what a day

I got up early to go to Irwin's funeral Mass.  I sat with the Hubels, friends and neighbors.  Rosemary was holding up pretty well.  It was a nice service with nice music.  The one thing I do like about the Catholic Mass is how much music is involved even in prayers.  Being Methodist, we have our hymns and praise music, but we don't sing prayers and I thought that was pretty cool.  I have only attend a couple of Mass services in my life so it is always a surprise for me.  I did tear up a bit which I expected as Irv was a good friend to Mom and I.  I sat with an old friend from High School at the luncheon.  I didn't even know she was there.  Her name was Julie Hoffman Moses, she married a classmate of ours too.  I asked her if she was going to the reunion and she didn't know anything about it so I told her as much as I could.  I gave her my email address so hopefully she will email me and be able to attend the reunion.  I have my ticket.  My friend, Laura, gave it to me as I can't afford the ticket price.  With limited income, I just didn't see how I could afford it now that I am on my own, so I inquired about lower price tickets for people like me and she had an extra ticket so she gave it to me.  I am so thankful for that.  I am looking forward to it.

Anyways, it was really nice to catch up with Julie as I haven't seen her since graduation although we used to live a street away from each other.  I also sat with the Hubels.  They are such a nice and neighborly family.  When I needed someone to stay with the little Mom while I went grocery shopping, their daughter Carolyn came to stay with Mom.  Mom liked her.  Sometimes Carolyn could even get Mom to finish an ensure!  Those were good days for sure.  I sorely miss her so much.  I expected the funeral to be a bit harder, but outside of Julie's parents telling me they were sorry to hear about Mom, I did pretty well.

This afternoon I was thinking about funerals in general.  You know as a Christian, I am supposed to be happy that a person is home with God.  All the scripture says so (the ones they read at both Mom's and Irv's funerals).  We are supposed to rejoice that they have been called home.  Yet, they are the saddest things ever.  How can we rejoice and be sad at the same time.  On one hand, I am so glad Mom is not in any pain and doesn't have Alzheimer's anymore, but on the other hand, I have never been so sad in my life.  This sadness surpasses even when I was a teenager and thought the world was a horrible place.  I am trying to be happy that Mom is in a better place, she is with God and what could be better than that for her?  Nothing, but for me, it is the worst thing that EVER happened to me.  Selfishly, I want Mom with me, despite her Alzheimer's and I know that is not best for her but it would be good for me.  It makes me feel bad because I want her back and I know that she was not doing well at the end, but I still want her back.  Yes, I am aware that it won't happen, but it doesn't mean that I don't want her back.  I know that is selfish, but sometimes I can't help being selfish.  It isn't all the time, just most of it.  How can I settle the selfish part of me to be happy she is with God?  I have no idea.  I just know that I miss her more now than I did when she first passed away.  I think it is because when it first happened, I had family all around me so it wasn't like it was real, then when they went home it became real.  Now I have been alone for about 4 months now and it is so real.  Before, it was like a dream.  If I closed my eyes I could see her and talk to her.  Tillie was here, Maia was here, Richard was here, Cathy was here, and Kathy was here, now it is just me.  I don't mind it so much.  I like living in the house even though I am alone.  I am not as scared as I was when I lost mom, I no longer want to live with Richard out of fear.  I would like to see him more, but he lives so far away from me.  I know I can pay my bills and stuff so I am not as scared as I was.  I do still get nervous by the end of the month if there are any bills left over, like there are a couple this month but they will get paid.

Overall, I think I am doing pretty well, despite being so sad most of the time.  I am enjoying teaching and being with my friends when I am.  Teaching is going well despite the fact the a lot of the students from the new company don't last.  This is a problem I have never had, but I live farther away than I guess the students' and the student's parents realize.  That is okay though, I am doing okay.

I hope this finds you doing well and enjoying the last day of April!  Tomorrow is May Day, one of Mom and I's favorite day.

royal wedding day

Yes, I confess, I am a Royal Family Watcher.  It could be because I am 1/2 British.  My father was from England and both sides of my family go back to England and then Scotland.  We are definitely a Celtic family.  There is also Native Canadian in us from my Great Grandmother's side.  I did NOT get anything from the Native side, Richard did, but I am all Celtic from the pasty, pale white skin to the almost black hair.  I actually don't mind my skin as it does sometimes look nice (usually helps if I have make up on).  I try to stay out of the sun since I burn so very easy.

I wanted to get up early to watch the wedding, but I finally fell asleep around 4 am so I missed it.  I went to get my hair done.  I have decided that I should get it done 2 times a week since I don't like droopy bangs and by today, they were droopy.  I went to the viewing of Irv, my friend, this afternoon.  I talked to Rosemary and to her daughter, Kimberly.  Kimberly used to babysit me when I was young.  She was a great babysitter.  Charlie had his lesson today as well as Acer and Calli.  I have been watching all about the wedding since after the lessons.  I plan to watch the special with Barbara Walters at 9 pm.  The pictures of the wedding are simply beautiful!  I love her dress.  It was so simple, yet so elegant.  I have a few plates, thimbles, and cups that have the Queen and the Queen Mother on them.  Some were Mom's and some are mine.  I do not plan to ever give those up.  Mom was an aide for the Lieutenant Governor of Ontario and a few times she was his aide when the Queen and the Queen Mother were in Toronto.  Those were such special times for me to remember.  I remember mom and I standing where the press were in front of the ropes for the Queen's walk about.  I think I took a whole roll of film myself of the Queen, same when the Queen Mother came to Toronto.  It was just really neat some of the things we were lucky enough to do because of mom's work.

Part of me dreads the funeral tomorrow.  The viewing wasn't as hard as I thought it would be.  I expected it to be harder.  It is so hard when someone you know passes away.  It did bring back some memories and feelings of when Mom passed away but not as much as I thought.  We shall see how I do tomorrow.  I talked to Kimberly today when I was there.  She was doing alright when I spoke to her but I know how that can change in a moment.  I remember that much from the fog of Mom's passing.

Acer and Calli did pretty well for their lessons today.  Acer is so creative that getting him to sit down to play his assigned songs can be a challenge but we got it done.  He is playing a Chinese Song that he learned in school and he figured it out on the piano.  We also played a game today.  He has perfect pitch.  Yup, 6 years old and has perfect pitch.  He got every note I played perfectly right including the sharps and flats.  Amazing young man he is.  Traditional lessons are not really something he and I really do.  We do a mix.  Calli is doing very well too.  She is in level 3 now and starting to play some pretty complicated pieces.  She hasn't decided how many pieces she will sing at the concert.  That is fine as we have 3 weeks until the concert so we have plenty of time to decide.  Acer will sing 2 pieces, 1 with his sister and 1 by himself and his drum.  It should be very cool.  He now has some videos about drums that answers questions about piano and drums.  They are very cute.  He also mentions that he practices drums all the time.  He says it is very important.  I love the videos.  He has 5 of them so far.

I have a bit more of a headache than usual, but I am not surprised with how my day went.  I expect one again tomorrow.  I hope I am wrong, but I doubt it.  Tomorrow will be stressful as funerals often are.  It is just so sad because he was a good man, and it was unexpected.  I fully expected him to recover from the pneumonia he had.  I didn't know about the leukemia.  They couldn't do anything about it because he was too weak to get it so basically, there wasn't anything they could do for him.  The only thing we can do is pray for the family.

Thursday

Well, it is another no lesson day today.  My poor Breanna broke out in hives around 1 am this morning.  She had an allergic reaction to some medicine she has been taking however, she is just not up to a lesson today.  I was supposed to have Christine's lesson tonight, but as I had a feeling, she cancelled her lesson.  She is also stopping lessons for the summer.  What?  I know, it isn't even summer but I had a feeling when she started last month she wouldn't last because of the distance to my house.  It took her longer to get here than she thought.  Her mom commented on that when she first came for the first lesson.

I do have a new student starting from the new company.  However, she is an adult so I am aprehensive as whether or not she will last.  The track record for the other adult students at the new company is zero so it is wait and see mode for me.  She is interested in trying out for community theatre so I am hopeful she will last longer than the one month that they pay in advanced.  I really am hoping that is for sure.  I love working with people who want to audition in community theatre because it is great to have such a good goal and I know of several theatres that are wonderful.  They put on great productions.

I am very, very exhausted again today.  I tried to take a nap but the phone woke me and I couldn't sleep any longer.  I am hopeful that I will sleep okay tonight.  I am getting up early tomorrow to go and see a movie with Lily.  That will be fun.  We are going to see Soul Surfer.  It looks good so I am pleased with her choice.  I am picking her up at 9:30 in the morning.  I think we will stop and get breakfast before the movie as it doesn't start until 10:55.  I have Charlie's lesson at 3 pm and then the regular lessons for Acer and Calli.  I also need to have my hair done sometime in there.  Should that not get done, I will get my hair done on Saturday so that is fine, either way will work with me.  I have decided, though, I will get it done twice a week because once a week my bangs droop and I don't like droopy bangs.  I like fluffy, perky bangs.

