Generations in Time

I have become my mother. I am not sure when that happened but all of a sudden today I realized I have become my mother. Keith came home on Monday as I was putting the last load of laundry in the wash and I asked him to change and I could get his work clothes in the load. He was putzing around and I asked him finally a 3rd time and he said Sally don't worry about it, I can just put them in the hamper and they can go in another day. I told him no they had to go in then and when he asked why I said cause it's Monday. He stopped his work on the laptop and said what does Monday have to do with putting my clothes in the wash and I said cause I do laundry on Monday.

Yesterday I was making a pot of home made soup for dinner and when he came home he asked what was for dinner and I said homemade soup like always. He said what do you mean like always we didn't have soup yesterday or the day before and I replied no but it's Tuesday I always make soup with leftovers and meat bones from whatever I had roasted on the weekend. Still no clue.

Today I was coming home from my walk with my granddaughters and was trying to remind myself to get some ground turkey out of the freezer when I got home to make meatloaf and then all of a sudden I had a light bulb moment. It was Wednesday. My mom always made meatloaf on Wednesdays... and laundry and home made bread on Mondays, and home made soup from leftovers on Tuesdays. It took the girls asking me why I was stopping to bring me around to conscious thinking again but it made me think of all the things I do in my day to day life that is so like my mother.

Phrases I use like paper toilet instead of toilet paper, close the lights instead of turn off the lights, insides of the fridge cleaned on the 1st Saturday of the month, bed linens changed on Fridays, recipes I use that are hers, the laughing in the middle of the night for no reason just cause I am over tired and can't sleep, the locking of the doors at night and then getting up again to go check them once more, the snorts that come out of my nose from laughing too hard and not being able to catch my breath, the lullabies I sing to my grandchildren, the serving of everyone else at the table before I serve myself, and the list goes on.

I remember quite vividly telling myself growing up, that when I became an adult and moved away from home I was going to be so different... my children were NEVER going to have chores, they were going to be able to stay up as late as they wanted, I was never going to say "because I said so" I would always give my children a proper answer, my children would be allowed to have freedom to go where they wanted when they wanted and never need chaperones, my children were never going to have to babysit their younger siblings, dinners would be made of cool foods that had nothing to do with health. What ever happened to those thoughts? Where did I cross the line between wanting to be a fun parent to being a responsible parent? Actually when did I become a responsible adult in the first place?

After we got home and I got the girls settled with their craft stuff I called my mom and we talked for over an hour about absolutely nothing. We talked about things of old, things we had done together, we talked about being mothers and grandmothers. We talked about nonsense stuff that only a mother and daughter would find interesting. After we said I love you and that we had to go a dozen times and actually hung up, I realized that being my mother wasn't such a bad thing after all. I mean really, I come from her and I think she is a pretty cool grandmother, my granddaughters think I am Barbie pretty (quote and unquote) so had bad could it really be to be my mother. I can think of many worse things.

I look forward to seeing her next weekend when I fly out. I'm not looking forward to the reason I am flying out but I know that when all is said and done we still will have each other and she loves me unconditionally. I can't think of a better person to be like then my mom.

That Old Memory Again

Those of you that know me know I hate this short term memory loss and how little of it I have because of the Fibromyalgia. It drives me crazy most times but I try and make fun of it. This helps :)

My forgetter's getting better,
But my rememberer is broke
To you that may seem funny
But, to me, that is no joke

For when I'm "here" I'm wondering
If I really should be "there"
And, when I try to think it through,
I haven't got a prayer!

Oft times I walk into a room,
Say "what am I here for?"
I wrack my brain, but all in vain!
A zero, is my score.

At times I put something away
Where it is safe, but, Gee!
The person it is safest from
Is, generally, me!

When shopping I may see someone,
Say "Hi" and have a chat,
Then, when the person walks away
I ask myself, "who was that?"

Yes, my forgetter's getting better
While my rememberer is broke,
And it's driving me plumb crazy
And that isn't any joke.

