Author: edebock

Summer sales!

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LogoIt seems like summer has hardly arrived in our part of the world and already retailers are selling off their summer stock and preparing for the next season. It’s a great time to perk up your summer wardrobe at discount prices.

Those of you who have been reading my Fashion Friday posts for the past couple of years are aware of the fact that I’m a cabi girl. Cabi clothes, sold through direct sales, are fun, fashionable, and good quality, but they’re a bit pricey for this frugal fashionista. That’s why I love it when my cabi consultant holds her end of season sales!

On my recent visit to her beautiful in-home boutique, I came away with a couple of delightful buys. Today I’m wearing the Poet Blouse. I love the uneven hemline and the feminine flair of this ruffled bohemian top. The lightweight sheer poly drapes beautifully and gives the blouse an airy feel on hot summer days. Its muted colour palette of beige, soft pink, green, yellow and black adds versatility allowing it to be worn with many different bottoms.

Perhaps the most surprising and delightful aspect of the Poet Blouse is that it’s really two garments in one. Snap the tank top liner off at the shoulders and it can be worn on its own or mixed and matched with other garments. The overtop could also be worn over a different tank or camisole to add a solid colour at the neckline. The versatility is endless!

The tank isn’t limited only to summer. Under a cardigan or jacket, it will move right into fall with me.

Have you checked out any summer sales? Did you find any bargains?

Devon to Edmonton by kayak

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On July 16, 2008 we climbed Mt Fuji, Japan’s most famous peak. Yesterday, exactly ten years later to the day, we kayaked the North Saskatchewan River from Devon, Alberta to Edmonton, which turned out to be a much easier challenge. Much easier, in fact, than we had expected it to be.

According to the Edmonton Canoe website which offers all day excursions, the 33.6 km paddle would take “five to six leisurely hours.” Maybe in canoe. Maybe if you just floated and didn’t paddle. Maybe, but not in our kayak!

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At exactly 10:00 AM, with the help of our daughter-in-law who dropped us off and delivered the vehicle to our end point, we launched the kayak at Devon’s Voyageur Park and headed down river. We usually paddle quite vigorously, but expecting this to be a longer trip than any we’d done before, we reminded ourselves to set a leisurely pace. After all, the river would do some of the work for us. In fact, even if we stopped paddling altogether, we’d eventually reach our destination!

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The day was perfect, hot and sunny with a gentle breeze to keep us comfortable. We aren’t white water kayakers. This stretch of the North Saskatchewan flows steadily, but there are no rapids to contend with. Though there was the occasional small eddy, for the most part the water was very calm. With few other boaters on the river, it was very peaceful and we spotted a couple of deer as well as a bald eagle, though not close enough to get pictures.

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An hour after setting off, we broke for a snack and drifted by the Blackhawk Golf Club on our left. Forty minutes later, we passed the Windermere Golf and Country Club on our right and one of the golfers hailed us with a hearty “Ahoy!” We’d been told that this course was located at approximately our half way point. Already? How could that be?

Sure enough, we’d been paddling less than two hours when the Anthony Henday bridge came into view and it was exactly noon when we passed under it! We hadn’t even stopped for lunch yet and we were already entering Edmonton!

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We found a spot along the riverbank of Terwillegar Park where we could pull ashore for lunch and a rest before finishing our journey.

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When we spotted two replica York boats at anchor we knew that we were passing Fort Edmonton. Imagine taking one of those all the way to Hudson Bay with a heavy load of furs!

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Around the next bend we saw the Whitemud bridge and knew that our destination, the Sir Wilfred Laurier Park boat launch, was just beyond it. We pulled the kayak out of the water at 2:00 PM. The anticipated 5 or 6 hour trip took us only 4. Considering the fact that we spent 45 minutes on shore over lunch, it wasn’t any longer and was actually an easier paddle than last week’s jaunt on the Battle River!

I’m sure that we’ll never climb Mt Fuji again, but I definitely want to do another trip on the North Saskatchewan! I’d like the next one to be longer though.

#13 Haunted Lakes

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Sometimes we travel long distances to see new sights when there are hidden gems right on our own doorsteps. Though they’re only about an hour and a half from home, I’d never heard of Haunted Lakes until I started looking for new places to golf and kayak.