I am kind of bored right now because I was planning to have lessons and they aren't happening today.  I look forward to having lessons tomorrow and seeing Breanna next week.  She is such a good student as most of mine are.

I do hope we aren't going to get the bad weather than many others are getting.  Way too much bad weather this spring so far.  We are supposed to get more storms this week and weekend.  Ugh, I am not enjoying this weather so far.  I do hope you and your family are safe from this weather.  The weatherman is on right now, 166 tornados yesterday.  Wow, that is awful.  We had flooding all around us but we have been spared so far.  More storms on Sunday here.

Pain level is okay, nothing to serious here just the usual amount.  It is a missing mom bad day though as I have been alone all day today.  I am very tired and I am hoping to head for bed early as I am getting up early.  I do hope you are having a good day.

midweek

It's Wednesday again!  I had Carson for his lessons.  He just started piano today.  I am pleased with his first piano lesson.  He is doing well with singing.  Amanda had her make up lesson today.  She will have her regularly schedule lesson on Saturday.  She is doing very well.  She started My Heart Will Go On today.  I don't have the accompaniment for it so she will need to get it.  I tried to get it off the Internet but I am just really bad at the technological type stuff.

I just got a call from a good friend/neighbor of mine.  Mom and I's good friend, Irv, died this afternoon.  Oh my, I can't even imagine what his wife is going through.  I know how bad it is.  One of his sons is on the plane on the way here.  He doesn't know that his father died.  I know how heart breaking this is.  When I lost Mom I thought my heart was going to go with her.  This reminds me so much of losing Mom.  It is tough to lose your parent, and for Rosemary, it is tough to lose your husband.  I just can't even imagine.  Barbara Jean will keep me posted with the details.  I don't know if I am strong enough to go to another funeral, but I will because they were dear friends of ours and they came to mom's.

I am extra tired today for some reason.  I don't really know why.  I think the rainy weather earlier made a difference.  I will be heading for bed somewhat early tonight.  Friday I will be going to a movie with Lily.  We are going to the early showing because she is picking up her friend from school to spend the night at her house.  I think her friend is spending the night both Friday and Saturday.  That will be fun for her.  We are going to see Soul Surfer.  It looks very good.  At least this is the plan today unless something happens with the planning for Irv.  Sometimes these things move fast.  We shall see.  I know with Mom we could have had something right away but that was bad for Richard so we waited until the Friday and Saturday.

I had an okay day until the phone call.  Now I am having a sad day.  I feel so sad for Rosemary and her children.  Losing a person you love is so hard.  I hope your day is better than ours.  Please pray for my dear friend, Rosemary and her family.  I will be.

no lessons day

I received a phone call a while ago from Rick, my student.  He is stuck at work and will not be able to have a lesson tonight.  I am bummed about that but what can I do.  He will be gone until May 18 when he will resume his lessons.  Charlie will have his lesson on Friday instead of tonight because of a school event.  I am so thankful he makes up lessons.  He rarely misses a lesson, he prefers to make them up.  What a great student.

I am very tired this afternoon.  I did take a brief nap.  I just couldn't stay awake anymore.  Right after I got up is when Rick called to cancel lessons.  I am just relaxing this afternoon.  I have things I could do, but I just don't feel like it.  I have some pictures to look at this afternoon.  One of the photo albums I rescued in November does indeed have family pictures in it.  Yup, good pictures would have been thrown away.  Not good.  This is why I must be present when stuff is going through.  I just have to.  Too much has been thrown away or donated that should have been kept.  Thankfully, it seems that they have no interest in doing anymore in my house.  I am grateful for that.  I want to know what exactly I have and I will decide what I do or don't want.  I don't need someone to decide for me.  I have had too much decided for me and I need to take control.

It is suppose to rain for the next few days again.  Ugh, that means I won't be able to go the storage unit and get more stuff out.  Maybe in between showers will work.  I guess I will find out depending on the weather.  Right now the weather is just humid and warm but the storms are heading here.  We are under a tornado watch until 10 pm.  Yuck, fortunately, it has been a very long time since we actually had a tornado here.  We did have some damage about 2 miles north of me last year from a really bad storm.  I hope the storms pass us by without any damage.

Pain is a bit more in the arms today then normal.  I don't really know why except the weather is not nice for pain but it is rare that my arms hurt, both of them.  My head is normal, thank goodness.  It is a more than normal missing Mom day.  She is on my mind a lot today.  I just miss her so much all the time and today more than usual.

I do hope you are having a good day.

musings for the day

Easter was a good time (even with the 3 hour little nap).  Unfortunately, I still am having trouble sleeping between the hours of 2 am and 5 am.  If I am asleep before that then that is a good night, but I often wake up around that time and then I can't go back to sleep.  It is fear that is keeping me awake.  We live in a safe neighborhood, we have been lucky enough not to have a break in in many, many years.  I think I was very young the last time and it was neighbor children who were doing.  Every little noise in the house just stabs fear in me between those hours.  I don't know why.  It is just those hours.  I need to fix this and I don't know how.  I am open to suggestions!  I have every door blocked (2 of them have the recycle boxes in front of them mainly for lack of a better place to keep them) the other is blocked only at night.  It isn't like I expect a break in, it is just I have never lived by myself before.  This is really cramping my sleep and I have a hard time sleeping in the first place because of pain.  I have done things to secure the house as best as I can.  I know I am partially deaf, but I can hear enough to know if someone were in the house or not.  If someone spends the night, I sleep pretty well and am not in fear.

Anyways, outside of that major issue, I am doing alright today.  (During the day, I am fine, it is the night that gets me)  I had a good day yesterday.  I got to see Kathy both Saturday and Sunday so that was the best.  I got good hugs from her little ones.  The girls are very good huggers.  Today is just 2 lessons.  I am hoping that by fall I will have more but that is still 4 months away.  I can't wait for May!  Less rain!  More sunshine!!

Gas is getting really high again.  The last time this happened we lost the store.  I do hope I don't lose anymore students like I did back then.  I will be in a big pickle if I lose any students.  I am thankful I don't drive very far.  I do need to get gas tomorrow though as it is less than a 1/4 tank and I don't like it below 1/2 tank.  My trip to Belle River used a 1/4 tank of gas.

We are getting much rain today.  Since I am spending the day inside, I don't mind.  Apparently, it will rain again tomorrow with 50 degree temperatures.  Boy the news is not so good.  I usually only watch the 7 pm one but I was watching Oprah.  I don't always watch that show, but when I remember I like the show.

I have Army Wives info on my facebook.  I love that show (apparently so do some of you!) There will be a new episode next Sunday, thank goodness!  I have to eventually watch the entire season 4 that I have on DVD.  Yes, I have skipped season 4, not because I won't like it, I know I will, I just haven't been able to remember to watch it when i have time.  I also love the shows NCIS!  They are soooooo good too!  That is about the most of the TV shows that I am addicted to.  I do like Dancing with the Stars but if I miss it, it isn't the end of the world.  Plus, I never get to see the results show because it is on at the same time as NCIS.

anyways, it has been a good day.  I just have my Emily for her lesson later this evening.  She is such a cutie!!!  I do hope you are having a good day too!

Happy Easter!!!

I went to Kathy's Parents for the afternoon.  Boy was it fun.  I had gotten her children some Easter treats and the best part, there is none left for me!  Since I didn't want temptation, I am so glad it worked out perfectly that there were no candies left!  I have enough junk food in the house that I don't need anything else.  Her girls were dressed in their Easter dresses that Samantha had picked out for the girls.  She is definitely going to be a fashion girl!  The dresses were really cute.  Samantha did a great job picking them out.  Samantha went and changed shortly after I got there.

Dinner was soooooo good.  I have to say that Mrs. Knight out did herself as usual.  She is a good cook that is all I have to say about it.  I am glad I went.  When I got home I took a little (3 hour) nap.  I have been so tired lately again, more than usual.  I don't know why.  I suppose it could be the new medicine.  I am so thankful that I can sleep in tomorrow!  That might be the problem for the last few days because I have had to be up early for the last 4 days, although, I would get up early everyday for these type events no problem!  Anytime I get to hang out with Kathy, is a great day plus my students, I mean, how cool is that?  Very.

Tomorrow will be a regular day.  I will have 2 lessons for the day.  Bob and Emily.  I told Aggie all about Emily.  She is anxious to meet her and her parents.

Kathy is looking at their schedule to see when they can come and clear out the storage unit.  I am hopeful we can do it in one day since I will be going every few days to organize what I want and what I don't.  There isn't much that I want so that is okay.  There are some boxes for the business I need to keep and a few other boxes, other than that, I want my keyboard that is in there and the rest can go.  I don't want anything else.  I will get a few boxes tomorrow.  There are a couple of boxes of writing books in there too at least I think they are in there.  I will find out tomorrow when I go.  I plan to get about 6 boxes tomorrow and then 6 more each trip until I have what I want out of the unit.