Sad day

We just heard the very sad news that our prophet President Gordon B. Hinckley has passed away late this afternoon. Although we are terribly saddened we all know he would have been very happy to see his beloved wife. Our thoughts and prayers go out to his family.

Great Greater Greatest

I was on another person's blog and they had this test to see if people out there that lurk while they read your posts, can help see if they are related to you and perhaps you are able to find some lost ancestor. I hope I get TONS of replies to this. Come on.. it's easy!! You do great, great great and great great great grandparents

Jean-Baptiste Cloutier
Sarah Pronovost
David Beauvais
Maximia Gibeault
Napoleon Arthur Joseph Prive
josephine Langlois
Jean Provencal
Louise Lallier

GG Grandparents
Uldoric Cloutier
Philomene Trottier
Jospeh Pronovost
Adelaide Despiens
Jean-Baptiste Beauvais
Hermine Demeres
Casimir Gibeault
Arthemise Robert
Jean-Baptise Provencal
Ester MacDonald
Louis Lallier
Lumina Lafontaine
Francois Xavier Prive
Dorothee Chicoine
Alfred Langlois
Marie Louise Cloure

GGG Grandparents
Louis Cloutier
Sophie Frigon
Jean Trottier
Josephe St. Arnaud
Francois Pronovost
Marie Anne Veilet
louis Lefebvre
Adele Brassard
Camille Beauvais
Adelaide Morotte
Jaques Demers
Zoe Pinsonneault
Antoine Robert
Elenore Jolinet
Jean Provencal
Angelique Emond
James MacDonald
Marceline Mary Lettre
Isreal Lallier
Margarit Baril
Oliver Lafontaine
Euphrosine Poirier
Jospeh Prive
Catherine Meunier
Pierre Rene Chicoine
Julie Dansereau
Henri Langlois
Henriette Chagnon
John Cloure
Mary Cloure

And yes I really REALLY would love to see yours even if it's only got 2 generations!!

Paying it Forward

So the other day on Facebook I get this message from a woman's name that I did not recognize. I was just about to hit delete without opening the message but something stopped me. I knew a few women with her first name and thought perhaps it might be one of them so opened the message. OH MY GOSH! I am so happy I did! She starts off with I hear you are writing a Cloutier book and are looking for some pictures? I'm thinking what? She goes on to say her grandmother was my paternal grandfather's sister so we were 3rd cousins!! At least I think that makes us 3rd cousins. I have not seen her in who knows how long. Anyway long story short she now has moved back to my home town has a lot of pictures and information for me!!

As if that was enough after I stopped screeching in her ear well as about as screeching as you can get online with typed words, she gave me the name of a man in Calgary who "inherited" a box and more of family pictures from his mother but as he has been going through them he notices that a lot of them have nothing to do with his family. He talks to her as he knows her grandmother was one and would she like them. So she said actually I have someone I just found who would be thrilled to take them off your hands. I called this man in Calgary last night and he is actually going to be driving from there to my mom's (which is 6 hours away)when I am there in 2 weeks to hand deliver all these pictures one of which is at least 2 feet long and was some sort of family gathering for the Cloutier's!!

I am not the least bit embarrassed to say I spent a long time on my knees last night thanking God for opening doors for me when it comes to my family history. Doors that have seemed completely locked tight. I was at the family history centre last night as there had been a training class and as I am recounting my story to my co-worker I was trying to figure out how I could scan all these pictures when I get there cause some will remain with them. Although there are my family members in the pictures, there are their family members in some of them too (small town!!) so she said no problem I have one of those small flat scanners that you can take with you and scan them at your mom's!! Could my day get any better????

I know I know you are all thinking what is she so excited about it's barely 8 in the morning!!! I am excited because of a promise I made to my grandmother Amanda Marie-Ange Beauvais Cloutier that I would make sure that I would do everything in my power to keep our family history alive.

