If Christmas is a big family gathering that you look forward to each year that is a good thing!
It has been cold this Christmas and it has kept our small family indoors.
The twinkle tour is a yearly outing. It is created at our regional park just out of the city. Lots of hard work to get this up each year.
Christmas is going well. I had to stop and take a selfie just to get grounded. It helps.
My son is an artist. He is building Sonic the hedgehog with paper mache. Checkout his you tube channel named Tommy’s Puppet Lab. He brought his paper mache puppet to craft while visiting us.
The crib games are always on.
I love making pita chips (and eating them). Recipe is:
just pita bread sliced into triangles and put olive oil parsley garlic salt oregano pepper on top bake in oven at 400 degrees Fahrenheit for 7 minutes.
I celebrate the 'day after celebrations'. Mothers Day, Christmas, Valentines are huge impactful guilt felt celebrations. I care about Moms and the sacred Christmas time. Valentines is just sooooo creative and so red and heart shaped and jewellery giving and eating in romantic restaurant celebration. If you are not in love or in a relationship or don't have a friend, or a Mom or family then those celebrations need to celebrate the love to the homeless, to the mental health facilities and poverty in YMCA centres.
I just don't get why I have expectations for this day. Like some amazing prize is going to be delivered to my door and I will open up this prize, because it is in a beautifully wrapped box or a gorgeous basket covered in gold cellophane...I mean my imagination runs wild.
I know I am a Mother and I have had wonderful things done for me and gifts given to me. Does it have to happen every year on a certain date?
Hallmark did a wonderful job getting in on this day. It's bigger than Christmas and I celebrate the day after Christmas too! Those days after 'THE DAY" celebrations are great. Pressure off, it's over, expectations gone. I celebrate the survival because I work mentally hard to process the ridiculous
expectations. I believe in the "work" to get that perception turned into gratitude and simplicity of the
event.
If Mother's Day and Christmas were not celebrated and so globally franchised the day would be sweeter, more subtle, more surprising. I mean family can think of surprising one with a gift or special work done and a baking treat without the hoopla! like that word btw because my mom used to say it all the time. Just go and surprise someone, just because. Keep the originality of anytime is a good time to share gifts.
Let's forget the global nation and everything we now know about around the world horrors, and the more we love, the better we are, I AGREE. Specifying a specific date on a certain type of status or gender and celebrate that symbol of mother, father, dad, mom, grandma....and so on then it gets really complicated and overwhelming. It's the specified date, the actual day that we are INFORMED and flashed everywhere to do something for whom ever you feel pressure to do something for on that specific date.
I left the house this morning after 9 am and drove my car to a place where I could be myself again. Peace and quiet to think and refresh, get a new grasp, and find my soul.
My son (Tom) and I visited Gramma and Grampa on Friday.
They are both turning 90 years old this fall.
Birthday cake day at College Park.
Every Friday from 4 - 5 pm there is dancing with a keyboard player
and Tom and Gramma were rockin' it on the dance floor.
(Gramma has to watch her heart though, because she likes to move and jive!)
one, two, three...
turn and jive!
Gramma was sooooo happy her Grandson danced with her, because Grampa doesn't dance anymore!
Here are....
Tom's budgies/parakeets!
I was attempting to teach them to say "hello" but they have not
spoken that word yet. Actually I think they are scared of me. Tom is their
Master and friend so he can pick them up and talk to them.
A new visitor came home yesterday. His name is Midnight and he is a 3 year old Paint!
Hubby's friend Morley owns this little colt and he is letting Brian do some horsemanship training with him! He is a cutie!
Here is a video of Midnight!
Looking forward to more riding again and to watch Brian
work with this young rascal!
Also had a birthday lunch with my sister Barb and my friend Ilona
at Eastside Marios! My niece Brenda was at this lunch too but I didn't get her in this photo.
I really enjoyed this time we had.
