Good Bye

We said good bye to our home in Brampton on January 16, 2019 and we said good bye to our family and friends a little before that. It was a very bright and sunny day for our move, cold but sunny. It took all day to load the truck that came to get our stuff. It was strange to see the house be emptied out of almost twenty years we lived here. You know, you don't realize how many things you have until it's time to move it out but each thing is something that reminds us of the years gone by. That is life. You have your family, your work, your good times, your bad times and then you have your things and yes I like a lot of things. So it was quite a job to get my things onto one truck. A word to the wise, when you order a truck make sure it's an empty truck because ours was not. Someone else's things were already on it and to make long story short some of our things didn't fit in. The trucking company left us scrambling in the late hours of the evening to figure out what to do with the rest of our things, lucky we had some friends ready to help us out. Steven got situated in an apartment and we spent the night at a hotel so we can get an early start to a new chapter in our lives.

We got the early start we wanted to make our journey to New Brunswick but a couple of hours in first thing on the agenda .. car trouble. Smoke from under the hood meant a stop at a car shop to check out what was the matter. We just had the van in the shop for a general check to make sure this very thing did not happen and still it seemed something was wrong with the radiator. It was the blown hose 

We got the early start we wanted but a couple of hours the first thing on the agenda was.. car trouble. We just had the car at the shop for a general check up to make sure this very thing did not happen and still the van was smoking. We pulled into a car shop in Kingston to see what was the matter.. a blown radiator hose. It took a little over an hour to get it right again and we were back on the road and our journey to New Brunswick.

We traveled with our two furry companions Buddy and Sabrina. Buddy is fourteen years old and we weren't sure how he would to with such a long trip and a complete change in his life but he seemed to hang in there. Sabrina is much younger but she is very attached to Sherie, John and the boys and we were afraid she may cry the entire time being apart form them but she did fine as well as they buried themselves in the many blankets in the back seat with Maya. Needless to say our van was crammed full with the leftover things from the house.

As we drove further and further into Quebec it got colder and colder. Piles of snow could be seen from the highway and as it got dark it got frigidly cold, with the van windshield constantly fogging up and the side windows getting covered with ice on the inside. When it got dark temperatures reached -28C at one point but if felt much colder with the chilly winds howling around us. We stopped to pick up some food in a place that felt and looked like the far reaches of the Arctic. We wanted to drive some more but decided to stop off as soon as we reached New Brunswick. In Edmundston we found the same hotel we stayed at in Brampton and got to sleep for the night.

Countdown

It seemed like it was going to be a long time until the final day when we made the move to our new home in New Brunswick. The countdown was on to the final day. There was a lot of anticipation and some anxious moments too about how everything would go and what would happen once we got there. Will we finish packing in time? Would our travel go as expected? We would leave early on the 17th and get there next day. Would weather allow us to keep travelling? Would we get the key on time on the day of taking possession of the house? Would our things get there next day or a week or later? Would our kids arrive ok by plane? And on and on it went but Day 1 did arrive and we were off early in the morning.  So finally before we knew it we were travelling to our new destination and even more quickly we'd been here a week today. Amazing.

A Birthday

Our little girl Kristina Marie has grown into a beautiful young woman and here she is as cute as a button in this polka dot dress with her pig tails by the mound of irises at a home where most kids grew up. It was a carefree time when she played with her best friends next door on either side and at a park nearby. She was a girly girl and liked to look pretty while playing with dolls or having tea in the backyard with her friends. Happy birthday Kristina, we love you and wish you all the best the world has to offer. Have a great day. Hugs and Kisses from mom and dad and the rest of your family..

Ray of Light

The sun was amazing that afternoon back in August. It was so bright and golden like it was trying to illuminate the very thing we were supposed to see. The yellow rays spread out across tips of trees, lawns and streets and a certain for sale sign in the distance. Embraced by the light we couldn't help but feel like this was a welcome to this town. That for sale sign has waited all this time just for us and this was where we were supposed to be.
 