It has been a medium pain day so that is normal.  My head is the normal pain today.  I am just more tired than usual.  There is no Army Wives on tonight either.  I am rather disappointed as I love that show.  I have movies I do need to watch, Narnia, Harry Potter, Tangled.  I watched the Barbie movie of Rapunzel today.  It was really cute.  Samantha and Alicia got it for Easter today.  They are really cute movies.  Even Jake was watching although he would not admit it.  It was pretty funny to watch him watch the movie casually, like he just happened to be in the room and not really watching the movie.  Matthew wasn't even in the room while that movie was playing.  I wasn't surprised on that.  He was down in the basement playing video games or something like that.  After the Barbie movie we started watching Singing in the Rain.  We all love that movie.  The girls, Kathy, her parents, Jake, and I that is.  Matthew does not like that movie so he was not happy to have to be upstairs for a few minutes before we left.  We all left about 3 pm.  I came home and went right to bed, I was so exhausted.

All in all, it was a great day, a really good day.

saturday excitement

I ended up with 2 instead of the 3 lessons, but when I woke up I wasn't even aware of the other lessons so it was a good surprise.  I knew Aggie was coming home for the weekend, I just didn't know she was going to have a lesson until I got up.  We couldn't have it at 2 like she wanted because I wasn't going to be home yet, so we ended up having it at 4.  Now all lessons are done for the day.  Amanda rescheduled hers because she is ill today.  That is just fine, I don't mind the reschedule.  It is better than the cancellation.  Totally better.  I do hope she feels better though because having a cold is a drag.  You feel so horrible the first few days of it.  Ugh, I had two this winter and am hoping I am done with the until next winter.  I had two really bad ones too.  Kayla has decided to sing "When Love Is Kind" with Amanda for the concert.  She isn't sure if she wants to sing another piece or not.  That is fine I told her.  It is completely up to her and what she feels comfortable with.   I am looking forward to the Spring Concert this year.  We will have to have a summer one because the Muglia girls won't be able to be in the concert and neither will Christine because of other commitments and a new baby brother for the Muglia girls.  Having a late Easter really messed me up schedule wise this year.  Oh well, not really that big of a deal.

I have a bit more of a headache now than usual.  I am not sure if it the weather or not.  It's hard to say.  So many are in flares right now so it is really hard to say.  It is a normal missing mom day.  Tomorrow will be a bit harder as it will be the first Easter without her.  These firsts are so hard at times.  I got through Christmas pretty okay and since I will be with Kathy, I know I will get through it.

Charlie did such a nice job at the trimming of the bushes.  He really did.  They look amazing and so much nicer.  I will be having him do them again in a few months to keep them looking just so.  He really did a great job.  We will be returning the trimmer to Bob on Monday.  I am so grateful and thankful that he loaned them to me.

It is so nice outside today that I wasn't even wearing a spring jacket.  Nope, just my sweatshirt and fleece pants.  Kathy and I went to the mall and put the scooter together.  It wouldn't work.  Apparently, there is a wire that is coming apart.  We can see how it is supposed to go together, but we couldn't get it together.  I have the number to call for service.  I hope it doesn't cost too much.  I think that is the problem because the batteries are fully charged so it has to be that wire.  I have to have a scooter that is reliable.  We did see another lady at the mall with a scooter and Kathy wanted to (me too) ask if she put it together herself because it was almost too heavy for Kathy to lift.  It took the two of us to put it together too.  I simply could not do it myself.  That is for sure.  It is 45 pounds for the back end alone plus the front end and the two batteries.  Those batteries are very heavy.  Thank goodness they work well - the batteries I mean.  I think once the wire is fixed it will be okay.  I will find out this week.  Just what I need a broken scooter.  Not cool, not cool at all.  I sat in the courtyard area while Kathy went to the Disney Store.  She came back empty handed because they didn't have the toy she wanted for the girls.  We think they will find them in Disney World when they go in June.  Then the girls can get Pascale, the little chameleon from Tangled.  He is very cute.  It will probably also mean a lot to them to get it there.  I know when I buy stuff from there as opposed to a store it often means a bit more.

Well, other than the head, I am doing all right today.  I can't wait until tomorrow, but I will have too.  I am also exhausted at this point so early to bed I will be going.  I do hope you have a great day and a Happy Easter too!

tired

I am rather tired now.  I got up early to get the trimmer for Charlie.  He finished all the trimming today.  He spent about 5 or so hours all together.  It looks great.  So much better than before.  I can smile as I come up to the front of my house.  I am very excited about it.  I am so happy with what he did.  What a great job is all I can say.  However, because I needed to get the trimmer, I am a bit tired tonight.  I plan to head for bed rather soon.

Tomorrow will be such an awesome day!!!!  I will teach my two lessons, which will be good and then...I get Kathy!!!!  We are heading to the mall too!!!  I have my scooter in the trunk ready to go.  I even know where the key is!  (attached to the car key ring)  Afternoon 1 with Kathy.  It will be so awesome.  We are going to eat first and then to the mall to the Disney store.  I haven't been in the Disney store for about 2 to 3 years as we have gone to Disney world itself, no need to go to the Disney store.  I miss buying mom cute Disney stuff.  I really do.  She would just get so excited about it too.  When we were in Disney in 2008, I couldn't find any, I mean any, of her t-shirts that I had bought her the year before to bring with us.  Basically, I packed her some jeans and 2 t-shirts with all the necessary under clothes.  When we got to Disney world I needed to buy her a new t-shirt everyday we were there because she didn't have clean clothes.  She was so cute about it to.  I did bring her hoodie jackets with us, but she didn't really need them too much until we went inside.  It rained a lot though while we were there.  Everyday, sometimes, all day.  Yeah, June in Florida is not pleasant with the rain.  We wore our ponchos all the time.  We did have a good time.  Had I known that it would be Mom's last trip ever and my last trip for a really long time, I would have had us stay a few days longer.  I really would have but I couldn't see the future.  If I could I would have run and hid because in August 2008 the bank came and took the store, all of it.  They even sold the fixtures.  Yeah, we lost everything so I think I would have hid from the future.  I gave the Muglia girls some of her hoodies that she barely wore, if ever.  I did give them the Disney ones too but I did tell them she wore some of them.  They didn't care.  They were clean, that is all that matters.  I also wish I took more pictures of her while we were in Disney too.  Here are a couple of the pictures we did take.

As you can see, we had a great time with our character meals.  It was definitely the best way to eat meals.  Mom and I loved Disney World.  It will be hard to go again without the little lady.

I do hope you are feeling well today and looking forward to have a great Easter.

thursday

I had Breanna's lesson earlier today.  She is doing very well.  She is almost ready to start learning a new hand position in piano.  She is slowly learning how to read the notes faster, which is simply wonderful.  She picked her 2nd voice solo for the spring concert.  She will sing "The Sound of Music".  I adore that song.  I love it so much.  I love the movie too.  Before Christmas I had the TV on and a movie started showing the Alps in Austria and I thought, wow, that looks like the Sound of Music, well, I was right!  So I just stayed where I was and watched the entire for the I don't know how many times.  The first time I saw it I watched it with Momma.  She bought the record for me too so I could learn all the songs (much to my brothers dismay!).  Momma and I would play that record over and over again.  When the VHS came out and we had a video player, Mom bought the movie.  Then on her 70th birthday, we got it on DVD.  I still have it.  I love watching it on TV, especially without commercials.

tomorrow I am going to cook the last of the corned beef.  I have a whole brisket to cook in the crock pot.  I just love corned beef.  I often get it for lunch meat at the store when grocery shopping.  It is soooooo yummy.  I bought 2 of them before St. Patrick's Day.  It was the first time I had seen any at the grocery store this year.  I wish they sold it all year round, but I can deal with it just during March and April.  I am going to put red potatoes in too.  I have some left.  Yum!  It will be a good dinner for the next few days.  I will split it up and then I will freeze the other portions.

I don't have anything but potential housework for the rest of the evening.  I don't have anymore lessons for the day.  I did go to the used bookstore for a few more books.  I do hope they are good.  They sound very good.  I brought some books back to them too that I didn't want to keep.  The problem is that I usually want to keep the books I purchase so it is hard to have trades but right now I have 5 more trades so that is good.  I can't wait until all the books are in the family room in the library part of the family room.  It will be awesome!  Now that tax season is over, I can speak with Julie and we can plan when we are going to do this.  I don't know why some of the books were even taking off the other book shelf, but they were.  I am keeping all those books and I said so at the time they were taking off the shelf.  I said I was keeping them and to leave them there, but they were moved anyway.  Now they will go back where they belong.  I have a lot of history books and biographies too as well as novels.  One year, I gave up reading novels for Lent.  Now I am not Catholic (I am Methodist), but it seemed like a good idea.  Mom was the only one who thought I would be able to do it because I read all the time.  My brothers both thought I wouldn't be able to do it.  Let me tell you, that was the hardest Lent Season ever!  I did, however, survive and that was when I discovered the history books and the biographies so it turned out to be a good idea.  On Easter Sunday, I told the family to leave me be I was going to read all day!  I think I did read most of the day too.  Even though at the time I did most of the cooking, Mom always did the cooking on the holidays.  She was an excellent holiday cook.  When it came to turkeys or anything special like that, it was awesome!  I did learn a bit about holiday cooking from her, but I am thankful that Mrs. Knight will be doing the cooking!  I am thankful for that.  I am bringing Easter treats for the children.  I am excited about doing that.

