Seattle November 2021

We wanted to go to a Kraken game, so we planned a short trip to Seattle. We were able to take advantage of a day off school on a Thursday, which made flights cheaper and tickets easier to find than would have been the case on a weekend. Back on August 24, I wrote about submitting leave requests for all of my personal days for the year, and the first of them was for the Friday of this trip, so we were able to leave on Wednesday night and come home on Saturday.

If you're thinking, "weren't you just in Canada," you are correct. Monday night, we were in Canada; Tuesday night, we were home; and Wednesday night, we were in Seattle. It was a busy and tiring week! After driving for ten hours on Tuesday to get home in time to vote - and we did drive straight to our voting station before even going to our house - we did laundry, unpacked and repacked, and then I went to school on Wednesday.

While I was between meetings at school, I checked our flight status and immediately started to worry. As you can see, the first flight from Dulles to Midway, was delayed and was scheduled to land after the second flight departed from Midway for SeaTac. Not good news. I was pretty panicky, thinking we might have to find a hotel in Chicago and fly to Seattle the next morning.

C called Southwest and did the "call back" option in order to speak with someone about the flights. As luck would have it, while he was waiting for the call back, a Southwest rep happened to call him in anticipation of the flight issues, and really worked some magic to get us on a flight out of Reagan that would get us to Chicago in time for our connection. While this was obviously good news, Reagan is nowhere near as convenient as Dulles, and we would have to get there during rush hour traffic. In the course of a very stressful 90 minutes, C picked me up from school, we drove straight to Reagan, and we ultimately made it to the gate in time. We also easily made our connection in Chicago, our flight to Seattle was on time, and we took a lyft to our hotel, arriving around 12:30 am. Overall, a stressful day that ended up working out in our favor. Actually, we really lucked out on all of our flights on this trip - for three of them, we had an empty middle seat between us, and for one of them, we managed to snag the exit row with only two seats in it!

We basically had Thursday and Friday in Seattle, with the game being Thursday night and our flight home being Saturday at 2:00 pm. In that time, we hung out with and went to the game with my friend Dan, and wandered around the city with no real plans or itinerary. It was the best! While I love trips where we do and see lots of things, I also love trips where we do practically nothing!

I'll write a separate post about the arena and the game tomorrow, but here are some pics from our time around Seattle!

this pic is from the summer of 2016

I tried to take a similar pic on this trip

original flight
scheduled to land at Midway
at 8:54 pm

connecting flight
scheduled to leave Midway
at 8:53 pm

the time of the first flight
just kept getting later and later

by switching from Dulles to Reagan
we were able to land at Midway
at 7:45 pm in plenty of time
to make our connection

we still weren't taking any chances
and sat in the first row just so
we could be the first people off
the plane at Midway

honestly these were the most
enormous leaves we've ever seen

Chris Cornell statue

Top Pot...so good!

the public library is amazing

the infamous gum wall
disgusto barfo

what tourists do when they're in Seattle

first red cups of the season;
fitting we were in Seattle

Happy Tails to you!

Quick Family Visit

Although October was a terrible month, November is looking up. We took a quick trip to Canada for my grandma's burial service and the good to come out of that sad event is that we were able to see C's parents, my aunt, uncles, cousins, extended family, and family friends. It had been more than two years since we'd been to Canada, and seeing people I love after so long apart was very good for my soul.

we went to the park where we used to go for
picnics when we were teenagers

we took a late night drive to Toronto

the CN Tower was lit up like a pumpkin

my aunt and uncle's cat...

...who decided to befriend the
person with the cat allergy

we left C's parents' house super early
the morning after my grandma's service
so we could get home in time to vote

Happy Tails to you!

My Grandma

Her name, Reina, meant "queen," and she was mine.

I completely and utterly revered her and I know how lucky I am to have had her in my life for 48 years.

I could write about her in a big picture way – but I don't want this to read like an obituary. I want to capture what she meant to me. How special she was. How her presence influenced my life in such a way that each and every day, I strive to be as kind and loving and forgiving as she was.