Bigger World

Love this picture of Jax looking out onto the world. He is three and his world is still small but it's about to get bigger as he and his brother Brandon make the move with us. I wonder how that will be for them. What they will think of it? Their world will be turned upside down. I know they are not the first little kids to move homes or even across country but still hope they will not be too homesick. At first that's bound to happen. They will miss their old home and old friends but the beauty of life is they will make the new house a home and make new friends along the way and everything will be right with the world again, though it will become a little bit bigger.

Selfie

Just a cute picture of Maya. Got one of her selfies. She tried to look grown up and serious here but the kitty cat stickers give her away. Most of the time though she is not serious. Maya likes to smile and everything is funny to her. It's rare to be talking to her seriously about something but maybe in a couple more years that will be possible however smiling through life is not a bad way to go.

Mom's Carrot Cake

Here is my mom's Carrot Cake that she baked the other day. We just happened to come by at the right time when she was putting this cake together. She is a great baker and this cake was delicious. She usually bakes many different varieties at Christmas time and other occasions. I have many favorites. I've tried some baking but just doesn't seem to turn out as well. I will have to keep trying. Maybe in the future I will have more time to experiment and get that perfect cookie or cake. In the meantime I will keep up with mom's baking.

Translation:  2 cups flour/ 2 tsp baking powder/ 1.5 tsp baking soda/ 1.5 tsp salt

2 cups grated carrots/ 1.5 cups sugar/ 1 cup crushed pineapple

1 tsp cinnamon/ 1/2 cup sliced walnuts/ 1 cup Mazola oil/ 4 eggs

Mix eggs with sugar well, add oil and flour, mix in all other dry ingredients, 

then add pineapple and carrots. Flour the pan then pour the batter. 

Bake at 350 for about 50 minutes.

A Little Bit This Way

When we were in St Stephen we explored the downtown area where there were some small shops, banks and restaurants then we headed the other way looking for a drug store. Everything is a little bit this way and a little that way. The community center with a pool and ice rink is in between which was only about five minutes from where we are going to live. The drug store was down the street and up a bit. We passed the Harron Collective which I didn't know then but I looked it up, is a Tattoo shop, I wonder if there is a first tattoo in my future to go with my new exciting life, haha. We also passed St Stephen Inn, a little bit larger place to stay, so yes, there are at least two Inns in St Stephen, the little border town on the river, and then we came up to the Guardian Drugstore. In that area is a souvenir shop and some other small stores. So here you go, a bit more on our new hometown.

Daisy

Hopefully in a few weeks we'll see some signs of life. Probably pushing it a little. It was a very cold day today and I'm sure there are many more to come before nature re-awakens.

A Little Memory

I know this is kind of random but I happened upon these photos of my husband and I when we were very young, living in different places at the time with no inkling that we would ever meet, much less live our lives together in matrimonial bliss. These photos are so similar. We are both cuddling a puppy dog which were not our own but we still loved. Charlie was in Vancouver, BC back then and I was still in Croatia. On the back of my photo it says the puppy's name was Bobby.

The "Day"

So the long awaited day has come.. come and gone now.. the day of my Retirement. December 31, 2018 I walked into my work and then left for the last time. You know how all your work life you dream of this day, anticipate and count the years etc well when the day finally arrived was it as euphoric as I imagined?  Well, yes it was. I've heard of some people say they were a bit disappointed, or sad to leave the place where they spent so much of their life in. Better yet they say they don't know what they will do with themselves now. They will be bored. Umm NO. I didn't feel sad. I walked out of there with my head high and looking forward to the future. Don't get me wrong, that doesn't mean that I wasn't grateful for having a place to work all these years because I was. I'm happy that I had a job, a place to come to each morning, work with good people, help the company prosper in my small way and go home with a paycheck that put a roof over my kid's heads and food on the table. For this I'm grateful but I never understood people who say they don't want to retire because they are afraid of being bored. Life is what you make it and I made sure I will not be bored. I've got plans for the future and it will be as exciting as it ever was if not more. It may be different from what I've been used to for so long but it will be interesting, fulfilling, embraced in love from my family and encompassed with dreams yet to be realized.

Passed by these views for almost twenty years, a chunk of life seeing the same sandpit, same parking lot, same trucks, day in and day out.

Feeling brand new. It is strange but seems like life is just beginning. How can that be when sun is suppose to be setting into my "golden years"? Who came up with that anyway???