I have regular pain level today so I am glad.  I do hope this finds you well too!!!

oh my!

I got a call from my brother yesterday.  We have a new issue to deal with and we both need prayers about it.  I can't go into details about here, needless to say, it is frightening for (I think) both of us, I know it is for me.  So please, pray for us.

Other than the newest upset, it has been an okay day.  I didn't wake up at 5:30 like yesterday, thank goodness!  I woke at my regular time, noon or so.  I had the regular type sleep, up and down with pain every few hours, but overall, a lot better than yesterday.

My young man, Carson, wants to add piano to his lessons.  I am excited about that.  He is 8, which it is a great age to learn.  I called his grandmother to let her know I would pick up the music and she was shocked, she didn't know that he asked for piano lessons too.  He is such a cutie.  He sings very nicely.  We started one new song today, Peace of the River.  I actually had 2 songs for him to start, but the printer was being a horrible printer today so it didn't go well.  I had shut down the computer so it didn't print until after his lesson.  Oh well, I have it for next week.  I can't find the book that I got the songs out of last week anywhere.  I am wondering if I put it in Calli's bag.  She has the other copy of the book and I am wondering if I accidentally put them both in her bag.  It is just not anywhere in the dining room or the living room.  No more lessons tonight.  I only have Carson.  Tomorrow I have Breanna and that is it too.  It is a bummer only having 1 or 2 lessons a day, but I am very THANKFUL for the few that I have.  It is starting to get better.  I am hoping summer lessons stay the same as they are right now.  The new ones are the question marks.  Bob, Charlie, Katie all have lessons all year round so I am hopeful that all my students only take off lessons for vacations.  We shall see.  I also do hope to go and see Richard this summer, all depends on what happens now for us.

I can't wait to see Kathy this weekend.  I get to see her on Saturday and Sunday.  I mean, that is just awesome!  I don't get to see her very often since we live so far apart from each other but I will see her twice this weekend!!!  Yeah!!!

I got the movie Tangled for my birthday from my aunt and uncle.  I was very happy about that.  I plan to watch it this weekend.  I also now have the movies, harry potter part 1 and Narnia.  I couldn't resist.  They were on sale.  I am doing pretty well with this thrifty thing.  I plan to do better.  I write down everything I spend so I have been keeping better track of it.  I discovered that I spend a lot on going out to eat for brunch at Tim Horton's and other places so I have bought brunch food and am trying to keep the cost down as I can't really afford to keep doing that.  I am excited to be closing the storage unit too, as this will allow the money to go to other bills that need to be paid.  I also am saving for a nook.  I really like them and am chomping at the bit to get one.  I put a few dollars away each month to save for it.  I figure between now and Christmas, I will have enough money to get one.  I am getting much better at saving money.  I hope to be an expert like my mother was.  She was the best at this.  If there was something she wanted, she simply saved up the money to pay cash.  I, not being of a patient nature, would charge it first and pay later.  Well, this cash only life that I lead is actually good for teaching patience.  I am, however, getting bombarded with requests to get a new credit card.  Yes, I am totally staying away from that.  It is just not a good idea to get a new one, plus with the bankruptcy not dissolved yet, I don't want a new one at this point in my life.  I will possibly look into to it in months to come as things (hopefully) improve.

I have medium pain today and the headache is its normal pain level.  Sometimes it is really annoying to have a headache everyday that nothing can be done for.  Doctors just can't do anything about the chronic headache, or at least the neurologists that I have seen have told me.  They can do something about it when it gets bad, but that only puts it back to normal pain level.  The rest of the pain is normal too.  The Melixicam (spelling??) seems to be working as well as the Celebrex did so that is good.  My hips feel so much better than before I tried Celebrex.

I do hope this finds you doing well too.

a different Tuesday

I woke up the first time at 3:30 with a thirst for milk.  I don't know why, but I wanted a glass of milk so I got up and went downstairs for my glass of milk, well, actually, 2 glasses of milk.  I was very thirsty.  Then I went back to bed.  I woke up again at 5:30 am.  I was wide awake.  I have no idea why.  I was also a bit cold.  I went downstairs and got something to drink and turned on the computer.  I had to post that I was awake at that time on facebook since it is such a rarity for me to be up that early.  I went back to bed about an hour later and got up again around noonish.  I was really dozing, rather than sleeping well from that point on.  My bottom sheet and blankets are all twisted on my bed.  I have to practically remake me entire bed so that I can get to sleep.  I do hope I sleep better tonight.  I am not up for another sleepless night.

It has been an okay day, great day for the lessons I had.  Charlie and Rick are both doing well.  Both were slightly late today for some reason.  Oh well, they still had their full lessons.  It actually worked out well that Rick was a bit late because of traffic since Charlie was a bit late.  Charlie is working mostly on what he is going to play for the spring concert.  Rick will not be in the spring concert as he will be out of town until very late the night before the concert.

I plan to watch NCIS tonight, both shows.  I love them so much.  I miss watching them with Mom but at the end she couldn't watch them since she thought they were real.  I think I have seen every episode this season.  I have the first 6 seasons on DVD.  I didn't get the DVDs of season 7 because I have seen most of them and I really can't afford them plus the USA channel plays reruns all the time so I can get my NCIS whenever I want.  I won't be getting season 8 either.  I will be loaning the first couple of seasons to Kathy for her son Matthew because he has become interested in the show now that he is 12 almost 13.  He likes the show so I am going to loan him so old seasons to see if he likes it.

I did have a bit of a bad headache earlier today, but now it is back to the normal headache.  I do hope this finds you doing well and having a good day.

A Lovely Monday

I was so exhausted this morning that I stayed in bed and dozed for a while.  When I finally got up, I was a bit dizzy but that passed.  It happens a lot and I know it is just a side effect of the medicines that I take.  I went down and had some brunch and took my daytime medicines.  Today is the first day for the substitute for Celebrex.  I am hopeful it will work out well.  So far, it is doing alright.  It is a bit of a chilly day so it is definitely a good day to try it.  I have been a bit chilled all day.

Bob had his regular lesson this afternoon.  He is doing very well.  He, again, took my trash bins to the road for me.  He is so nice.  He is also going to check to see if he has a trimmer for the bushes since both of mine are broken.  This will help Charlie a lot this coming weekend.  I will find out later this week.  I would return it next Monday after Charlie uses it on the weekend.  Charlie is coming again Saturday to do the shrubs.

After Bob's lesson I went to Walmart for some milk and bread.  I went to make a sandwich and realized I didn't have any bread.  I picked up a few things and the came back home.  Nothing to exciting, some Easter treat bags for the Heyart children.  I am making some Easter treats for the kids for Sunday.  I am so thankful I am going to Kathy's parents house for the holiday.  I am thankful to be included in their holiday dinner.  I think I have enough candy for the kids.

Emily had her 3rd lesson this evening.  She is such a doll.  She is so cute and is playing very well.  Next week she starts reading music!  That will be exciting for her.  Her eyes were wide with excitement when I told her that we would be learning lines and spaces next week.  Because of this we added the Treble Clef Sign and the Bass Clef Sign flashcards to the flashcard pile.

Not much happening this evening.  I am going to watch Dancing With The Stars in a bit when it comes on and then head for bed.  Tomorrow is 2 more lessons so that is wonderful.  They don't really start until 5:30 though, so I have the afternoon to get some housework done.

I am so glad that tax season is almost over because that means soon we will be starting on the Family room.  My sewing corner will be a reality.  I am excited about that.  The library will be there too.  I am bringing the bookshelf that is in the living room back down in the family room.  I will move the shelf that is in the dining room back into the living room and that is where the kids toys will be.  I need the bookshelf back downstairs because I have books that need to go on it.  I love reading and I love books so I have plenty.  I don't plan to get rid of any of my books that are in the family room.  I will also put the writing books back on the shelves too.  They are in the storage unit right now so they need to come back.  Next month the storage unit will be closed.  I am anxious to be done with that.  There are about 4 to 6 business boxes that I have to keep and I will put those in the garage.  I am not going to get a different storage unit because they are very expensive and rather unnecessary since I have a garage.  I will also be figuring out a way to sell the fibro cook books that I have in the garage.  Andrew and I wrote them in 2005.  Some of the front info (not the recipes) are outdated because of new testing and studies.  I have about 800 of them left.  Yeah, that is a lot.  I do hope to sell some, if not all of them some day.

One the TV is all about Prince William and Catherine's wedding.  I remember being so fascinated with Princess Diana.  I got up super early to watch the wedding.  I also got up super early to watch Prince Andrew and Sarah's wedding too.  I am not sure if I will get up at 5:30 am to watch the wedding.  I imagine it will be played over and over all day long.  We shall see if I am awake enough for the wedding in 11 days.  (The TV told me that.  I had no idea)

I am going to watch Dancing with the Stars now then off to bed.  I am a bit tired now.  I have been very tired since Saturday.  I think the stress of the day made me very exhausted.  I do have a bit of a bad headache again today.  I do hope it is a good day for you and less pain!

so tired today

I am so tired today.  I don't know if it is because of the long day yesterday or the stress of yesterday, but I am exhausted today.  There were so many desserts yesterday that I ended up bringing home almost the entire yellow cake.  The chocolate one was the shape by I don't care for chocolate cake so I left it.  I really shouldn't have made them, it was a waste of my time and my money.  I wasn't very happy about that but next time, I will not make anything.

