was 7:28 a.m. and it is now 7:43 so this post will be short. I am going to post some photos. I am sorry. We were up a few times during the night which led to this ….

What a summer we had along with a couple of fav photos from last Christmas.

I am so sorry for the rush.

Have a wonderful day.

Continuing to live this life with kindness, respect, compassion, patience, love, laughter, understanding, gratitude, focus, possibilities and COFFEE. Definitely need coffee this morning.

Always, Carol & Alvin

Last Half 2022 – September

Good Morning ALL! I hope this finds you well. What a morning I am having!! We were up at a reasonable time of 4:15 first and then to the sofa until 6:30 (shocking) and then up just after 8:00 a.m. for the day. What a life we lead. I noticed when we were first up that the moon appeared to be in the shape of a crescent. Oh so beautiful. Just like magic, one day it is a full, circle shape and a few days later it is a crescent. When I was up, I immediately went over to look after my charges: Humphrey, Bogart and Miss Cynder. Fed, watered and treated. The cats had their littler cleaned. Their parents had bought a new litter container and it took me a couple of tries but I figured out after you place the “litter” in the top, there is a trap door handle to pull and voila, bye bye “stuff.” The cats were not into company this morning not sure why. Humphrey did give me a bit of love and Bogart just hissed when he walked by and I stroked his tail. Cynder the gecko was sleeping.

Once home, Mr. Alvin was happy to see me and wanted a treat, so gave him a bit of his “dry food” followed by a drink of water and then we were outside for a pee and poo.

Yesterday was a great day, I got so much done in the garden and could feel it in my body this morning when I went to bed over. I guess I am not quite as young as I used to be, lol. Must remember to do some stretches before doing extensive garden work. First of all, I cleaned up the garage, then went to work on the back flower garden. I cut back the plants making ready for winter and then transplanted the plants that my friend gave me. Also, transplanted most of the geraniums into smaller pots to winterize in the basement. It took me several hours but at least most of the gardening is done. I have two pots of lavender, one pot with a huge plant that I bought from Costco (not sure what the plant is exactly), lily, citronella plant and a greek oregano plant to bring in or dispose of. There are also the two pots of impatiens on the front step and three plants to trim back in the front garden. But most is done. I did not get to trimming the tree. After the outdoor work was done, I went to see the charges next door and did some laundry and cleaning in between. Then it was getting on so I made a potato, cauliflower dish (baked in oven) and put it on to slowly cook. Actually originally I was making scalloped potatoes until I realized that some of my potatoes were too soft to peel. ARGH. I do not like to waste. Anyway they are put in the green bin for compost. So not a total waste. Man, do I need some coffee. We had a quite evening with another visit next door for a total of three.

This morning once I am done here, will put on a pot of coffee and then put away the drying dishes and then start preparing to give Mr. Alvin a haircut followed by a bath. I have many items on the list and will try to get to most of them. I need to have a shower but figured it better to wait until after the boy has a haircut as I will be covered in hair.

Tonight I think we will sleep on the sofa or else set the alarm so that we can get up to watch Queen Elizabeth’s funeral live on t.v. I could wait and watch later but I want to be up to see the service as it happens. To pay my regards and to give my respect to a woman who gave her life to the people of the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth and was a role model for women worldwide.

My daughter’s plant

Ready for winter

New plants

new plants

Geraniums to go in

The plant that is nameless

Humphrey

Bogart

Humphrey this morning

Well that was a most trying situation. Trying to get photos posted. Technology does not always like me. The first photo was not meant to be posted. This time.

Time to head back downstairs as I desperately need COFFEE.

I hope that you have a great day.

Continuing to live this day with kindness, respect, compassion, patience, love, laughter, understanding, gratitude, focus, possibilities, and coffee.

Always, Carol & Alvin

Last Half 2022 – August

Good Morning ALL! What a wonderfully cool Monday morning this is. The sun is starting to rise, the sky is a pale blue as the night leaves for morning with pale orange hue on the horizon away from the sun. Beautiful. The house is cool this morning and I even forgot to open our bedroom window last night. How did that happen? I even got up just before I turned the lights out to turn off the fan which I had briefly turned on at the lowest setting. I have closed the bedroom windows and blinds except for the office one for now. I will close them once I am done writing this post. Monday morning here we come. I am so happy that Mr. Alvin slept until almost 4:30 and then he woke up at 5:57 (still beat the alarm). So we have been up for a few extra minutes. Today is shower so I need a bit more time and we are still walking in the mornings due to the heat at lunch time and after work. Yesterday when we went for a walk in the mid morning, it was so beautiful out that we just kept walking and before I knew it we had walked our whole “old” route. This time it took us 45 minutes. Alvin is slowing down. We used to do it in 25-30 minutes. But I figure 45 minutes of fresh air, sniffing in that beautiful air, checking out the grass, the trees, the flowers and just being together is great. I am happy that he is still able to walk. I am so proud of Mr. Alvin. We bumped into an older gentleman with his dog, a girl, I do not remember her name now but Alvin liked her. She was 9 years old, I think the man said. Anyway, Alvin took a shine to her and she was timid but did not seem to mind the attention. The love fest carried on for a few minutes before we both went on our way. So nice. Whoa, the sun is coming up and reflecting off of the neighbours garage, looking oh so pretty. I am glad that we are up and getting things done.