This is the end of my birthday week. (I'm now 63)
I have connected with 3 really good friends this month. Two from
Vancouver Island and this one in Regina. I am very glad we can still
be friends and laugh and share the good and bad times.
Here are all my little videos and photos of our Banff, Alberta ski trip!
Here is the Hot Springs
staying warm while shopping
in Banff
scenery and more mountain scenery...
On the bus to the Sunshine Village gondola.
Brian really enjoys skiing and it was great to see him go and enjoy
himself. When our boys were in elementary school we signed them up
for ski lessons with Prince Albert Ski Club.
While in PA he got his Level I ski instructor certification.
I just had to go up the bunny hill/beginner escalator!
Where was this when I was learning to ski? So easy to
get up the little hill. So many disasters on the old T-bar lifts I had
when I was learning.
lots of little videos below....
Nancy Greenski can still get down the mountain!
(i did a couple months of gym training workouts at Anytime Fitness
in Yorkton before we left for this trip. It really was a bonus for me to have done that)
I always needed a stool mind you, to get up onto his back, and hope
when I am out riding that we don't stop and have to get off
and then get back on; out where there is no stool. I have looked for many
boulders and bumps when this happens so I can leg up and get back on
(LOL)
Motherwell Homestead in-between Yorkton
and Regina.
This was an experience and scary to see these men
get this thresher running. How dangerous it was for
those farmers to operate this. They did get it running too!
My cowboy boots (Ariats) I bought in Bozeman, MT
in 2007 got an overhaul and I bronzed them with bronze spray paint
and painted
a bit of the design. I will keep these forever, and hopefully someone will
throw them in my coffin (morbid but thats what I want)
this Christmas season I realized that
Tom is a genius with puzzles he did this 1000
piece puzzle in 5 days - it is glued together now and we will
frame it! this was such a gift I had no idea it would
be put together that fast and it is a beautiful picture.
Thanks son!
We live 5 miles from a world renowned Strawberry
farm called Prairie Dome Strawberry Farm (look it up it is worth a trip) and they take you for a ride on the big
open ended wagons to your area of picking. Was enjoyable!
My dad gave me this letter that he found in one
of his photo albums as I wrote this to my
Grandma when I was 10 years old while at a summer camp.
(I think I was homesick a bit. I was only away for 7 days)
My husband (Brian) made a new bed frame for our
master bedroom bed. It was a new challenge and he
worked at it diligently. I am staining it here in this picture.
I was impressed!
One of my most dearest moments; Tom and I and Brian went for
a ride through the back hills at our Swift Current acreage during the holidays season in (guessing maybe 2009)
Tom can ride but his interest is not really that developed but he has gone
on a few rides with us. He rode Rocky and I must of been on Ben and Brian on
the colt at the time maybe Leroy.
Good Spirit Lake in April 2016
beautiful white sands and a lovely
clean lake for swimming and it has barely
changed since we used to go as a family
with my mom and dad. We always treasure
this spot and attend it several times in the summer!
Oh my this was so thrilling to see a sea turtle while
we were walking around the rocks at the Big Island in Hawaii
Special moment for me. They are so big!
Riding with the Top Line Trail Riding Club
at Sask. Landing and we were on the very highest ridge
I'm the second in line and Brian is the 2nd last rider.
One of our riders walked quite a ways up the other coulee
hill to get this photo.! (I was a bit nervous but I had Rocky and he
is the best trail riding horse, he is steady and sure)
Parkland Therapeutic Riding Club in Yorkton year end
party; the clients/kids got to paint this white horse
I have never seen that done before and this horse was amazing!
He was tied on each side of his bridle in the middle of the
horse barn so the kids could paint away.
My folks came up to see his exhibit
and that was pretty special for me and Tom having my parents come see his success in the
art genre.!
This was a blast and having our acreage to have a fireworks
celebration was so exciting. We bought the fireworks at Canadian
Tire and set them up down our lane. What a Hoot!
Myan Riveiria in Mexico!
This was the most wonderful
ocean I have ever swam in.