I also got called a goody two shoes yesterday which did not make me feel very good.  I was actually really mad with the tone of the voice that was used to call me that.  So now, I am a spoiled brat and a goody two shoes according to Tillie.  I don't find that funny nor do I think it is true.  They were not said in a complementary tone either.  Andrew agreed with the good two shoes comment.  Yeah, what a way to make a cousin feel good.  I did not feel very welcome, I actually almost left because that was so mean.  I don't go places and insult people but I guess I am fair game.  I almost got in an argument with a cousin because she said if she could she would come and take my Japanese maple out of my yard and put it in hers, I said no you wouldn't, she said yes she would.  Well, really?  It is my plant in my house and my brother Richard planted it for my mother.  I was like, oh my, just go to someone's house and steal a plant.  Fortunately, she has emphatically said she is not coming back to my house, so I am hoping I am safe.  Apparently, when she was cleaning out Mom's room (they were supposed to only sort, not get rid of - yeah, many tears over that one) she became ill.  She pretty much said my house is full of mold and something like that.  I pointed out that there is no mold in my house.  I know there isn't, I had it checked and we are all clean from mold.  My mom waterproofed the family room 10 years ago and it is still going strong so no dampness and no mold.

I am not sure why it is okay for people to hurt my feelings when I get reminded not to hurt other peoples feelings (I do NOT go around insulting and hurting people's feelings either).  I guess I just don't matter to certain members of the family.  If I have to worry about their feelings, they should worry about mine.  I am glad I will not be seeing them for Easter, I am going to Kathy's parents house with Kathy.  It was nice to see my Uncle and his wife and a couple of cousins I haven't seen in a really long time, but the insults from 1 cousin and 1 brother were rather mean and I didn't need that.  I don't know if I will go to too many family functions for a while.  It will depend on who is there.  I do like seeing the ones who are nice to me, but I can do without the argument and the insults.  I am not a spoiled brat nor am I goody two shoes.  Do I like to do what is right?  Well, yes, but you don't need to insult me because I am not a rule breaker or a law breaker.  I didn't find it funny at all.

I am heading back to bed again soon because I am so tired today.  I hope tomorrow is a better day.

Party Day

Today was my and my cousin, Darrin's birthday party.  It was fun.  I still have trouble at family functions because Mom isn't with me.  I miss her even more when we are all together because she should be with us. She was the matriarch, now Tillie is.  Wilbert was there.  He doesn't look like he is really doing too well.  He sat at the kitchen table most of the time.  He did come into the living room for a bit right before he left.  Tillie left before he did because, I guess, they have trouble getting him out the door when she is there so this is the best way to do it.  Andrew was there too along with many cousins.  My cousin, Kenny, his wife, Vicki, and their son, Kyle were there too.  I haven't seen Kyle since he was a little boy.  Kyle and I are now facebook friends.  He is very interested in the family tree.  Tillie and Wilbert have done a lot of work on the McAgy family tree.  Mom was interested too, I was at one time, but right now, I am just not into anything.  Maybe in the future I will be.  Kyle did comment that when he got home he was going to have to draw a family tree to see where everyone belongs.  I can imagine that it would be confusing.  It is difficult when you are meeting one side of the family you have never seen before.  I know them all, so it isn't an issue to me.  My Uncle John, his wife, Michelle, and their son, Jayson were there too.  They just got back from Jamaica last week.  Michelle's niece was getting married there.  They had a great time.

Kayla and Amanda had their lessons this morning before I went to the party.  Both are getting ready for the Spring Concert.  Kayla has decided she is only singing one song.  I said that was perfectly okay.  Amanda is singing one with Katie and then she is singing one by herself.  Kayla is singing one with Amanda.  All in all, I think it will go well.

I have a bit more of a headache today.  I got it at the party near the end.  I left before most everyone did since I had a long drive to go.  It was 1 3/4 hours away and about 1/4 tank of gas.  I do hope that my head goes back to its normal headache.  Somedays I don't even notice the normal headache all day, but tonight's is pretty bad.  I am also very tired.  Driving by myself so far makes me exhausted.  I do hope to see my Uncle again soon.  I also got to spend a lot of time with my brother Andrew.  I forgot to bring the gift I found that Momma had bought in 2006 at Disney World for him.  He laughed when I told him about it.  I was so happy to find the music box that she bought me when we were in Disney.  It was in her Disney box that they saved of her stuff for me.  Momma must have bought it when we were there years ago and forgot about it.  She would buy Christmas gifts all year long and then put them away until Christmas.  Andrew wants me to get rid of all our stuff and move to London with him.  I did tell him that I do not want to move and I like our house.  He said he doesn't like our house and he doesn't miss it at all.  I guess that is good, it means he likes London, Ont., which is where he lives.  He and Angie live together now.  I am glad to see they are together.  It seemed like that just wasn't going to happen.  I was teasing Andrew about having children, and apparently, Angie wants some so oh, okay, maybe I will be an aunt again someday.  If not, that is okay.

I am very tired now.  I am definitely heading to bed early.  Charlie is supposed to be coming tomorrow to trim the bushes.  Addison was here to clean out under the bushes.  He had to earn some volunteer hours for church so he asked if he could do something with my yard.  Hey, I was all for it.  He is also going to cut the grass this summer for me again.  Thank goodness.  I would not be able to do it.  I just can't walk that well to do it.  I am thankful that Charlie is going to trim the trees in the yard, he is doing the front and the back.  The side bushes are okay, they don't need to be trimmed, I don't think.  Between the two young men, our yard will be rocking.

I do hope you had a great day too.  It was a good day despite missing Momma at the party.  I just miss her so much ALL the time.  I don't expect it to get better.

Friday thoughts

I am so glad it is Friday again.  The week flew by, which is good for me.  I had Katie's lesson earlier this afternoon.  It was so hard to get up this morning because I think I was awake most of the night.  I don't like it when it is like that.  I don't know why I was awake most of the night, but i am so tired now.  I foresee an early night since I have to be up at 10:30 am tomorrow for lessons.  After lessons, I will head over to Windsor to pick up Lia and Esther since they need a ride.  Since Andrew is not graduation tomorrow (it is in May), then I won't have to worry about leaving early enough to get a good sleep so that is good.  That was my big concern.  Now I just have to get the info from Andrew about the graduation.

I am making the cakes tonight for the party.  I am excited about seeing so many of my cousins.  I haven't seen them in a really long time.  The last time I saw them was at Mom's burial in Chatham and I must say, I was not doing to well then so I didn't enjoy the visit because I was so sad.  I am still sad a lot, but sometimes it isn't so bad.

I have discovered I really like going to the hair salon to get my hair washed.  It feels so nice and pretty.  I have been wearing it up for so long, I forgot how dark my hair is.  The scalp is doing better too.  It was really difficult for me to wash my hair with one arm since the other arm doesn't work to well.  The bursitis doesn't let me lift the arm up too much so that was pretty hard for me to do.  I go to the salon on Tuesdays and Fridays to get my hair washed.  I also like it when other people do my hair.  It usually turns out better than when I do it.  It has always been that way for me.

It is a regular missing Mom day.  A few nights ago it was a horrible missing Mom night, but so far today, it is just regular.  I have to go and find the cord for the trimmer.  I just remembered that.  Charlie may or may not be coming tomorrow to do the bushes.  It is supposed to rain tomorrow so I am not thinking he is coming tomorrow.  Maybe Sunday, if it doesn't rain too much then.  This whole weekend is supposed to rain.  Next weekend is supposed to be better though, so I am looking forward to that.

I picked up some Easter candy for the Heyart kids for Easter from me.  They didn't have cute little bags though so I will have to use zip locks.  I will get the candy in order for next Sunday.  I can't believe how late Easter is this year.  It is amazing how late it is.  I am glad I am going to the Knights' for Easter.  I mean, Kathy 2 days in a row?  What could go wrong?  Nothing!!!

Well, I think I am off to make some cakes!

somewhat productive day

I moved 8 boxes out of the storage unit into the garage today.  I was very happy about this.  I am now exhausted from doing it, but happy at the same time.  I sorted through some boxes and placed some away from the others that I am keeping.  There are sooooooo many that I am not keeping.  Lots of reference books are going.  They are old and out dated and I don't want them.  I do not have the room for them, nor do I want to make room for them.  I am just thankful I got 8 of them out.  I plan to get some more next week since this weekend is supposed to rain all weekend.  Yuck, but hey, it is April and you know what they say?  April showers bring May flowers and i do love the flowers.