A good weekend and I am so grateful that the temperatures were less hot. Way less hot. Yesterday I spent some time cleaning out some of the flower pots where most of the flowers had already passed on. I also did some rearranging and cleaning of the garage preparing for putting the patio/deck furniture away. Won’t be for a bit but not too far off, I would think. I have already prepared the front flower bed except to trim back the perennials that remain. There are three of them. I was going to clean the blinds on the main floor and that did not happen. Just putzed. It was a wonderful day.

Off the subject, I have had this computer (new) in 2009. It is a 2009 model. So it has served me well. The computer can no longer accept updates so it remains behind. I have an Apple iMac. I have been researching to find out which would be the best one to get and am shocked by the results of my searches. I found that the Shopping Channel had some on sale and you can pay for them by interest free monthly payment which would be ideal for me. Upon some research between myself and my daughter (whom I could not do anything technical without), found that the newer Catalina operating system will not be supported after this year. So I do not know if this means that there would be no more updates. Who wants to buy a computer that is basically obsolete before you even pay for it? The new ones that were made in 2022 are thousands of dollars. I love Apple products but seriously do we need to charge so much. Aren’t the Apple people rich enough. How about making things a bit more affordable. You have the “customer base.” Anyway, I have some serious thinking to do before I spend any money. More research and time. I hope this old gal can work for some more time. She has done pretty darn good. Fingers crossed.

Well time to head back downstairs and go for a walk with the boy. Alvin is resting on his bed in the office here beside me.

I hope that you have an awesome day. Cannot believe that the long weekend in September is only a few days away. September, FALL ……. I love fall.

Continuing to live this life with kindness, respect, compassion, patience, love, laughter, understanding, gratitude, focus, possibilities, coffee and …….

Always, Carol & Alvin

PS: I am so grateful to be working from home ….. I love that we can go for a walk and come home and then I can plug in the coffee pot and then start work. I love that I can drink home brewed coffee all morning long if I chose.

The New YEAR 2022

Good Morning ALL! How are you this Monday morning? We are up and at it extra early as I am only working two days this week. I tossed and turned last night so not a great sleep but I did catch some zzz’s along the way. Last night I set up my workstation downstairs which I think had Mr. Alvin wondering what the hey was going on! it will be a nice change to be working downstairs one again. As the temperatures start to increase over the upcoming months, it will be much more comfortable working on the main floor where I can have fans blowing on us. We will be closer to outside for Mr. Alvin. If he chooses to lay on the deck for a little while, he can do so. There is a pretty sunrise this morning and the night sky is slowly clearing to make way for clear blue sky for the day. I love this time of day in the spring. After a long winter of darkness and so much of the you know what, I said that I am not going to say that word and I have not and will not, anyway we are grateful that winter has passed once again. I do wonder what this summer will look like. Oh and the wind. It seems like we have much more wind as of late. The howling of the wind last night did not help me to shut down although it was more my thoughts would not subside so that I could sleep. It will be nice to have a few days off but with my job coming back is not pretty. Oh well, I am looking forward to having the grandpups, Miss Aspen and Master Milo here for just over a week. Alvin will enjoy it as well. I am hoping that he will sleep in a bit and not get up so early. Back to the sunrise, I can see slightly mauve hues on the southern rise. Oh, I love the morning sky. I just heard what sounds like a huge dog barking somewhere in the near distance from us. I wonder what is going on at his house. I hope that he is okay. We have had a lot of coyotes in the neighbourhood over the past several months.

I am happy that yesterday I cleaned the upstairs and downstairs including the floors, moved my work computer and monitor and items down stairs, reorganized my desk upstairs, watered plants, raked the backyard, started to clean out the main floor coat closet and went for a walk. Felt good to get things done.

Well the coffee is ready and I want to get an early start on work. I want to have everything done before I leave tomorrow.

I hope that you have a great day and that we all have good weather to go for a walk either once or today on this Monday. Getting outside with Alvin always makes me feel good.

Happy Monday.

Continuing to live this life with kindness, respect, compassion, patience, love, laughter, understanding, gratitude, focus and possibilities.