Long Lost Cousins

Here it is at 4am and I am so excited!! I just got an email from one of my cousins Bill on my Dad's side that I have not seen or spoken to see since Dad's funeral 19 years ago!! How thrilling! I think that I have mentioned a few times on here that I am working on a very time consuming history book on my Dad's side of the family. I sent out letters to his siblings last fall hoping to get some much needed updated pictures as well as information. The information has been slow coming in but last week I got an actual real snail mail letter from the wife of Barry another one of my cousins. I couldn't believe it! I can't remember the last time I have ever gotten a real letter in my outside mail box other then from my Mom!!

It was 2 whole pages long, came with pictures and I had to make a pot of tea and sit curled up on the couch to read it. I remember those good old days of opening your mailbox and it would be stuffed with mail.. long before email came around. You would write long thick letters not these 2 paragraph stuff.. but hey I am not knocking that! I love getting mail whether it comes electronically or not! But the info is trickling in and I am just very happy to have heard from another family member. I am the most happy with my Aunt Inez who has helped me tremendously with pictures and information of our ancestors. She definitely is going in the forward of the book! I am working on a message board for the family so people can post pictures on there and their addresses, send messages to one another etc. Good way to keep in touch. But on the weekend I went to the stationary store and actually bought all sorts of writing paper to be able to use instead of printer paper lol.

I am a happy girl and I feel my grandmother is happy with me that I am working so hard to get this book done to reunite the family.

The Wednesday Letters

Now anyone that knows me knows I am always reading. If it has 2 covers and pages in between I am reading it. At times where I have gone for a long bath telling myself I am just going to sit and close my eyes to relax I end up reading the backs of shampoo bottles and other paraphernalia hanging around arm's reach of the tub I can't stop reading. So when I heard about this particular book and how it sold hundreds of thousands of copies in the first day it hit the shelves I needed it. I picked it up when we were in Alberta for Christmas and read it in one sitting.

Other then the Book of Mormon, I have never LOVED a book like I have this one.It is truly amazing! It makes you cry it makes you laugh it makes you want to throttle people but mostly it makes you believe in forgiveness and why the Lord gave us that capability. It made me think of the petty things we get upset about that really in the grand scheme of things doesn't really matter. It made me think of grudges that people hold against others over such small things again in the grand scheme of things doesn't really matter, and it especially made me think of a love so powerful between a husband and a wife.

It made me think of Keith and I and our love and how powerful it is. How it has held us together through thick and think, good and bad, in sickness and in health, in richness and poorness, well ok we are still waiting for the richness part, and it made me think of the sacrifices we have made for each other. I think of how he has taken care of me over the last few years with my health deterioration and now with this latest settling over our heads like a big old dark cloud. I think of all the nights after nights that he wakes up to massage my aching muscles that won't stop cramping, the times he has gotten up in the middle of the night to get dressed to go outside at 3 am to go walking with me because of restless legs; it made me think of how hard he works but will drop it all in a second to come home because I called to say I needed him.

This book touched me so much that I have started my own Wednesday letters except I call them my Friday letters. Every Friday since I read the book I slip a letter in his briefcase. He never tells me he read them but I know he looks for them. Yesterday I was up really late and had to be up very early to go for my MRI. He was going to drop me off on his way to work as it was in Vancouver. I was getting my shoes and I noticed he was rummaging through his briefcase. I asked him if he was looking for something and he just had a funny look and said oh no. I smiled inside and knew he had been looking for his letter. But I had faxed it to his work before he had gotten up so it would be waiting for him when he got there as a surprise.

I think every couple should have their own Wednesday Letters. I think every person should read this book. You can get it at Amazon.com or Deseretbooks.com or at any local bookstore. You can also borrow it from Sally's personal library if you live close enough to read it but first come first serve. I do not mind lending it out as long as I get it back.

If you want the link to the book it self it is:

http://www.thewednesdayletters.com/main.php

Have a great day and keep on writing!