I talked to Kathy for about 45 minutes this afternoon when I got back.  She is working on the Easter basket planning today.  It looks like I will be at her parents' house for Easter dinner.  Hey, works for me, I get Kathy 2 days in a row.  Since I have no Easter plans, this will work beautifully.  I do plan to get the kids a bit of chocolate for Easter.  I will get it this weekend before they are all gone.  Nothing huge, just a little something for them.  I also have to get some eggs and oil for the cakes I am making tomorrow afternoon for Saturday's party.  Saturday we are celebrating my birthday and my cousin, Darrin's birthday too.  It shall be fun.  It will be at Darrin's house.  He is a very nice cousin, well, most of them are.  He has a daughter named Ocean Dawn who is just delightful.  She is a growing so fast.  I think she is 10 or 11 now, I am not sure which.  I will have one cake say Happy Birthday Heather and the other Happy Birthday Darrin.  That way we are both covered.  I am checking tonight to make sure that it is only us, if there is another birthday, I will add the name to one of the cakes.  I did find out Hayley won't be at the party.  I am a bit disappointed, but she has something that came up so she can't make it.  Audrey isn't sure either because it depends on her exam for the day.  I do know my cousin, Kenny and his wife, Vicki, will be there.  I am very excited about that.  I look forward to seeing all my cousins there, there are just too many to name here.  I have a lot of cousins.  My uncle John will be there too with his family. My younger brother will be there too so that is good.  He is officially finished with his college work now.  He is looking for a job.  He is an outreach worker in London, Ontario.  I think he will be great at it.  I do hope he gets a job soon.  He officially graduates in late May from what he said today.  I plan to be there and am hoping our older brother will be there too.  We both miss him a lot.  I haven't seen him since Mom's funeral and Andrew hasn't seen him for 6 years.  I at least get to talk to the big brother every so often, whereas I don't know if Andrew does or not.  I forget to ask him and he doesn't mention it.  I hope he does.  It is good to be in contact with brothers.

I think I am going to lay down for a bit.  I am so tired from bringing in those boxes.  Hard to believe 8 boxes exhaust me, but they did.  Next time I will only bring 4 home at a time.  There aren't that many left that I can lift anyway so I am almost done picking them up and bringing them home.

I do hope your day is going well.  Mine is despite the extra exhaustion and the disappointment of not having Christine's lesson tonight.  Her mom is ill so we will make up the lesson as soon as her mom calls me.  Christine is a very talented young girl who will go far with piano.

hump day

Happy Wednesday!  It is hard to believe that it is Wednesday, but yes, it is.  I am looking forward to the rest of the week because I have 1 student today, 2 tomorrow, 3 on Friday, and 2 on Saturday along with the family birthday party.  I am excited about that.  I did also find out, Andrew is NOT graduating Sunday, it is in MAY.  Well, that just ruins my plans for a surprise this weekend with having Richard come out.  Bummer, is all I have to say about that.  I will just plan it for next month.  I do hope it is not on the same day as the Spring Concert.  Andrew is not very forth coming on details for this event.  I doubt he even knows when it is.  I do hope he tells me soon so that I can have Richard in on the details and then surprise Andrew.  I know I would love to have my big brother at my graduation, oh wait, I did.  As a matter of fact, Richard and I had the same commencement day for our MBAs.  It was grand to have him to myself for the first part of the day.  I was disappointed that he didn't come to my party, but I had lots of other people come and students too so that was good.

It is a quiet afternoon right now.  Carson will be here in 30 minutes.  What a cutie he is.  He has a very nice voice too.  I do hope he practiced well this week and had no trouble.  He has only had 1 lesson so far.  He did very nicely though for his first lesson.

Rick DID have his lesson last night.  I was worried because he was gone for a month, but he arrived and had a great lesson.  Next week I think we are going to do some sight reading with do-re-mi syllables.  I have to dig the book out for all my vocal students.  They all need to learn this.  Ear Training can be either super easy or really hard, not usually an in between thing for students.  I found the sight singing rather easy but the dictation difficult.  We won't be doing any dictation.

I haven't put my new printer together yet.  I keep meaning too, but then I forget or I get busy, mostly I forget, stupid fibro fog!  I am thankful that while I have fibro fog a lot, I am able to focus on lessons.  I don't know how I would do if I had more a day, but I used to be able to teach 6 to 8 lessons a day and now I am lucky if I get 4 in one day.  I am praying for 5 more students that have lessons weekly.  I find I am sleeping a bit better and don't freak over finances as much now that I have a couple more regular students.  I am almost paying all the bills.  I still have medical bills to pay and I hope to get them on track this next week or so.  I just need 5 more and all the bills will be covered nicely.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part 1 comes out on Friday.  Unfortunately, I will not be getting it on Friday.  I will have to wait until next month or so.  Same with the new Narnia movie.  I just don't have enough money this month for them.  Oh well, maybe next month.  It isn't like I am lacking in anything to watch, I have several I haven't seen yet.  I still haven't watched some of the ones Mom and I watched together.  I just haven't been able to do it.  I had to tell the young lady at the pharmacy that Mom passed away.  She was shocked.  She had thought that I just left Mom at home all this time.  She was totally stunned because she had seen Mom quite a bit with me.  It made me tear up on the way home.  I just miss her so much.  I wonder how my friends who are in the same club as me did it.  How do you go and move on without your mom?  Especially if you were as close as we were?  I often wonder and want to ask them, how do you do this?  How do you get out of bed and want to face the day?  If it wasn't for teaching, I doubt I would ever get up.  I think I would just lie there and fade away.  Teaching is the only thing that gets me up.  Without it, I don't know what I would do.  How do you get up and motivate yourself when you are so sad?  i miss her so much all the time.  I just don't know.

It is pretty nice and sunny out today.  I do hope you are having good weather too.

Tuesday 4-12

I am watching the news and there is a designer who makes dresses out of garbage and recycle materials.  Somehow, I can't see me wearing a paper dress or a plastic bag dress.  That just looks and sounds weird.  The dresses aren't really practical either, but hey, it gives him something to do so okay.

It has been a nice and sunny day today!  Unfortunately, it will rain by the weekend.  Charlie is going to come this weekend or next to do the bushes for me.  He is going to trim and shape them all.  I am very happy about this because it so needs to be done.  Our backyard will look a bit better, but since the gardens are not weeded during the summer, it won't look super good.  Hey, I am least getting the bushes and shrubs  shaped and taken care of.  As long as the grass is cut all summer that is all that matters.  I am not worried about a great looking yard, just a better looking one like we have had these last few summers.

I haven't heard from Andrew so I don't know the details of his graduation on Sunday.  it is kind of annoying as I am trying to coordinate a surprise from him.  I do hope to hear the details tomorrow.  I messaged him this afternoon so I am hopeful he got it.  I need to know these details, like where and what time.  I need an address so I can get directions for it.  It is a 2 hour drive for me to get there.  We have the family party on Saturday and then graduation on Sunday.  I am not sure what I am doing for Easter.  At this point, I have no plans.  Kathy is coming to town so I plan to see her on the Saturday.  I still have some gift certificates from Christmas so we will be using them.  I love both restaurants that we have them for.  We shall see where we go.

I am setting up the new printer tonight.  I have to scan a paper and send it out tomorrow.  I have had the printer since last Thursday, but I have not pulled it out yet.  I am excited about scanning pictures of the family with it since I found a few more pictures out of an album I have never seen before.  It has pictures of me and my family when I was about 7 or 8 years old.  I even have a birthday crown in one of them.

I am doing laundry tonight.  As usual, I waited to the last minute to get it done.  Someday, I will do some laundry before it is super necessary, but I am not holding my breath about it.  I have a pile of clean clothes on the dryer that need to be put away.  If I have a guest this weekend, I will for sure be putting them away.  i also have started putting some stuff away in the living room.  I can't believe tomorrow is Wednesday already.  I have to move the box that has the disposables in it and move it to the garbage.  Since all the packages are open, I can't donate them anywhere.  Bummer, but nothing I can do about that.  I also have to move the Christmas boxes downstairs along with the Christmas tree.  The living room just needs to be picked up a bit and the CDs put away.  I have a pile of originals that need to go upstairs to my room where the originals are.  I am not sure what originals need copies made of them though.  I am going to check that sometime this week.  There is some music that needs to be put away too but I will do that after next week.  I have a student or students everyday but Sunday this week.  I have Carson's lesson tomorrow.  He is such a cutie.  Charlie and Rick had their lessons tonight.  Both are doing pretty well.  Rick was absent for the last 4 weeks.  He was on vacation to Hawaii and Las Vegas.  He seemed to have a good time from what he said.  I liked Hawaii when I was there 7 years ago.  I went for a writing conference.  I went snorkeling in the volcano and up the road to Hana.  It was lovely.  I had a very good time.  I think the best conference that I went on was the one to Mexico on the cruise ship.  Mom came with me on that one and it was so much fun.  We had such a good time.  Mom and I giggled a lot during that trip.  I have been lucky, I have traveled some before I got too sick.  Now, I am not so interested in traveling a lot right now.  Maybe as I get more students I will be interested, but right now I am happy to stay here at home or go see my brothers.  That is the only place I want to go to.  Visiting my brother is all.  He has the lovely attachments, William (10) and Abigail (11 almost 12).  So hard to believe they are that old now.  Where has the time gone?

