Eddie and I went to Florida in August to attend my 40th high school reunion where I was able to introduce him to some friends that I haven’t seen in decades. In this picture I am with my very dear girlfriends Maria, Christy and Irene. We have been friends since we started Greek School together at around age 6. We share many memories.
We started our reunion with an evening boat cruise on the Anclote River and then met again the next night for dinner and reminiscing. It was such a wonderful time of getting caught up and sharing stories of our children and life experiences. My only regret was that the others in our little group (Terry, Fontaine, Marie) couldn’t be there. We were entertained by Maggie, another Greek School buddy, who was our social butterfly and knew the whereabouts and details of just about everyone in Tarpon Springs. I have to say I am sold on reunions and look forward to our next one.
Our class president and friend, George Zissimopolous, yet another Greek School friend, was unable to attend the reunion because of a battle with cancer. We hope and pray for a full recovery for you George and am sorry you couldn’t be with us.
Here’s a short video of the reunion:
Attending the reunion was just a part of what we did on our trip. My Aunt Grace passed away days before we arrived and we were able to attend her memorial service. It was a bitter sweet time as we were reunited with two of my cousins, Kim and Harry Miradakis. Harry I hadn’t seen in 41 years ! Kim was primary care giver for Aunt Grace for 11 years and is such an inspiration to me. Aunt Grace was married to my Uncle Coacho who is my dad’s brother.
Here is a short smilebox of the family visits we had. I’m so happy we were able to see so many people on this trip. My next post will be about our Toronto trip where we celebrated Eddie’s and Bob’s birthdays - so keep checking the blog!
After hours and hours and days and days, Eddie finally won the game BUBBLES (see side bar). He called me in the room for that precious last shot and I made him wait until I grabbed my camera. Although we were disappointed at the lack of fanfare from the program it didn’t dampen our excitement! (Cheers and applause were added by me to enhance the moment!)
For those of you who are hooked on this game the pressure is ON! You CAN win. So let me know when you do and I’ll tell the world through my blog (Lisa - I’m talking to you, girl!)
Ottawa has so many festivals! Bluesfest was July 8 - 19 and Eddie was able to get two tickets to see Blue Rodeo.This band has been one of my favorites for years and I was pretty excited to see them again. I have some pretty funny memories of a concert we went to as a family at Massey Hall in Toronto. There I was enjoying a Jim Cuddy solo while the rest of my family were sound asleep (You know you were ! !). I really think Eddie enjoyed the concert this time, even though it was outdoors, we were standing and it was raining - ha ha ha. Click here to see a short Utube with some of my favorite songs.
We went to Toronto July 26-28 to celebrate Jason’s, Ronnie’s and my birthday. Alice had us all over for a BBQ. Irene and Gordon couldn’t make it as they are busy packing up their things for their big move to Toronto this month. We had a BBQ feast - it was amazing - and then topped it off with a mango mousse cake. Thank you everyone!
During our short stay in Toronto Alice and I spent an afternoon shopping at Pacific Mall looking for knock-off purses for my friends Cassandra and Lisa. We had such a fun time and Alice was able to get us some great deals. I look forward to doing it again - what do you think, Alice? Click here for some pics of our family BBQ.
Vivian, a co-worker of Eddie’s at Minto, drove back to Ottawa with us. The next weeked was the Civic Holiday in Ontario and so she brought her two children over a couple of times to play in the pool. Eddie and I were smitten by Melanie and Zachary. Hope y’all come again soon! Here are some pics of our weekend.
Last week Irene drove eight hours to Ottawa from London. We had a relaxed and enjoyable visit. The weather was wet so we mostly stayed home. Mike and Melissa joined us for sushi on Friday night and then the three of us had dim sum on Sat. We managed to get in the pool for about 20 mins on Saturday night but it was chilly. After church and our usually PHO lunch downtown, Irene headed back to London. This is probably the last time she will be making that long drive to see us as she and Gordon will be moving to Toronto soon where Gordon will be attending Seneca College. That means they will be at least two hours closer to us - yeah! Glad you could visit us, Irene!
On Friday, June 19, my mother-in-law, sister-in-law and her fiance Bob and Eddie’s cousin Patrick (who lives in Indiana) came over for a visit. We enjoyed a leisurely dinner Friday night and then were hot to trot on Saturday morning.
We started Saturday with garage sales in the neighbourhood. That made us really hungry and so our next stop was for dim sum where me met up with cousin Ting. After that we headed to the Experimental Farm to see the flowers again. We found that the Iris plants had peaked the week before when Eddie and I were there but the peonies were spectacular. From the Farm we went to the ByWard Market so Patrick could taste his first ever Beaver Tail and enjoyed watching the festivities. Our next stop was the Royal Canadian Mint. We took a tour and learned a lot about what is produced in Ottawa and Winnipeg.
Jason was with his friend, Lora, at her parents home about an hour from Ottawa so he met up with Eddie after we explored the Mint. We came home for a rest and a swim before heading out for dinner with cousin Ting and Tyrone. By 10 pm we were exhausted and very full!
Bob prepared our Sunday Father’s Day breakfast which we really enjoyed. Thanks Bob. 3 1/2 hours later we ate again! Lora picked Jason up and headed for Toronto while the rest of us headed over to Saigon Boy for PHO. It was a fun and food-fill weekend with decent weather and lots of laughs.