Two Bones to Pick

Ok I am on a soapbox right now!! I need to vent over two separate issues! First one is about common courtesy. I swear Emily Post is turning over in her grave at the lack of manners so many people have these days. I know how we were raised in our generation. I know how my children were raised. But somewhere in there, I don't know what happened. I was raised to say please and thank you; men/boys stood up to give their seats to any female regardless of age; girls gave up their seats for their elders; you opened doors for the person behind you;

Let me give you an example of how that is NOT happening today. Well over the last couple of days. I had to take the bus a few days ago. There wasn't any seats available on the bus and I had to stand. Standing is very painful for me after a few minutes but I had a 20 odd minute ride on the bus. There were seats filled with young males but no one offered me their seat. Yes I know I am sure some of you are thinking hey it goes both ways, it's the 21st century women can give their seats up as well. Get real! It's called common courtesy.

Today I had errands to run and as most days I do it on foot as I don't have a car. I had 2 granddaughters with me so I was pushing the double stroller. I went to Office Depot, the Dollar Store, the bank, and the second hand store. At each of those stores as I was coming to the door, someone was either coming in the store or just leaving, all saw me and NOT ONE person held the door for me. Now anyone who has ever pushed a double stroller knows you need basically 40 acres to turn those puppies around and you could use some help. But nope! No one.

At 3 of the places as I was leaving someone was entering so I held the door open and not one said thank you. At the last place when they walked by I sarcastically said "You're Welcome". They turned around and said "what's your problem?" DUH!! Aren't parents teaching their children anymore? I happened to tell my almost 4 year old granddaughter the other day that she was beautiful and she just looked at me and said "Thank you". Now that is manners.

Then that brings me to my second beef today. Drivers. I swear I am going to walk around with a bat one of these days! And when I become President of the World I am going to make it mandatory that anyone who drives through a crosswalk without looking BOTH ways and giving pedestrians the right of way on a light will be made to walk everywhere for a period of time!!

I walk nearly every day, different routes, different lengths of time but every single day I have to stand at some crosswalk intersection and wait for cars to finally stop even though my light is flashing and they can plainly see me. On 72nd Ave just a few minutes from my house at the intersection I have been hit twice in the last 3 months. Not hit enough that I bruise etc as the cars have been just cruising but enough that the driver knows they hit something. They get to the corner knowing traffic is only going to be coming from their left hand side so that is the only side they look not thinking there are people trying to cross at the light on their right hand side. When I was hit yesterday I smacked my hand on the hood of the car as I yelled. The driver had the gall to start screaming at me about hitting his car and doing the old one finger waver at me! I told him he hit me and he had the audacity to tell me it was my fault for being in the intersection!! I had the walkway! I am going to always have pencil and paper with me from now on on my walks and I am going to take down license plate numbers and call in to report them. Enough is enough.

For pete's sake I am 5'10" and usually am pushing a stroller on my walks it's not like I am easily missed! Alright I feel better now for venting :)

Focused on a misson

I pretty much stayed off the computer most of the weekend.. I know!! Will wonders never cease?? I didn't even check my Shaw mail since Friday! I don't even want to tell you how much mail was sitting there this morning :( But I needed to get my life in order. I absolutely hate disorder. I hate things not in their places and not put away. I hate things stacked up in the "to do" pile, stacks of mail that has to be sorted and dealt with etc. Our one counter that has a basket on it to put mail that comes in was probably 6 inches high with stuff! Every time I sat in the living room I could see pictures out of place from when we had our Christmas things out and so everything that belonged on shelves and fireplace mantle were just behind things and so on. I finally had enough and when Keith said he had to work Saturday I thought AH HAH!