According to legend, the natives of the plains had been in the habit of pitching their teepees on the eastern shore of the larger of the two small lakes. Once, in midwinter, seven braves camped there overnight and when they woke the next morning, they spotted the head and antlers of a magnificent buck that was caught in the ice on the other side of the lake. They hastened across the ice to claim their prize, but as soon as they started to chop the ice around the antlers, the mighty beast, still very much alive, broke free and smashing a passageway before him, swam straight to shore and disappeared into the woods. All seven braves were drowned and it is claimed that their spirits still haunt the lake. Supposedly, every winter when the lake is frozen over, a huge fissure appears along the exact path that the deer traveled to shore.

Not being even slightly superstitious, I thought it was pretty funny when I phoned ahead to reserve a camp spot and was told that we would be in site #13! It was actually the perfect spot for us as we were able to launch the kayak directly from our campsite.

I absolutely loved the picturesque Haunted Lakes golf course!

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Never before have I had to tee off with a freight train thundering overhead!

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After playing 18 holes our first day there, we kayaked the perimeter of the lake in the evening. Though it was bigger than it appeared from the campsite, it took just a little over an hour. Later, as we sat outside the trailer doing our devotions and enjoying the evening air, Richard glanced up and noticed what looked to him like the hand of God hovering over the water!

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Our first day at Haunted Lakes was so perfect that we  hoped to repeat it the next day, but after 16 holes of golf, we were driven off the course by thunder rumbling overhead and rain beginning to fall. We spent the remainder of the day hunkered down in the trailer listening to the rain on the roof and watching the wind churn up the lake. Considering how dry it’s been here in central Alberta, we weren’t terribly disappointed, but I look forward to returning again some day and hopefully enjoying more sunshine!

IMG_20180712_133842499_HDRSince this is supposed to be Fashion Friday, here’s a picture of me golfing on another course on our little trip. This is a typical golfing outfit for me. As long as the weather allows, I’ll be found on the course wearing shorts or a skort, a sleeveless golf shirt, a ball cap, and golf sandals. And yes, that’s a knee brace. According to one of my doctors, my knees are older than the rest of me! That’s a nice way of saying that they’re arthritic. I bought the brace mainly for hiking, but since 18 holes of golf (even with a cart) was beginning to cause discomfort, I decided to try it for golfing too and found it very comfortable.

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Strong arms at the ready?

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I lift weights every winter to keep in shape, but this past winter I had a more specific goal to spur me on. I wanted to be able to paddle our kayak longer than I could last summer without feeling like my arms were going to fall off! In particular, I wanted to be able to do a five or six hour trip on the North Saskatchewan River this summer. I started lifting earlier in the fall than I usually do and I continued later into the spring. By the time I quit, just before my May 23 cancer treatment, I was lifting more than I had for several years!

No, we haven’t done that kayak trip yet, but over the past three days, I’ve tested out those arms and shoulders and I think I can do it! On Wednesday we played 18 holes of golf in our local seniors tournament. That’s not a big deal, but then on Thursday we paddled the kayak for more than three hours. Last year that would have been more than I could handle and I must admit that by the time we finished, my arms were sore. I went to bed that night wondering if I really could handle the long river trip, but when I woke up the soreness was gone and I golfed another 18 holes!

Thursday’s excursion took us back to the Battle River, a tributary of the North Saskatchewan  that meanders through central Alberta and western Saskatchewan. Starting at Big Knife Provincial Park, we paddled upstream for an hour an a half. The river moves slowly, so paddling against the flow isn’t as challenging as it might sound.

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Other than waterfowl, we didn’t see any wildlife, but we were both reminded of Psalm 50:10 when we saw the cows grazing on the grassy hills overlooking parts of the river. “Every animal of the forest is mine, and the cattle on a thousand hills.”

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Can you see the curious bovine faces peeking at us in this one?

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Holding the camera still enough in a moving kayak to get crisp photos with the zoom lens is virtually impossible, but I did manage to get this one of a very protective Mama duck and her offspring.

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We really weren’t very close, but she squawked and flapped about in quite a frenzy trying to warn us away from her lone duckling. I’m sure her poor heart was beating faster than any duck’s is meant to and I wished I could reassure her that we were no threat. As if scaring her once wasn’t enough, we met her again in exactly the same spot on our trip back down the river. This time Junior was hidden somewhere in the reeds, but once again she did her best to scare us away.

In spite of the fact that the Battle moves slowly, the trip downstream should have been a bit quicker, but we were bucking a stiff wind much of the way and it took a little longer than we expected. We were glad when the bright yellow buoy marking the location of the Big Knife boat launch came into view!

