A Much Needed Vacation

I spent 10 wonderful days at my parents house in Victoria from Oct 10 to 19.

It was relaxing and wonderful and exactly what I needed.  I have not booked a full week off work since last September, and I was definitely due for some time away.

I arrived in Victoria on Friday morning (October the 10th).  My dad and I drove over to The Rootcellar and picked up vegetables for Thanksgiving dinner as well as the Turkey we had ordered. We were going to have the big family meal with all the fixings on Saturday as my cousin, his wife, and 5.5 month-old son were going to come over from Surrey.

Saturday (October 11), we visited with my cousins and played with the baby.  He is so darn cute and is working on being able to sit up unassisted.  My cousin's wife added me to her iPhone picture group and now I have hundreds of photos of their son, plus I get updates.  We had our Thanksgiving dinner with maple pecan pie and pumpkin pie for dessert.  Everything was delicious, although we somehow forgot to put the cranberry sauce on the table.

Sunday (October 12), the visitors left and we had leftovers for dinner plus the cranberry sauce.

On Monday a nurse came in to take care of my grandmother for 3 hours.  My parents and I went to Wal-Mart uptown and then lunch at Milestones.  It was nice to just hang out with them.  I felt like an only child, lol.

Tuesday started off with my dad and I trying to get blood work done on my grandmother.  Something about the lab being busy, and nothing being checked off on the requisition form, and they turned us away saying they needed an order from a BC doctor.  So we went over to the walk-in clinic at the Superstore where there was a very short wait and they had her already on file from a previous visit. Later, my mom dropped my dad off at the airport in the afternoon for his weekly trip back to Edmonton.  My grandmother and I continued to work on her puzzle.  Actually, we had bought a few 300-large-piece puzzles, and she was able to do them pretty much on her own.  But I would help with a piece or two every once in a while.

My grandmother and I watched a submarine head out from the naval yard.

Wednesday my mom and I took my grandmother, along with the BC requisition, to get her blood work done.  We had good timing and were in and out fairly quickly.  I also went for a nice walk along the top of the hill where my parent's live.

Thursday is another day when a nurse comes in to take care of my grandmother.  My mom had a physio appointment and so I had lunch at Floyd's Diner and enjoyed a dish called Jack's Toast with the Candied Banana topping.

Then I made a trip to Michael's, and then I went back to pick up my mom.  Later a woman came in to do my grandmother's hair (curl and style).  I also went to pick my dad up from the airport.  I only missed one turn, because I could not get into the right lane (too busy), but I remembered that I could take a different exit a few blocks up, so it was all good.

Friday my dad and I made another trip to the Rootcellar.  I could have filled the shopping cart with apples & pears and been very happy.

We also ordered Romeo's pizza for dinner.  It's my favourite pizza place.  I got the Maui Luau (with no chedder) and I froze the leftovers and brought them home with me.  Yummy.

It was a windy, drizzly day, but I got some awesome pictures of the waves on Lagoon Road.

 

Saturday we went out to the Keg for dinner in a super old building on Quadra St in Saanich.  I realized it had been ages since I had a good steak.  Mmmmm red meat deliciousness.

All too soon it was Sunday and I headed home.  It was a beautiful day and I ate lunch sitting on the deck and watching the sailboats.

I don't know why, but we left for the airport at 2:45 for my 4:00pm flight.  So when I got to the counter at 3:30pm, they had closed the flight for checked baggage.  I got rebooked on the 5:00pm flight to Vancouver (instead of going through Calgary), but all the flights out of Vancouver (on Air Canada) were booked with people already on stand-by.  I ended up on the 9:55pm flight to Edmonton and crawled into bed after 1:00am.  I was tired Monday, but mostly I just wanted to still be on vacation.  I also learned that I need to make sure I am at the airport 1 hour before the flight leaves the hard way, lol.