So clean I did and put everything away. I even cleaned off my scrap booking desk and organized every piece of paper. What a job! But I knew my lunch time I had already done too much but I ignored my back and my muscles and kept plodding on. Dumb Dumb dumb! I was so focused on completing my task at hand I kept going. Keith came home and just had to take a whiff of the house and got upset with me. He could smell I had been cleaning. He told me if I needed things done I should have waited till he came home and asked him to do it. Ok Keith you work 18 hour days 6 days a week and even when you are home you have so much paperwork to do for work you can barely keep your eyes open at your desk and you want me to tell you there is vacumming to be done.. yup sure I'll jump right on that!

I told him I was fine.. uh huh...sure he believed me! By evening thought I knew it had been too much but I was happy sitting in the living room watching tv with Keith. I could relax. My goal this week had been to finish off some added pages for the scrapbook I had made Mom when she had been here a year and a half ago. I am going there in a few weeks and wanted to make some new pages to add to it. But I couldn't get at it as my desk was also piled high with stuff. Now it is normalized and I can function once again.

When I went to get out of bed yesterday morning I knew I was in trouble. I felt like I had been hit with a Mack truck. I don't get this. I was very careful to not bend over or to pick up things that were too heavy. I didn't move furniture around or twist around constantly but I couldn't even lift my legs to get into the shower. So I stayed home from church and just sat in my massage chair. By mid afternoon though I got up to get dinner started but was getting really light headed. I skipped dinner as I was getting nauseous. I have these amazing anti-emetics that I found that are all natural and you just put them under your tongue and within 15 minutes the nausea is gone or at least dissipating.

But around 10 it came back and this time it didn't stop at the nausea. ROSALEEN BERNADETTE AUDREY HAYSOM!!!! You made Nana sick by throwing up on her last week!! I crashed on the couch after I cleaned up and just sipped on some ice, I kept telling myself it is mind over matter. I WILL NOT get sick. I didn't sleep well at all and although I've stopped throwing up I am tired and sore.

So much for starting on my scrapbook pages! Maybe later this afternoon or evening I will feel like moving a bit more. Oh the joys of living in a worn out body lol! And the worse part? I can't even say to Keith I am really hurting as he will give me the old evil "I told you so" look hehehehe! Well I am off to go back and lay down for a rest. Then we will attempt at life again when I get up.

A Bientot mes amis :)

S.D.D.

I know that is not the right acronym for Severe Anxiety Disorder but I just made it up. It suits my mood today. It's my acronym for Sunshine Deficit Disorder. I know it is only January not even the end of it but barely beginning but I am tired of this grey cloud that hangs over us.. makes me grey inside and cranky and out of sorts. I finally did find those pictures the other day and they were right where they belonged. In the holder on my scrapbook desk waiting for the frames. Right in front of my eyes. If I thought I could do it without pulling a muscle I would kick myself in the butt!

We had grandchildren sleep over last night.Rosaleen has been sick with a slight cold but I had laid her down for a nap on the afternoon. When she woke up she had a 102.3 fever. I normally have medicine here for kids but I was out so called Daddy who sent some over. She no sooner saw the bottle she starting crying. I got a tablet in her mout but she was so agitated that she started retching finally just throwing up. Unfortunately she was sitting on my lap at the time facing me and I got it right in the face and all down my shirt and on my lap. Poor girl!!

Got her all cleaned up and she started feeling better but kept her on water and clear fluids for the rest of the night. This morning she was cool but by mid morning she was getting cranky again not knowing what she wanted. So I laid her on the couch against her very loud wishes and within minutes fell asleep.

Lareta had an early morning appointment today so the rest of her children slept over last night as well. It was really weird having to make that much breakfasts and school lunches that early in the morning. I kept thinking I was going to forget something. I think it's Nana who is going to need a nap when Papa gets home today.