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There will be more kayaking and more golf before we tackle the North Saskatchewan, but campgrounds with decent wifi are few and far between, so it might be a little while before I can post again. Even this one took hours to put together!

 

Trailer packing

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LogoIn a previous packing post, I mentioned that there are some items that I can take with me in the trailer that don’t pack well in a suitcase. Since we’re out and about with the trailer this week, I thought I’d share my trailer packing techniques today.

As RVs go, our travel trailer is small; just 24 feet from hitch to bumper with no slide-outs. Though we’ve managed to squeeze in an extra adult and two kids on a couple of occasions, it’s really perfect for just the two of us.

One of the things that attracted me to this particular unit when we bought it was the amount of storage space. Last summer, we spent a full six weeks on the road and if I remember correctly, other than washing my bras by hand, we did laundry three times. This year, we’re planning shorter jaunts, but even on a long trip like that one, I had no problem fitting in enough clothes.

On our current trip, we plan to play several rounds of golf and do quite a bit of kayaking, but we’ll also be spending time in urban settings and we plan to attend church on Sunday. When I was packing the weather forecast looked very favourable, but we all know how quickly that can change, so I packed for a variety of activities and conditions. In fact, I probably packed way more than I’ll actually need!

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The trailer bathroom has a roomy closet where we hang most of our clothes. I’m showing you only my half. As you can see, I packed mostly neutral colours, so that it’s easy to mix things up and create many looks with just a few garments. I do like brightly coloured golf shirts though, so you can see some of those in there and I added my bright red jeans for an additional pop of colour. Although the closet isn’t full length, I did manage to take a dress all the way to Dawson City, Yukon for our nephew’s wedding last summer. I hung it at the end of the closet against the wall and laid the bottom portion of the skirt flat being careful not to pile anything on it.

A second smaller closet near the entrance to the trailer is used for jackets and there’s room beneath them for hats.

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The trailer does have a couple of drawers that we could use for clothing, but we have chosen other uses for them. The one in the bathroom holds toiletries, medications, a travel blow dryer and a handy little travel iron as well as a a few other odds and ends. The reason that we don’t need to use the drawers for clothing is that as soon as I spotted the storage space under the foot of our queen bed, I had a brainwave. I bought each of us a plastic bin to fit into that space. Mine holds socks, underwear, camisoles, pyjamas, shorts and skorts… everything that would usually be folded in drawers. They make packing very simple as we can carry our bins into the house, load them up, and return them to the trailer. Easy peasy!

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Just inside the trailer door there’s a cubby where we pack our shoes. There are usually more shoes crammed in there than you can see here, but Richard hadn’t packed his in yet. What you see is my trusty Merrells used mostly for hiking; some old shoes, sandals and flip flops that I use only around the campground, and the slippers that we keep in the trailer for chilly evenings and mornings. The cupboard is much bigger than it looks from the outside, so there are other things hidden in behind including shoe boxes that hold my dressier shoes and sandals.

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I don’t anticipate having access to wifi very often on this trip, but I look forward to sharing our travels with you as I’m able. If there isn’t a Fashion Friday post next week, be sure to look for one again the week after.

The jacket!

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Melania Trump jacket

I REALLY DON’T CARE. DO U?

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Thursday of last week we were pulling into the central Alberta city of Red Deer to participate in a convention that I’d been preparing for since early April when I received a message from one of our daughters-in-law alerting me to Melania Trump’s latest fashion faux pas. My post for the following morning was already ready to publish and there was no time to write a new one. Though the furor has died down and I’m a week late, I still can’t help commenting.

When we lived in Japan, it wasn’t unusual to see someone wearing a t-shirt, sweatshirt, or jacket bearing a message written in garbled English. Sometimes those messages made absolutely no sense and sometimes they were extremely vulgar. The one that stands out most strongly in my memory was a young teenage girl wearing a t-shirt with PEDOPHILE BAIT boldly blazoned across her chest. Surely neither she nor her parents knew what that message meant. In fact, most of the Japanese who wear these garments have no idea what they mean. It’s simply popular to wear English.

I wish I could believe that Melania Trump didn’t know exactly what I DON’T REALLY CARE. DO U?  meant! I don’t believe in putting other women down for what they choose to wear, but Melania is a public figure whose conduct and choices have an impact far beyond herself. The message on her jacket would be completely inappropriate for the first lady of any country anytime, but it was made even worse by the fact that she was on her way to visit a few of the more than 2000 immigrant children wrested from their parents’ arms at the Mexico/US border and being held in various shelters around the country.

