Mary-Jo’s Christmas letter 2018

This year I’m starting this early (for me).  The shopping is done (my mother would be proud), the outside lights are up and cookie making is scheduled but not started yet.  No decorations are up yet inside but the tree is scheduled for when cookie making happens in a week – Travis is coming to help with both.

It hasn’t been the best year for us – in fact I will be glad when it is over.  The good news is that we are relatively healthy – just a few more aches and pains as the years progress.

After dithering about on whether we should move or not for the past couple of years we have decided to stay where we are for the foreseeable future.  We like our house and the neighbourhood and how convenient all the shopping, doctors, dentists etc. are.  We may need more help especially with the outside but luckily we can afford it if it become necessary.  House prices have dropped some in the past year partially due to government legislation (so David keeps saying – see I told you we should have sold) but there really isn’t anywhere we have found that we want to move to.

Adam has had a lot of changes in his life this year.  In the spring he and Dana broke up and after a month or so home with us he reached a separation agreement and bought her share of the house in the trailer park and moved home. He has reestablished contact with Travis and gets to see him most weekends so we don’t get Travis quite as often but he was down last week and we were busy making Christmas presents for his mom and dad.

Anna is still working at the local Metro (supermarket).  She is working now mostly in the floral department and makes lots of arrangements at home for practice.  She isn’t making a lot of arrangements at work and wants to do more.  She did a wonderful job decorating the house for Thanksgiving and is already planning what she will do for Christmas.  She is still devoted to her cat Millie but is having trouble limiting her food – when Millie asks for more she gives in.  One of her Christmas presents is an automatic pet feeder. You program it for how much and when to feed the cat (multiple times a day) and we are hoping that Millie gets used to getting her food that way.

Speaking of pets Clare was quite ill in the spring, spent time at the emergency clinic ($$$) as well as the vets.  She was finally diagnosed with Addison’s disease (people can get it too but it’s not catching).  It’s where the adrenal glands stop working and the electrolytes go weird.  It can kill them but she can live a normal life with pills in the morning and a shot once a month.  Of course the people that produce the medicine she needs once a month had trouble with the product (black stuff in the product) and it took months to restart production. We were lucky that our vet had enough in stock.  I had joined a facebook group dedicated to animals with this disease and you should have read the panic especially in the States.  Luckily a generic drug was available and most animals were able to make the switch with no consequences.  She seems to be doing fine but we do watch carefully as they can have flareups.

My knees have come a long way.  I still have trouble standing for a long period of time.  I know I am still not getting enough exercise (and Anna and David keep reminding me of that) but at least I can get around and do stairs again.

We still get a lot of enjoyment out of the bird feeder that is hung in the tree just past the deck.  We watch the different birds and the antics of the squirrels.  The little red squirrels can get on the bird feeder and eat but the bigger black and gray ones can’t (it’s got a spring mechanism that shuts the holes because of their weight).  I watch the squirrels chase each other through the tree outside my window and the red ones jumping for the bird feeder from the deck.  They launch themselves into the air.  David has taken several pictures of them doing this.  He also spent countless hours this summer trying to catch birds in flight.  He produced quite good results and posts them on the neighbourhood Facebook group as well as here on teampowell.ca

On the wildlife front we have the usual rabbits in the yard but this year a couple of times we have had a fox wander through. We knew there were foxes in the neighbourhood but seldom see them. Unfortunately one time he (she) caught a squirrel and proceeded to kill it right in front of the deck.  I’m very glad he took it away and consumed it elsewhere.  We also have a hawk that visits on occasions – funny we don’t have as many birds to the feeder for a while after his visit.

David has also been busy in the workshop building stuff for the workshop.  He made a lovely router table (shame it’s only for the workshop) and he has produced some videos of his work there.  Whenever Travis comes he wants to go down and help Grandpa in the workshop.

We haven’t done any major projects here this year.  The upstairs still needs painting and the carpets replaced.  The biggest thing we did was replace the outdoor lights – of course David dropped one as he was putting it up – small chip in the coating but luckily the glass insert wasn’t in yet.  I had offered to help but he was sure he could do it by himself – I did get some mileage out of that mistake.  We have also been up a couple of times to help Adam with his place.  David helped him stabilize his deck and crawled under the trailer to check on some heating ducts.  We loaned him a chop saw for a couple of weeks (big square box thing) and shortly after it was returned we had a small snake in the basement.  Only way we can figure it got in was that it was curled up in the mechanics of the saw (Adam stored it in a shed outside) and came in when he returned it.

David’s niece Pamela who battled breast cancer a couple of years ago and seemed to be doing well but had a setback in early summer when she found out the cancer had spread to her bones.  She had been given a year or two to live but unfortunately after a summer and early fall of pain passed away suddenly and unexpectedly in early October.  We were very close and it threw us for quite a loop.  It will take a while to recover from that.

We also had a flood upstairs which has left a lovely mark on the ceiling in the kitchen and a toilet that stopped filling (never had that before).  When David replaced the inner workings then the feed pipe from the wall started leaking and it needed to be replaced.

Then it was the turn of the TV digital receiving and recording unit to stop working, multiple calls to the supplier, replacing one unit only to find that it still didn’t work – of course they don’t still support the units we have had for several years so all the boxes leading to the TV had to be replaced.  We lost all the shows we had recorded and are having to learn a new system as well.

We also had problems with our internet and hosting supplier.  Emails weren’t coming through or being sent and we couldn’t access our website.  Limited or no support from the vendor here as well.  So David researched and found another vendor and he spent about a week and earned several more grey hairs getting us switched to a new supplier and new emails set up.

Last month I also had a short interaction with a pole in an underground parking lot.  Just brushed up against it. Just some paint damage but it appears that one of the pieces that needs painting by the rear wheel well is part of a piece that goes right to the front of the car.  To remove it for painting they have to take the roof rack off which is removed by removing the inside roof of the car.  It sounds like they will basically take apart the whole drivers side of the car – car goes in next week and I will be without it for 2 weeks.

As you can see it has been a year of one thing after another.  I’m surprised the doctor hasn’t had to raise my blood pressure medication!!!  I hate to say it for fear of jinxing us but things seem to have settled down now.

As I said we have a new email location and I have taken the opportunity to set up a new address.  My old one will still work for a while longer but please contact me to get the new one.

That’s about it.  Hope you and all of yours are well.  We will be having multiple Christmas celebrations with Travis coming down a couple of day in advance and then some family here on Christmas day.  Hope you and yours have a good Christmas and all the best in the New Year!!!  I’ve certainly got my fingers crossed for the new year.