Loved this swim, this ocean....I truly
felt I was in heaven for about 30 minutes.....
will never forget! The universe was aligning up with
me at that time, I know it. I said an amazing prayer to God. It was January
last year and it can be a hard month.... (sigh)
Okay this was so cute, I helped Brian do the chores for our
neighbour back in November and she (our neighbour) had at this time 30 goats or so. We watered and
gave them some feed and I took this video. They are crazy busy and cute and
a bit noisy when excited. Our neighbour loves goats and makes homemade soap bars using
goat milk. This was a unique experience.
Horse back riding in Hawaii on the Big Island!
So loved this it was so beautiful and serene and different
landscape.
This is a cross stitch that hangs in one of our guest bedrooms
My son had his 2 budgies in the room this picture was in and he lets them out
of their cage certain times of the day
He apologized if his birds had destroyed this picture
as their was paper or wood shavings on the floor under it
I looked at the picture and everything was the same
so I said no they must of chewed on something else
Tom flipped the picture over and and we saw they were
chewing on the back of the picture.
I saw this writing and was glad the birds did not
attack it more than they did.
I don't remember seeing
this writing. My mom wrote when her Aunt gave it to her
I guess.
As my folks are getting very senior these treasures of their
past are highly enlightening.
( 1939 before World War II)
Ollie Trembley (Shankowsky) wrote on the back of this framed cross stitch: "Takila Pekamyk brought this tea towel (of hand woven fabric and cross stitched by my Aunt from Poland, western Ukraine) (Lashkow); my father's birthplace. I had this framed after my mother passed away 1959/Sept. Dad passed away Dec 24th/69.
See those dark hair colours around Grace's eye. That is a new marking. She is turning 11 years old and we've never seen that colour around her eyes before. She is a very pretty buckskin and this just adds to her beauty.
Here is my son's art exhibit of his marionette paper mache puppets from assorted cosplay characters that are popular with the youth most likely under age 14. These are
creations; which means he recreates characters from video games that youngsters love to play and watch from the internet world.
His display entailed the puppets hanging from the ceiling and on the wall with a screen
showing his videos.
He has a passion for this and his youtube channel is soaring with 152,000 subscribers.
On this same weekend my son had help from "the parents" (I kept them fed and hubby helped Tom mastermind this project) in constructing a new front fence and gates
and also a very long boardwalk from his front gate to the backyard.
(lots of boards here, plank by plank!)
So what was my creative part in this project of 4 days?
I bought the groceries, prepped and cooked the lunches and suppers a very
integral part.
We are home now and I think I have a poppy seed stuck in my tooth (I had a lemon poppy seed
slice that afternoon- very cool Donna )
Brian chatted up with strangers (he enjoys that!) well it looks like he is
talking to noone here, but he was (poor photo). Brian did get sick during our holiday
which was really unfortunate for him and was down and out for 2 days
(yup that sucks)
I had a warm swim in the ocean and
it was sooooo relaxing!
'
We all wore Tommy's Puppet Lab T-Shirts throughout
our stay and Tom got a few new subscribers..so good on that one!
The Myan Ruins we doth toured and....
I and Tom climbed this old ruin...
made it to the top and took photos like all the other
100 tourists that made it as well (it seemed like 100 up there in that
small area) oh well it is a tourist attraction!
and then we had to come down on our butts and
a rope was available for security lol!
Tom had a Dolphin experience and ...
here he is with a dolphin ..he surfed on the noses of these dolphins and
also held onto the fins and swam with them...he is ecstatic to say the least.
"
We said Ola alot and Gratias and tipped the people working on the tours and in the resort..all the time
just to note: a couple of stops to shop after a tour left me without enough cash
at the small vendors along the way so I did not buy much there.... we still feel we added to the Mexican economy!
The Myan culture is pretty much no longer but we enjoyed the small villagers and Shamans
in the small little farms that are still practicing the Myan lifestyle. Interesting!