But it snowed here all night..now it has been raining since early morning so what was slush at 8 am is now 6" deep of water outside our door going past the curb and covering our driveway. Kind of takes all the fun out of watching it snow. I have had lots of work to do online today and finally brought my laptop out to work in the dining room so that I could keep an eye on the 2 little girls but out here I have to use the wireless and it keeps cutting out!! Or I send an email out but because the signal strenght is low it takes forever to send in the meantime I can't send another one out. I mean what's the point of paying to have a wireless modem and the privileges of using it if you have to carry your laptop around with you as you walk through the house finding a spot that has a stronger signal!

I need chocolate!! Cranky moods equal chocolate!! But to end on a positive note.. Safeway Pharmacy called me yesterday to say I had won 1500 airmiles!!! Our local Safeway had done some extensive renovations in October and had a re-grand opening with draws. I guess I had entered and was one of the winners!! Now I can bank these for next time I want to go home for a visit :) BONUS! They said it would take 1-2 months before it shows up on my account.... there goes that patience thing again. Why does everything always end up having to deal with patience? I swear that is why I was put on earth ----to learn patience. I obviosuly was sitting in a corner talking when God handed out that piece of strenght!!

Well that's it for now.. have a great rest of you day especially you sunshiners!!!

Mental Health Day

At different jobs in my life I have seen peers take a "mental health day" off. I could never understand that. considering I have never taken sick days off from work, I didn't understand that. But yesterday I got it. I had taken all the pictures that family members had sent us at Christmas and scanned them wanting to put them all in the new frames I had gotten. Somewhere after I finished scanning them I lost them. For ELEVEN hours I looked for these dozen or so pictures. I know I had them but then they were gone. It was really weirding me out. I couldn't concentrate on anything else. I felt like I was losing my mind. Anything else I started working on yesterday I would get completely distracted and go off looking for them again.

I wanted to make a homemade chicken pot pie for supper. I had the stock simmering for hours. I got all the ingredients chopped and finally put it in the oven. After baking for an hour or so I took it out and the crust is nice and golden brown and bubbling around the edges. It smelt soooo good!! I took it out of the oven and set it on the stove to cool a bit and went to the fridge to get some salad things and there sitting on the top shelf staring at me was the bowl of chicken breasts starting at me. I went up to Keith and said sorry but we are having VEGEE pot pie,

But that's the kind of day it was for me. I hate being discombombulated. I have no focus, Ugh I hate old age. This fibrofog that is getting to me really sucks. I firmly believe it is someone else's turn to be sick and tired!!

Movies

I love watching movies. One of my absolute favorite things to do. Lately I have gotten hooked on the TCM channel watching old black and whites that has only 1-2 screen fulls of credits at the end instead of 20 minutes worth. But Saturday we decided to rent some movies. Keith picked them out and came home with them. We are usually very careful about ratings and the reason behind the ratings. One of the movies was a Steven Segal one that I had never seen. Which is amazing in itself as I think he is a fine specimen of a man and have seen most of his movies hehehe. Anyway I checked the rating and it was PG13.. ok thats usually pretty good. No nudity.. bonus...some gun violence and fight scenes..well DUH it's Steven Segal of course there are fight scenes.. and under language where normally it states by count how many swear words there are.. stated simply "pervasive language".

What the heck was that? Neither of us knew and I was too comfortable to go find it online as we don't have a dictionary so on it went while Keith got popcorn going. Well I have to say it only took about 45 seconds into the movie to understand that pervasive language means EVERY word IS a swear word. No wonder there was no count! I'm yelling at Keith in the kitchen to turn it off as he had the remote with him but the popcorn popper was whirling away and he couldn't hear me. I went in there, turned the machine off to ask him where the remote was just as we could hear stuff that made us cringe!!!

Then he asks what on earth I was watching that had language like that and I said YOU RENTED IT!! He replies he would never rent something that bad! Ok never mind that give me the remote!. Of course had I been thinking I could have just gone and turned the DVD player off by hand. Needless to say, Rogers is going to get THEIR ears full when I get there today with them asking them why they would not have a different rating on it! But what scares me the most is what kind of idiot decided that it was ok for 13 year olds to hear that kind of language in their house?????