She was the second person to ever hold me and on the day I was born, she gave me a Winnie the Pooh bear. During my entire childhood, she called me "Pooh Bear" – even into my teen years. When my friends would call me when I was at her house, she would call out, "Pooh Bear, the phone's for you!" and I would be equal parts mortified and delighted. That stuffed animal never left my side when I was a child – I talked to it, all the while believing it could understand me; I bathed it; I carried it everywhere. All these years later, I knew that if my house ever caught fire and C and our dogs were safe, there would lonely be one possession I'd ever run back in for and it was my Pooh Bear.

I was her first grandchild (and I was her only granddaughter for 36 years before my cousin was born) and she was the grandma every child dreams of having. Growing up, she took care of me when my mom had to work overnight shifts at the hospital and I never lived more than 25 minutes from her for the first 22 years of my life (and we lived on the same street for a long stretch of that). What an incredible gift.

She instilled in me a love of animals and a love of all things British (she had such a fondness for the royal family). There are two scents that instantly make me think of her – McIntosh apples and lilacs – and those are two of my most favorite things to smell in the entire world. When we were having some landscaping done at our house, I asked for a lilac bush to be planted and when it blooms, I love to inhale its scent and think of my grandma.

I have two very distinct memories of her from the day C and I got married. The first is when she danced with danced with Eeyore in the Yacht Club Gazebo as the string quartet played (we had Pooh Bear, Tgger, Eeyore, Mickey, and Minnie with us that day) and it was the most precious thing ever. The second is when she hugged me and said, "You're going to have a very happy life! He's such a nice boy!" (C and I had been together for 6 years at that point and my grandma really loved him and he absolutely adored her.) Her approval was everything to me!

I've written about her on several occasions (including a post back in 2014 when I almost wrote the exact same thing about my Pooh Bear) and shared many pics of her on IG over the years. She was just the absolute best grandma ever.

She encouraged my love of music and it was the piano at her house where I first plinked and plunked the keys for hours on end. She attended my many French horn concerts - even in the early days when they were barely more than me making honking noises on a new instrument - and she always told me it sounded wonderful (when I knew good and well that it didn't!). She was always, always, always in my corner and knowing I had someone who loved me unconditionally gave me an invisible suit of armor that carried me through some of the more challenging days in my life.

I could write volumes about her, but there are three precious memories that I will end with.

The first is when she literally saved my life. I was about four years old and swimming in a lake and I almost drowned. I can still picture looking up at the surface of the water from below and seeing my grandma's arm reach into the water to pull me out. It was one of the scariest experiences of my life that in reality probably lasted ten seconds but felt to me like an eternity. She wrapped me in a towel and held me until I wasn't scared anymore and the memory of that event will stay with me forever.

The second is from May 2019 when my mom and I went up to Canada for Mother's Day to see my grandma. I stayed in the same room as the two of them, and one night, my grandma woke up around 1:00 am and asked me if I would help her to the kitchen for a bowl of cereal. I did, and we sat together at the kitchen table, eating cheerios late at night, just the two of us in a quiet house, and I thought of the million times when she fed me and took care of me. What an honor to return some of her kindness. One of those moments in my life I will never forget.

The third is from a few days before my grandma passed away. My aunt, who took the most amazing care of her for the final four years of my grandma's life, had asked if I wanted to facetime with them. It was October 21, and I went to school early so I would be able to facetime from my office before an early meeting I had. My grandma was very weak and kept drifting off, but I spoke to her and my aunt kindly held up the ipad so she could see me. It didn't matter to me whether or not she responded; I just wanted to see her and have her hear my voice, but at one point, she looked right at me and raised her hand to wave. And then she said my name. And that is one of the most meaningful moments of my life...all these years later, we were still connected.

I loved my grandma beyond words and this post doesn't even come close to capturing my feelings. I've been working on it for over a week and I have still fallen short. She was an incredible person, wife, mom, and grandma, in addition to the many roles she played in her lifetime.

I will miss her terribly.

“A grandma is warm hugs and sweet memories.

