Thanksgiving Trip
Thanksgiving this year was spent up in the Seattle area where my wife is from. It was a rather short visit this time (5 days) and I posted a few pictures of the visit, including one of the rain when we landed. Winter months are generally not very nice in the pacific northwest, but it is usually a mixture of clouds and drizzle. This was full on downpour!
One of my Facebook friends commented on the picture of the rain with "So, what's your first impression of the Northwest?" I kind of chuckled at that after thinking about how many trips I have made up there. We have been married 28 years now, and have gone to visit at least once, and more often twice a year. If I guess conservatively at half the years were twice, that amounts to 42 trips to the Seattle area! I think I might need to start filing state taxes there.
My wife's father continues to worry us a lot, he seems to slip a bit more each time we visit. He met us for lunch and then had to call for help because he couldn't remember where he parked his car at. At his house, all the stuff that was beside his wife's bedside when she passed away 3 years ago is still sitting there in the spare bedroom. Nothing is cleaned up or thrown out, and I think the family needs to come together and have a work party to get the house in shape.
Skyler loves going there and seeing all the family, and he got to see his favorite cousin, Kirsten. She is great with him and he loves her. He also has to have us call or text his aunt Karen with everything that happens in his life. They all are really nice to him.
We are also worried about my wife's oldest sister's husband. He has cancer in his esophagus, shoulder, and hip. He is going through radiation and chemo, and we will have to just wait and see if it makes a difference. It is not a good situation.
It is good to be back home though, where it is so much easier to take care of Skyler than it is on the road. The hardest thing is to bathe him, when we don't have his bath chair to sit in. We wind up doing lots of sponge baths, and that worked when he was little, but now he is a young man with "guy stink"!
I hope all of you had a good Thanksgiving holiday, take care.
One of my Facebook friends commented on the picture of the rain with "So, what's your first impression of the Northwest?" I kind of chuckled at that after thinking about how many trips I have made up there. We have been married 28 years now, and have gone to visit at least once, and more often twice a year. If I guess conservatively at half the years were twice, that amounts to 42 trips to the Seattle area! I think I might need to start filing state taxes there.
My wife's father continues to worry us a lot, he seems to slip a bit more each time we visit. He met us for lunch and then had to call for help because he couldn't remember where he parked his car at. At his house, all the stuff that was beside his wife's bedside when she passed away 3 years ago is still sitting there in the spare bedroom. Nothing is cleaned up or thrown out, and I think the family needs to come together and have a work party to get the house in shape.
Skyler loves going there and seeing all the family, and he got to see his favorite cousin, Kirsten. She is great with him and he loves her. He also has to have us call or text his aunt Karen with everything that happens in his life. They all are really nice to him.
We are also worried about my wife's oldest sister's husband. He has cancer in his esophagus, shoulder, and hip. He is going through radiation and chemo, and we will have to just wait and see if it makes a difference. It is not a good situation.
It is good to be back home though, where it is so much easier to take care of Skyler than it is on the road. The hardest thing is to bathe him, when we don't have his bath chair to sit in. We wind up doing lots of sponge baths, and that worked when he was little, but now he is a young man with "guy stink"!
I hope all of you had a good Thanksgiving holiday, take care.
LOL, "guy stink"!
ReplyDeleteHaha, dude, if you smelled me when I came off the treadmill today, you'd take the guy stink. :)
ReplyDeletePhew, running can make you smell worse than a block of old cheese.
You're welcome!
It's raining here too, if that makes a difference. Rain, rain, rain.
Well, I'm behind you in the count, but I've been out there 11 times now (New Year's will be a dozen). I know what you mean about thinking you could file taxes. It's like my 3rd home.
ReplyDeleteSounds like the visit was a mixed bag. That's kinda rough. Glad you're home, and hope you aren't buying any emergency tickets out there any time soon.
I've been to MN at least a dozen times...and the older I get, the harder it gets. For me, it's the bathroom too. Most people have tile floors but my feet can't grip so I go flying. It's soooo much easier at home where my bathroom floor has low-grade carpeting.
ReplyDeleteI would love to visit the Northwest some time...and Colorado (again). You'd let me visit, wouldn't you? ; )
Ha, good job Skyler isn't chunky!
ReplyDeleteI've never been to that part of the country. Glad you had a good holiday. Getting old's a real bitch, ain't it?
ReplyDeleteRecent events have reminded me that everyone deals with grief in their own way. I try and remember that when I see closets still stuffed with my mom's clothes, and her things in the medicine cabinet. It's incredibly frustrating, but it's not a real health or safety issue so I keep my mouth shut. On the other hand, ignoring the garbage until it starts to smell, or not doing anything about the dog crap that piles up on the lawn is a real problem. I have friends and family who have had to deal with a relative's memory loss. It's heartbreaking.
ReplyDeleteLoving family is wonderful, and when they get sick the loving gets more concentrated, don't you think?
ReplyDeleteTraveling must involve some amazing logistics for you and Skyler. But kudos to ALL of you for doing it anyway.
It's not the rain the at bugs me about Seattle's winters, it's how the rain seems to turn rob everything of color. Everything is gray for months and months. Depressing!
ReplyDeleteSorry about the bad parts, but it does sound like some of it was good too.
ReplyDeleteBest wishes to K's father and B-I-L, but it makes these visits all the more important and something to be treasured. Glad to see the good parts seemed really good.
ReplyDeleteWe took Lynnie to Bill's daughter's house and then to my daughter's house. By the time we got back to Stillwater, it was 9:30 and all the other residents were in bed. He ate like a pig and seemed to have a blast.
ReplyDelete