Alice and Bob brought me some plants for our garden and then she went to our next door neighbour and took a trunk load of plants back to Toronto. Our neighbour has a green thumb with perennials covering most of the front and back of her house.
Originally this weekend was to include Pauline from Australia but unfortunately her health prevented her from making the trip to Canada. Hope you are feeling better, Pauline.
Remember when April showers brought May flowers? Well that doesn’t happen any more because it rains non stop in MAY! Ottawa has a Tulip Festival in May and Jason, Irene, Gordon, Nancy, George, Eleni and Erin all came to visit us and to see the tulips . . . but it was too cold and it RAINED. I had visions of us all tip-toeing through the tulips but we never saw them. However, that did not stop us from have a great time together and doing other things. We even celebrated Irene’s birthday!. To prove what a happy time we had take a look at our pictures HERE. Hint: If you click on a picture you can zoom in for a better look.
Later on in the month Eddie had a business trip to Florida from Tuesday to Friday. I had great plans of digging in the garden and planting flowers - NOT. The rain kept me indoors most of the time he was away. During a rare dry moment though, we had a blue spruce tree and an old mock orange bush removed from the front of the house. It broke our hearts to have to destroy the tree but it was getting too big and was too close to the house. We had three garden/tree specialists all tell us it had to go. Of course, I had my camera ready to record it all for Eddie to see. As I write this he’s on the plane waiting to take off from Ft. Lauderdale to Montreal and then on to Ottawa. I haven’t told him the tree is gone - I’ll let you know if notices it right away. Meanwhile here is the video. (This may take a few minutes to load.)
I am looking forward to a dry and warm month of June.
April was so busy that I got lost in all the photos and events. It started with a trip to Florida April 5-16. Next was a visit with some friends here in Ottawa and then a trip to Toronto. I really wanted to have our photos posted sooner but this switch from PC to MAC is slowing me down.
Our trip to Florida was fun. We managed to see many of my family members and even some school friends - some I haven’t seen in 40 years! I overlapped with my sister (Nancy) and brother-in-law (George) for one day at the beginning of my visit and then at the end overlapped a day with my niece (Eleni) and her daughter (Erin). In between we had a private tour of the new culinary school at my High School. This new building/school is the result of my cousin Manuel’s vision and dream and was very impressive. Way to go, Mr. Gombos!
Eddie was able to join us the weekend of my mother’s birthday (April 11). We celebrated at Mama’s Restaurant. We were able to do a little gardening and enjoy being together. Here are the Florida pictures.
Their visit was far too short but the next weekend Eddie and I went to Toronto where we saw them again as they helped us celebrate Peter’s birthday. I also saw many of my dear friends from Ladies Group and Bridletowne that weekend. Here are those pictures.
So, you can see that April was a blur and a lot of fun. May has also been busy and I will be posting about that very soon.
I’ve been in Florida since April 5. I came down to be with my mom for her 83rd birthday which was on April 11. While here I found some old pics on my PC and showed them to Mom. She gave me a few more to scan and I put together a small (almost eight minutes) slide show. Some of these pics are of Mom and her two sisters growing up but most were taken during my lifetime. There are hundreds more - probably thousands - but these are all I have for now. I’m still learning how to use my Mac so putting this together was a real learning experience for me. I wish Jason and Irene were here to help me! Anyway, here is the slide show.
I hope to post my Florida pictures when I get back to Ottawa. I hope you will drop by again to see them.
Jason, Irene and Gordon came to visit us during the Winterlude Festival. Unfortunately the temps rose just enough to cause a mini-melt of the canal and ice sculptures so we had an indoor visit together. By Saturday the canal was open again for skating but we decided to stay in. The day they left Eddie and I did go for our first stroll on the canal with our friends Lisa and Ronni and their girls.
The following week Scott and April and their boys came for a visit and we walked the canal again while they skated. There were so many people enjoying the festivities. There were horse-drawn sleigh rides, tee pees and refreshment stands set up and colonial demonstrations of all kinds. It was so “Ottawa”!. You can see our pics here. Now, of course, the water is starting to flow again and the stands are starting to be disassembled. It’s nice to see the beginnings of spring and our next big festival will be the Tulip Festival in May. Ottawa is a very colourful town and we are having fun enjoying all it has to offer.
That was the question of the night! Eddie and I went to Toronto on Jan. 25 to celebrate Chinese New Year with his family. We started with the traditional New Year’s Eve feast at Tanya Place. My sister-in-law Irene and my mother-in-law spent days preparing the food. We were all there except for Irene and Gordon who couldn’t make it at the last minute. After dinner while visiting in the living room Bob (my sister-in-law Alice’s boyfriend) got on his knees to ask Mahmah for permission to marry his daughter. Fast Eddie quickly grabbed a camera and videoed Bob proposing to Alice. As you can see from the video clip the place erupted with joy as we congratulated Alice and Bob. To our knowledge a date hasn’t been set yet. It was so cool to be included in this special “moment”. CLICK HERE and see it for yourself. Congrtulations again Alice and Bob - we love you ! !