She remembers all of your accomplishments

and forgets all of your mistakes.”

~ Barbara Cage ~

my queen

married for almost 65 years
before my grandpa passed away in 2012

my grandma and C's mom
they loved each other very much

this was the most heartwarming thing ever

ready to celebrate an amazing woman

Pooh Bear was with us on our first day together
and I wanted Pooh Bear to be with us on our last day together.

Happy Tails to you...

Life Lately October 2021

Despite my optimism that October would be be a better month than September, it was awful. Probably the worst month of my life. Ginny was admitted to the emergency vet hospital on October 7 and we said goodbye to her on October 11. Then on October 26, my precious grandma passed away. So much sadness in such a short amount of time. I was not ready for either loss.

I feel like I pretty much spent the entire month in a fog. All I can say is that I am so very grateful for my family and friends who have showered me with such love and kindness during this time. I have colleagues who hugged me and said just what I needed to hear day after day, friends who repeatedly called/emailed/texted to check in on me, and family who shared in my grief because they loved Ginny and my grandma, too.

But as always, there is one person. The one I always lean on. The one who has been my steadfast compass for almost 33 years. It's pretty easy to be a great spouse or friend when things are going well; it's when times are tough that people show their true colors. What C has done for me over the past three-plus weeks required a level of selflessness I cannot even describe. I would keep it together during the day at school and pretty much have a breakdown every night and he dried my tears and listened to me rant and held my hand and made me laugh, day in and day out. Ordinary things. Things that he has always done for me. But these are not little things. They are big things. Because he was heartbroken, too. He lost his little best friend when we said goodbye to Ginny. While I went to school each day and saw my friends and got hugs and love and support, he was working at home, alone, in a silent house with no Ginny. And then I would come home and fall apart and he would put aside his own grief and take care of me.

We've been together a very long time. I always use the hashtag #ridiculouslyhappymarriage on our selfies on IG because we do have an insanely happy marriage. Sometimes people will ask something along the lines of "what's your secret?" and I never know how to answer because I don't think there is a secret since every relationship is unique. But I always think back to something I read about marriage many years ago and that is that in a marriage, sometimes you're the flower and sometimes you're the gardener. You take turns. You don't keep score. You do what it takes to help your spouse thrive. Simple as that.

I count my lucky stars to be married to him. During the good times, he is great. During the bad times, he is even greater.

I am bidding October farewell because while I feel like I don't know where the time went, I also feel like it was the longest month in the history of time. The photos of Ginny posted below are from the beginning of the month that I haven't shared before now, along with a few others from October. I can't believe how my life has changed in 31 days.

But I got to hug both of my brothers today. The three of us were together. And for that reason alone, November is already a better month.

I miss her so much

I was trying to change the sheets
and she did not want to get up

so she hid her face from me
and went back to sleep

I was eating cheese and she wanted some

our last family pic together

she was not impressed that I kept trying to put my sunglasses on her

October 6 - regular vet visit

our tradition is that whenever
one of our dogs had to go to the vet,
dinner that night was a cheeseburger

she was very excited

and tried to bite through the paper

we didn't know this would be her last
dinner at home with us ever

I sat with her in a huge fuzzy blanket and C took the pic as a joke bc we looked so ridiculous, but I love that this was how she spent her
last night at home

I added her pic to the most important
section of my bulletin board

my presh

we've given away/donated most of the
dog "things" - beds, blankets, leashes, etc. -
but the water bowl, although empty, remains
in its spot our kitchen and I don't know that
we are ever going to put it away

I had been searching for this mug for months
and finally found it on ebay; it arrived a few days after
we lost Ginny

we drove to Maryland and found this
Kermit and Jim Henson statue

one of my favorite songs

C did this very cool 2000 piece Pixar puzzle

celebrating the start of the NHL season

happy we got to see my dad

this was our first
walk in the woods without Ginny

a Ted Lasso mug that C gave me

my new favorite shirt

a beautiful cutting board
I ordered with the names
of our eight girls 

Happy Tails to you...