What was she thinking? What could possibly have possessed her when she got dressed that morning? And where were her advisors? She knew that her surprise visit to the border would attract plenty of media attention. If the intent of her trip was to demonstrate her care for the children who have been separated from their imprisoned parents, the message on her jacket seemed completely contradictory. Or was this a carefully thought out plan by Melania herself or someone behind the scenes to deflect attention away from the humanitarian crisis itself?

The president weighed in later in the day defending his wife’s choice of jacket by tweeting, “I REALLY DON’T CARE, DO U?” written on the back of Melania’s jacket, refers to the Fake News Media. Melania has learned how dishonest they are, and she truly no longer cares!” Sadly, his message made no more sense than the one on the back of her jacket and it contradicted Melania’s spokesperson, Stephanie Grisham, who said, “It’s a jacket. There was no hidden message.”

So why did she pick that particular jacket to wear? Melaina Trump has been carefully crafting her public image for decades. I can’t believe that she simply grabbed any old jacket without thinking about how it might be interpreted. She has lots of jackets and I believe that she chose this one very deliberately. I can only assume that she wanted it to send a message, but to who? And why? We can only speculate.

This isn’t the first time I’ve had something to say about one of Melania’s jackets. First there was the $51 000 Dolce & Gabbana that she wore when she arrived in Sicily last year, but my indignation over that one pales in comparison to this $39 one from Zara!

Melania Trump jacket

Living a life of significance

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I think it’s safe to say that most people yearn for significance. Perhaps when we’re young, we’re too busy to think about what that means or to wonder if what we’re doing will have lasting significance, but those of us in the second half of life, especially those who have entered their retirement years, may struggle with finding purpose or significance in their daily lives.

Significant Living - Jerry & Shirley RoseSo what does living a life of significance really mean? Significance can be defined as “being worthy of attention” or “meaningful”. It begins with the word “sign” for a reason. A thing’s significance is a sign of its importance.

I’ve just finished reading Significant Living: A Road Map for the Second Half of Your Life by Jerry and Shirley Rose. One of the things that the Roses point out is what significance is not. 

“Some people confuse significance with success” but they are not the same thing. Many so-called successful lives lack true significance.

It’s very easy in this day and age, when we’re exposed to the lives of the rich and famous through the media, to feel that we’ve somehow missed the boat if we haven’t done something truly big with our lives, but what does significance really look like? The answer will be different for each one of us, but again I quote the Roses, “For some, significance may come through mentoring or having a significant influence on the family. It may be starting a business or doing volunteer work. The important thing is not the size of what we do. Whether our pursuits are ‘big’ or ‘small’ the importance lies in filling a need in the lives of other people. Significance usually translates into getting involved with others.”

That definitely resonated with me. I do want to make it clear, however, that in our relationships, and particularly in marriage, we ought not to depend on another person to give our lives significance. Significance should come not from another person, but rather, from how your life affects the lives of others.

The simple key to living a life of significance is to share your time, talent, and treasure with others. Those of us who have reached retirement age usually have an abundance of time to give. Chances are, we have also developed skills and talents that can be used to better the lives of others. Regardless of where you are in life, you don’t have to be wealthy to give generously of what you do have to worthwhile causes, to family, or to friends in need.

For me, significance begins by knowing that God has a purpose for my life and that I am using the gifts He has given me to impact the lives of other people. I believe that the most significant thing I ever accomplished was raising my children to be the responsible young adults that they are today. I know that I also had a significant impact on at least some of the students that I taught during my career. Now that my children are grown and I’ve retired from teaching, it would be easy to feel that my significance had waned, but that is not the case. Even in our very small rural community there are many opportunities to volunteer time and talent. Over the past couple of years I’ve had the pleasure of teaching two young immigrant women who never had the opportunity to receive a formal education how to read. I’ve also done online editing and mentoring, again on a volunteer basis. If anything I’ve said on the blog has impacted another person in a positive way, that too has added significance to my life.

Do you feel that your life lacks significance? Consider your gifts and passions, then look for ways to use them to impact others. Are you living a life of significance? If so, please share what it is that makes your life meaningful. Perhaps it will help someone else!

 

 

Should I keep it?

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LogoTwo of my favourite fashion bloggers, Pamela Lutrell who writes Over50Feeling40 and Jennifer Connolly of A Well Styled Life, write a weekly Would You Wear It feature in which they each post photos of a mannequin they’ve found and ask if their readers would wear what its wearing. Today I’m going to do something similar only instead of a mannequin, you’re seeing me and I’m asking Should I Keep It?