I am planning to watch NCIS and NCIS Los Angeles then off to bed.  It has been a good day so far.  I did some laundry, I taught a few lessons, I read some of my book, I cleaned up a bit in the living room, so now I am a bit tired and ready for bed soon.  I do hope this finds you doing well.

spring!

We have decent weather today.  I don't remember if it supposed to rain or not but being this is April and not May, I would say chances are very good for rain.  I put out the trash bins for tomorrow, well, Bob actually took the trash bins out for me.  They were really heavy today as they were very full.  I will have empty bins again after tomorrow.

Bob was struggling a bit through his lesson today.  For some reason his fingers just wouldn't behave for him.  This is very, very rare for him.  I teased him a bit by saying his fingers want to go to the garden and work not play the piano.  After going through the songs and parts of the songs again, he was back on track.  He will be ready for the spring concert in May.  He will be playing Volare and a Bach Invention.  His Mozart Sonata will not be ready as we are only on page 3 but that is okay, these pieces take a long time to learn as they are long.  I love this sonata that he is learning, simply love it.  It is one of my absolute favorites of all time.  Mom loved it too.  When Frank played it last year or so, Mom was so cute, she would bob her head in time.  You could see she was singing the song in her head.  I so miss her listening to all the lessons.

I have Emily tonight for her 2nd lesson.  What a cutie.  She is missing her front tooth and you can see it trying to come in.  She is 7.  She is very excited to learn.  I love students that are very excited to learn.  It makes my job super fun and you can really get the student excited.  With a student at that age, I don't use the word practice, I just tell her or him, to play their songs several times through a day.  it seems to work okay and they do it.  I also say that they can play for their dolls or stuffed animals.  I used to put my dolls on the floor, arranged in an audience fashion, and then I would practice my clarinet.  I loved, and still do, playing my clarinet.  I don't play as often as I used to, which isn't very good, but i am getting back into the swing of practicing it.

Richard may be coming for the weekend.  I am excited.  I haven't seen him since Momma passed away and well, quite frankly, I can't say I enjoyed visiting him as I was so sad and upset at the time.  This time, if he is able to come, I will enjoy my brother's visit.  He is such a good big brother.  I simply adore him.  I also adore my younger brother (who for some reason likes to tell everyone he is older than me).  At this point, I do not see either one of them very much so it will be good to see them both.  I don't think the boys have seen each other in about 6 years.  That is an awfully long time not to see your sibling.  Fortunately, I see Andrew every so often at Uncle John's.  Richard I don't see as much since he lives about 3,000 miles away from me so I am thrilled when I do get him here.

Not too much happening today, getting the trash out was the big job of the day.  I have to clear up the living room before Friday and make up the bed in Mom's room.  I need to put the Christmas tree back downstairs and the decorations in the furnace room where they belong.  I plan to read some more of my writing course.  I am on chapter 14 now.  Only 4 more to go and then I am done with the initial read through.  I had some ideas this morning at about 4 am.  I am going to put a notebook in my room for when I can't sleep and I come up with some story lines, or ideas.  I used to do this all the time.  When I was in college, I used to call the answering machine and say my ideas or sing the tunes in my head for when I was writing music.  Mom always chuckled at that.  She would check the machine and her my notes to myself.  She never minded.  Sometimes she would write out my ideas that I put on the machine for me so I would have them when I came home.  She was very good at dictating notes.  The melodies or lyrics she would just leave on the machine.  That was not her forte.  I always had her listen to my songs or read my stories.  I even had a recording studio in the family room for about 10 years.  I no longer need it as everything is digital now and that was all analog but it was fun creating Christmas tapes for everyone in the family.  I miss doing that.  Mom would listen to them all the time.  Sometimes I would be like, Mom, I don't want to her me sing, and she would say, too bad, I do.  She was very proud of my musical abilities.  She loved that I am a teacher.  She was so proud of that.  Well, if it wasn't for her I wouldn't be a teacher or a musician.  She got me started on loving music at a very young age.  She would hum some melody and I would hum it back.  We did this starting when I was about 2.  We had music in the house all the time when I was small.  I so miss those days at times.  Now when I hear certain music or certain songs, I can smile and remember her.  It doesn't hurt all the time to remember her, just some of the time.

a lovely day

What a beautiful day, both with the weather and with going out to dinner/lunch with friends.  Emily was even able to be there!  I was very happy to see her.  She is so busy as she is a senior in high school this year and she now works part time.  I was happy to see her and Lily for dinner.  We went to Olive Garden for our meal.  I love that place!  It is so yummy!!!  We had a really good time.  I think we were there for a good 2 hours.  We had to leave when it was time for Lily's youth group meeting.  I had such a good time.  I haven't had a relaxing time with the Emerton's in a while.  They are just so busy.  They are such good friends of mine.  They were good friends of Momma too.  I got seafood Alfredo.  So yummy!  Lily got macaroni and cheese and french fries.  She said it was very good.  Emily got a salad.  The food at Olive Garden is always good.

It is 83 degrees today.  How lovely!!!  I am enjoying the sunshine today.  It goes back to the 50s tomorrow and for the rest of the week.  I suppose that is good because I don't relish a super hot summer this year.  Thank goodness for a/c!  I also on the very hot days, miss the pool we had when I was growing up.

Not much happening for the rest of the day.  I am going to work on my writing course some more for the evening.  So far, I am reading the entire course through and then I will go back and read it again and do the exercises.  I am starting to get a few ideas for a story.  I have never had this issue before so it is new to me not to have a story in my head.  I don't really like a blank head.  I miss the music and stories that would fill my imagination.  I am hoping the fog will clear up as I start writing.

I did talk to my big brother, Richard, on my birthday, Friday.  I called him about 9 and then he called me right back.  He said he wasn't sure what time to call.  The kids are busy as usual.  The are now 10 and 11.  Abigail will be 12 in July.  Seems like yesterday she was born.  I sure miss them a lot.  I don't get to see them very often.  I haven't seen them since July 2008 when Mom and I went to Seattle to see them.  I am hoping to see them this summer.  I just miss the whole family so much.

I am having a medium pain day.  Not too bad for the nice weather we are having.  I do have a bit more than usual of a headache right now.  I took some pain pills so that should help.  I have a busy week of teaching ahead of me.  Boy, do I like that!  I just wish I had more!  Hopefully soon I will have a few everyday except Sunday.  i do hope this finds you doing well!

Saturday thoughts

It has been a good couple of days.  I was very worried about how I would feel yesterday without Mom and all, but I remembered her and I also found some pictures of a birthday of mine when I was small.  Talk about funny pictures.  They made me laugh.  I vaguely remember how Mom would make a big deal about birthdays, she didn't go overboard (like at Christmas) with presents, but she always let us know how important that day was for her.  She loved to tell me and my brothers about when we were born.  She liked to tell me how she watched me be born.  There was a huge mirror on the ceiling in the hospital that she looked at when I was born.  She also liked to tell me how she knew that she was having a girl, even though in those days nobody knew.  Momma painted my room pink and everything before I was born.  She told everyone that she was having a girl and she was right.  There are pictures of my brothers and I in that album that I just found.  We were so young in those pictures!  I am going to scan them for my brothers and then I will also put them on my computer for me.  I am keeping all the original pictures.  I don't know what I am going to do with them, but I will come up with something.

I had my usual 2 lessons this morning.  Amanda and Kayla are doing very well with their lessons.  Amanda started on a new song that Kayla wants to sing at the concert.  Both girls are going to sing with each other or with Katie for the concert.  Amanda did say she would like to sing Many a New Day by herself.  I said great, that would be wonderful.  I have told both girls it is up to them whether or not they sing with someone or by themselves.  Whatever they are feeling up to.  I am very happy with how my students are progressing.  I just need a few more.  I now have students everyday except for Sunday.  That works for me.

Tomorrow I am going to dinner with Lily and her family.  I am looking forward to that.  Her family are such good friends of mine and they were good friends of Mom.  Mom loved hanging out with Lily.  Any chance we got her made her smile even if it was just taking her home from somewhere.  She felt the same way about Emily and Elyse too.  Boy, I miss her.

It has been a good pain day too despite the dampness in the air.  It is suppose to rain again tomorrow but be very warm, 78 degrees, then back to the normal, 50s for the rest of the week.  We are having a very strange spring this year.  I do hope you are having a good evening!

Birthday

It is my birthday today and surprisingly, no tears as of now.  I am completely missing the Mom at this point as it is the first birthday without her, but surprisingly it has been a good day so far and the evening promises to be even better as Calli, Acer, and family will be here for dinner and cake.  I just finished making the cake.  Oops, I think I should use a different pan next time.  I thought it was a 13 X 9 and it is a bit smaller.  It took 10 extra minutes to cook.  Oh well, I am sure it tastes really good as the cake mix is from a box brand I like.  I decided that next week for the family party I am going to make 2 13 X 9 cakes for the family party instead of ordering one.  It will be more fun to make them.  I am going to make one chocolate and one yellow.  I don't particularly like chocolate cake but I do like yellow.  I will get the ingredients that are needed this coming week.  I am waiting for my lovely students to arrive.  They should be here any moment.