Always, Carol & Alvin

The New YEAR 2022

Good Morning ALL! How are you this Monday morning? Alvin and I are doing great. I changed his bed in the office and I think that he likes this one better. He is one lucky little guy as he has three beds. Now one in the family room in the basement, one in the living room and one upstairs in the office. I do not have to haul them around so that is great. Alvin is one wonderful little guy. Yesterday was so nice that despite the messy icy sidewalks we ventured out for a walk. I had cleaned our walks pretty good with only one chunk of ice that is in the dip nearly impossible to remove at this point. We still have the five feet of snow and ice chunks lining the streets and our sidewalks. Keeping most people from parking on the street including company and delivery trucks. One of the neighbours from a few doors down is parking in front of Sonja’s house and I believe the reason is because they have an opening in the snow to the street or at least it is lower. Not really the way it should work. They should be parking in their garage or garage pad. The street is for company and delivery trucks not to park one of your five vehicles. I am kidding about five but some people have at least three vehicles which makes it difficult. Most times this street is down to one lane and people drive way too fast. Our street is really busy. Anyway, we went for a walk. We got down the sidewalk very carefully to the corner where our friends live across and made sure we checked both directions and in a low spot we crossed to their side of the street. The sidewalks were not too bad. We walked up the street and then I realized that I found the perfect walking place, the crescent. There is a pile of snow from the graders and we walked around the crescent and the pile of snow ten times and then went home. It took us 20-25 minutes so I figured that was perfect. Mr. Alvin was slightly confused as he kept trying to break free of the circle walking and go down the back walkway toward the other park. I was happy and felt like we actually had some exercise and we so enjoyed the warmth of the fresh sunny warm air. One of my friends posted that it was +10 degrees celsius. So today we will do that same walk. We were walking on the street in the crescent but I was able to watch for cars and not as busy as being on our main street. YAY, a safe place to walk. I hit the motherlode.

The forecast is for continued nice warm temperatures and hopefully SUNNY blue skies. I am a bit tired of the grey ones. My body craves the sunshine. My mind needs the sunshine. My soul would very much like the sunshine a bit more often. I can see the sun starting to rise with partially clear skies so we are definitely off to a great start. Happy Monday that be!

I wish you a great day. If it is nice where you are – go outside and take that walk. Whether it is 5, 10 or 30 minutes, fresh air and exercise is magic. Good for your heart, mind and body.

Continuing to live this life with kindness, respect, compassion, patience, love, laughter, understanding, gratitude, focus and possibilities.

Always, Carol & Alvin

I am so grateful to have a cup of homemade perked coffee. Oh, I forgot to mention that one of my dear friends called yesterday morning to see if I was up for a cup of coffee? I had just made 10 cups and was going to have one, what great timing and usually I do not make that many cups so it worked out perfectly. We had a great visit and even had some good laughs. I am so lucky to have such great friends and happy for such a wonderful surprise on a Sunday morning.

The New YEAR 2022

Good Monday Morning ALL! How are you this morning? It is still dark outside so I don’t know if we will see the sunrise or if it will be overcast. I think that it might have been raining overnight. It would appear to be so with the icy covering on parked vehicles that I could see out the front window earlier. The streets will be super icy so if you are driving and in our area, please be careful. Always better to err on the side of caution especially in the winter time. Perhaps you are reading this post from a sunny warmer climate and that is wonderful. Winter in Canada is serious business. Our weather can change in a heartbeat from sunny skies and warm temperatures to blowing snow or freezing rain. We had warm temperatures yesterday although it was overcast a good portion of the day. Unfortunately we were not able to walk. Looking at the ice out there made me cringe and after our short walk to the park on Saturday, I was not really looking forward to doing that again. We did see some friends and neighbours which was good but slipping and having to walk so carefully is not really much fun. So we stayed put.

I did go out and chip away more of the ice and we have an area carved out that the water can run to the drain. That took some doing but certainly has helped with the water/ice problem.

One of my girlfriends was going to Costco yesterday morning so she picked up a couple of things for us. I was so happy that she had time to stop in for a coffee and visit. She only had 1/2 hour as she had to pick up one of her sons from his Rock Climbing Class. I think RC would be so much fun. Can you imagine scaling a small mountain / hill? It was funny that I made extra coffee with the thought that perhaps she may be able to stay for a bit. YAY.

I got through my utilities and sorted that out for tax time. One of the things about having a small business. Keeping records and then finding where you put them, is another. Anyway all ready to go or at least pretty close.

Well almost time to start work, a few minutes away. I always like to get my computer turned on and be settled before the actual start time. Being prepared. I am not a fan of rushing at the last moment.

Mr. Alvin did get some fresh air outside with me on the deck when I was removing some ice from parts of the deck.

I wish you a wonderful Monday.

Continuing to live this life with kindness, respect, compassion, patience, love, laughter, understanding, gratitude, focus and possibilities.

Always, Carol & Alvin