One of my fashion goals this season is to cull my summer closet removing older, worn, or unused items that are simply taking up space. This dress, purchased at one of our local thrift stores a few years ago, didn’t come out of my closet last summer and I’m debating whether to keep it or let it go.

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I don’t wear dresses very often but this one seems casual, bold, and a bit quirky, all things that I’d like my summer wardrobe to say. The bodice is a bit snug, but it’s just  loose enough around the midriff to hide the bulges that lurk there and I love the double slits front and back that make it cool, comfortable, and easy to walk in. Many women in my age range don’t like to bare their arms, but I love to go sleeveless in the summer.

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I’m wearing it with a favourite bracelet, a piece of wearable art that picks up the colours in the dress, and a pair of dark brown American Eagle gladiator sandals that were also second-hand.

So, what do you think? Should I keep the dress or pass it on? Please give reasons for your answer.

Packing fail?

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LogoWe’re home from Vancouver and I just unpacked a dress, two pairs of capris, a pair of cropped pants, and four tops that never came out of the suitcase during the sixteen days that we were away from home! Considering how much time we spend living out of a suitcase, that definitely felt like a packing failure, but was it?

Why did it happen? Spring and fall are easily the most difficult times of year to pack efficiently for in this part of the world. Weather can vary widely and one needs to be prepared for almost any eventuality. It was 30ºC (86ºF) when I was packing. but I knew it wouldn’t be that hot in Vancouver. I packed for a variety of weather conditions, but I definitely wasn’t prepared for the month that Vancouverites are referring to as Junuary! I expected cool days, but also some warmer ones, but day after day it was cool and damp with temperatures in the mid teens. I only wore my sandals and the third pair of capris in the suitcase once. Thankfully, the day that we played tourist was the nicest one of our stay.

Two of the tops were definitely a packing fail. I actually considered wearing them, but in spite of careful folding, they came out of the suitcase looking creased and crumpled. When I shop for clothing, packability is one of the factors that I consider, but these two were hand-me-downs from my sister-in-law. I hadn’t traveled with them before and I learned that I’ll be able take them with me in the trailer where I can hang them up, but not when I’m traveling with a suitcase.

So how did I manage when my choices of what to wear were severely limited? Three factors saved the day:

  1. The morning we left home was a cool one prompting me to add one more pair of jeans and a long sleeved t-shirt to the suitcase at the last moment. I was very thankful for those two extra pieces!
  2. The majority of what I packed was neutral in colour allowing me to mix and match, creating a variety of different looks with a limited number of pieces.
  3. I packed plenty of layering pieces including two camis for added warmth under lightweight tops, a jean jacket, a lightweight cardigan, and my cabi waterfront shirt from several seasons ago.

Regardless of season or destination, the latter two are always keys to successful packing. So, while this wasn’t the best packing job I’ve ever done, it wasn’t a total fail!

Celebrating 95!

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Our main reason for choosing this particular time to come to Vancouver was the fact that my father was turning 95. Rather than all three of we Alberta siblings visiting at once to help Dad celebrate this momentous occasion, we determined some time ago that it works better if we space our visits out giving him company more often. Thus it fell upon me to make this birthday a special one, but I certainly didn’t do it on my own.

On Dad’s actual birthday last Tuesday we took him to his favourite restaurant for dinner. There were four generations at the table that evening. We told Dad that our son, Matt, would pick him up after work and bring him to the restaurant where we would meet them along with Matt’s wife, Robin, and their two boys. What we didn’t tell him was that Matt would be driving the Beatrice, the 1983 Volkswagen Westfalia van that my parents picked up at the factory in Germany, lived in in Europe for over a year, and that Dad drove until just a few years ago when his sight began to fail! It’s now one of Matt’s most prized possessions and the grin on Dad’s face as they pulled up to the restaurant was heartwarming.

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Dinner out, as nice as it was, wasn’t enough to mark reaching such an amazing milestone, however, so we hosted a birthday party at Matt and Robin’s home yesterday afternoon, managing to pull together a group of sixteen relatives, again representing four generations of Dad’s family. There were cousins and second cousins and cousins once removed, though I’ve never really figured out for sure what those terms mean! I just call them all cousins. There were relatives who hardly knew one another and spouses that some had never met. It was truly an enjoyable occasion and though I’m sure he was quite exhausted by the time the festivities were over, Dad was delighted to see everyone.

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