I spoke to Kathy this afternoon and then I got my hair done.  Because of the bursitis in the shoulders I have been having trouble washing the hair so I found out on Tuesday when I got it cut that they wash and dry hair for $3.  That is not expensive at all.  I spend more than that on a pop.  The hairdresser suggested until my scalp is better, to have it done 2 times a week and then in a bit drop it to once a week.  Works for me.  So after I talked to Kathy for a while I went and had my hair washed and dried.  Boy does it feel nice.

My little ones should be here any moment.  I will write more later tonight.

It was a nice evening.  We had KFC for dinner and then nice cake for dessert.  Acer and Calli did well for their lessons.  Calli hadn't Brailled out her Candle of the Water song so she and I took care of that after her lesson.  She brought her tools with her, her slate and stylus and together we Brailled the words for her.  This summer I plan to go to the library and see if I can braille out her words before she gets a new song.  Now, we are doing it a bit backwards.  Instead of me having the words ready, I don't.  I hope to change that by Summer.  I am glad that she is enjoying her lessons.  We started a new piano song this week and she put her hands together for her old song.  She is doing very well.  This summer I am hoping to have a bit of money to get some braille music.  They have it available on dancing dots.com but I don't have any yet.

All in all it hasn't been a horrible birthday.  I had an enjoyable evening and the afternoon wasn't too bad either.  I didn't get up very early but that is okay.  I was rather tired.  I did go to bed early last night.  I think I slept pretty well for a change, I only work up a few times instead of every couple hours.  I was happy with that.  The pain level is average for me.  Now that I have the pain pills again, I am glad.  I am sleeping better with them.  Overall, I haven't been super sad today.  I have been sad, but that is to be expected since it is the first one without my mother and my older brother seems to have forgotten it is my birthday.  i am a little disappointed in that.  He usually calls me on my birthday every year.  I am hoping he will call this evening before I go into bed.

a decent day

It has been a good day so far.  Not too much pain, not too much fatigue for a change.  I even slept pretty well last night, which is unusual.

I had Breanna's lessons this afternoon.  She is doing pretty well.  She practiced one piano piece wrong though so that totally bummed her out for a few seconds.  Then she was fine.  She learned 2 new little pieces for piano before we turned our attention over to voice lessons.  She brought with her the pop song she wanted to learn.  We went through it twice.  It is a Miley Cyrus piece and it is nice.  She will do very well at the spring concert with it.  I don't know what else she will sing either, but we will decide before the concert.

After Breanna's lesson, Carson had his first lesson.  He is a nice 8 year old boy who's grandmother lives across the street from me.  He is so cute.  We started with warmups, which are very new to him then we moved to 2 songs.  Next week we will talk about eyebrows and things like that.  I foresee all my girls going gaga over him.  He is that cute and he sings rather well for being 8 years old.  He has a nice boy soprano voice.

I went to Tim Horton's afterward for some lunch.  I had a bit of time before I needed to pick up Lily.  I was so excited about today because I would see Lily for about a 1/2 hour.  Her parents were both unable to pick her up so I volunteered.  Hey, it was no problem, plus, I got Lily for a short time.  She showed me how my alarm works on my phone.  Now I know.  I am excited about that not that I need it right now, but hey, once in a while it could come in handy.

I don't have any plans for the rest of the evening.  i am going to watch some news to see the weather forecast.  It is suppose to rain a lot tomorrow and then have a bit of a warm up.  I can't wait!  This has been a rather cold winter for me.

I called the cable company today.  I have gotten in the mail some advertisements from them advertising a  lower price than what I pay.  I have never done this before but I called and asked if there were any specials that I would qualify for.  They lowered my rate by $10.  Hey, that is $120 for a year savings so yeah, that is great.  I am excited about that.

I do hope this finds you doing well.  It has been a pretty good day for me, although I am a bit tired now.  I think because I was go go go and now I am not.  It is too late in the day to take a nap so I will just head for bed a bit early if I am still so tired.

Wednesday

It is raining and has been raining all day.  Yuck, is about all I can say about that.  I am a bit achy from it too.  I was slightly (?) airheady today.  I arrived, I thought, on time for the doctor.  Whoops, I actually was late.  I totally forgot about the mammogram I was supposed to have.  I did have it done, only 45 minutes late.  Fortunately, I did NOT have to reschedule this.  I am thankful for that small thing.  I don't know who invented that machine, but they need to come up with a better invention.  It just hurts so much.  I don't know if it hurts nonfibro people as much, but it just hurts.  Anyways, after that I saw my doctor and we decided to try the Meloxicam that the insurance company will cover.  If it does not work, then we will appeal to the insurance company and then apply for help to cover the $127 that the Celebrex costs because on my meager income, I just can't afford that.

I had a total surprise when i went to the secretary of state's office this afternoon.  I did NOT have to wait!  That is correct!  no waiting!!  I went in and went to the info desk to get my number.  She asked what I needed to have done and I said new tabs and a new handicap sticker as my expires on Friday.  She said she could do that right now.  I was floored.  I have been using the automatic stations because the lines for the people are huge and you end up waiting for a good hour or hour and a half just to pick up new tabs.  I couldn't believe this.  No waiting?  What planet was I on?  I have no idea.  But, 10 minutes later, I had my new sticker and my new tabs.  I did not put them on yet because it is raining out today.  I don't want to have to get new ones because they fell off so I will wait until tomorrow.

I am very tired today.  I don't know if it is the lack of sleep the 2 nights before last has caught up or what, but I am exhausted today.  It also could be all the running around I did this afternoon.  I am not sure.  I am debating on whether or not a nap is a good idea.  It is almost 4:30 pm.

My neighbor, Mary stopped by to see me with her grandson, Carson.  He is 8 and is interested in voice lessons.  Well, I gave her my number (I was in the car ready to go to the secretary of state office) and told her my availability.  She has Carson after school Wednesdays and Thursdays.  Well, that works perfect as those days I have a lot of availability.  I said, look at your schedule and then let me know what works for you.  She said she would give me a call tonight.  I look forward to that.  They live across the street from me so how convenient is that for the young man?  We could start tomorrow or next week, whichever works for him and Mary.


I have had a decent day despite the pain.  I am thinking I might just go into the living room and take a wee nap now.  I am just that tired.  I do hope I sleep well tonight though.  I have to get up a earlier because of Breanna's lessons.  I also am thrilled because I get Lily!!!!  I am picking her up from school tomorrow because Ross will be out of town and Julie will be at work.  The 2nd to last week for taxes is super busy.  I signed off on Mom's and mine today.  I did nearly cry when I signed mom's because it is her last ones ever.  Anything that is the last one for mom makes me weep.  I just miss her so much.  I know so many of you understand that feeling very well and I am thankful for all of the support, prayers, and kind words you have given me.  It sure helps in this very sad time especially since quite a few members of my family think I should be over her by now or moving forward and not looking back.  Either way, I am grateful for my friends and the part of the family that understands how this has been a living nightmare for me.

I do hope this finds you doing very well and maybe you may even have some sunshine??  I certainly hope so!!!!

next time, I better read the email better

I thought I read the email correctly when I got the first email about the writing course.  Apparently, it is a download course.  I found that out when I called them this afternoon because I was getting concerned that I hadn't gotten my course yet.  I quickly got my password and user name.  I tried to download them this afternoon.  I had to stop when Charlie arrived for his lessons.  I discovered why it wouldn't download properly.  I had too old of a Adobe reader program.  I have since corrected that problem and now I have the correct version.  Wow, what a day!  I have since downloaded all the stuff I needed to download and there were several documents.  The actual course is 318 pages with several other documents, one being 118 pages.  I will be starting the course tomorrow after the doctor appointment.  I also have to go to the secretary of state office which I didn't do this morning.  I didn't fall asleep until about 5:30 am.  I woke again at 7:30 and turned off the alarm.  I was so tired that I just couldn't stay awake.  I awoke again at 12:30 pm.

I ran into Rosemary and Kim, my neighbors, at Tim Horton's.  I was planning on reading a bit and then going to get a haircut.  We were there about 2 hours.  We just chatted about everything.  It was a lot of fun.  I really enjoyed myself.  I did have time before Charlie's lesson to get a haircut so I headed to the hairdressers.  I got a few inches cut off and now have bangs.  I still have long enough hair to put it up in a ponytail.  I am happy about that as I like ponytails.

Charlie's lesson went well.  We talked for about 15 minutes so we ran over.  Thankfully, I didn't have another student after him.  He drove himself to my house from his dad's work today.  His dad has a shop and he details cars and fixes them.  They just moved to a new building so Charlie was doing yard work today.  He said he likes working outside, boy was that music to my ears.  I asked Charlie how much he would charge to trim my bushes in the backyard and shape the ones in the front.  He saw what I meant so I am hoping he will let me know next week.  I have been needing someone to do this for me.  I am hoping to get it done in May.

I was able to pick up my pain medicine today so I am very glad about that.  I hope to sleep better tonight.  I have not slept well since I have not had them.  I am very sore tonight so I am very happy that I have the medicine.

I do hope you are having a good evening.