You may have wondered whether the absence of any communication from us this past Christmas meant that we had succumbed to the ravages of dementia. December was totally chaotic as you will see below and Christmas barely happened chez Baker. We apologise for the omission.
Shortly after moving house, they went on a 3-week trip to Japan, which
they enjoyed very much, even if Dave was having serious doubts about how
his back would stand the lengthy flight to Tokyo. There is not much
improvement in the back issues which have plagued him for years now. They
were able to spend some time with Mary’s brother John, Yoshiko & daughter
Amy in Hiroshima which was no doubt a delight for John, being the first of
his relatives to visit in over 20 years. In mid-July, we headed down to New Brunswick, taking 3 days on the journey down. Once there, I immediately started on re-painting the exterior, using a power washer, belt sander and various scrapers. Lots of ladder work! That took most of 3 weeks, after which, I spent the final two weeks cutting back the vegetation which was encroaching on all sides. Hardly a holiday! We didn’t do too much else, but did make a trip to Sackville to visit Jane & Bob Eaton, and another to Moncton to visit Sammie Shaw who is now in a rather nice retirement home on the outskirts of Moncton after several years of living in Ontario with her daughter Susan. We drove back from the cottage in 2 days, which was fortunate in more than one way. Mary had not been feeling too well for the last of our vacation, and the day after we returned, she started throwing up regularly. After two days of no improvement, she went into emergency at the hospital, where she was admitted, suffering from a bowel obstruction. They managed to get things under control, with her having more tubes in and out than the shuttle at launch. Eventually, she went in for surgery, which went splendidly well. Just a case of getting part of the bowel removed from a cavity in the lining where it had become lodged. No bowel re-construction or anything. Again in the meantime, I had a meeting with our chosen real estate people, who wanted to put the house on the market within 2 weeks so that it was ready to “show” right after Labour Day, which in Ontario virtually marks the end of the summer season. First, they get in a home-stager, who ends up making the place not even looking like yours. I also rented a self-storage unit in town, and Ian plus two friends from the church moved a further pile of stuff out from the attic and basement. I can’t say enough about the job that Dave & Nicole did on doing a virtual spring clean throughout the house – they must have spent 24 hours slaving away at it. When Mary was released from hospital, she moved in with Dave & Nicole and stayed there for some six weeks. When selling a house these days, they don’t want the owners on the property, and I also spent most of my time in Aurora. The selling process seemed to go on for ever, but in fact took just 6 weeks before we had a firm offer. At that point, we moved back home and started looking for a townhouse that we could rent. We needed to get our capital out from real estate and earning us income. There is generally not a lot of rental property available in this area. We looked at just four properties, one in Aurora and three in Newmarket. The Aurora place was in a great location, but had some serious drawbacks, not least of which was a very minimal kitchen. We eventually settled on one of the Newmarket properties, but have no idea how long we might be able to stay here as the owners may want us out after just 18 months. As townhouse developments go, it is one of the best in town (according to our real estate guy) and we’d tend to agree. The houses are about 10 years old, and there are quite a few trees around which will be nice in the summer. Anyway, we signed up on the new place from 1st December, which gave us several weeks overlap as we planned to move on 10th January. Very useful, as I was able to get all our “junk” out of self-storage and into our new basement, thanks to the generosity of our friend Dave Gannicott who lent me his truck and two willing workers for much of one day. By early December, we were surrounded by packing boxes and by this time, 348 Botsford didn’t really seem to be “our” home anymore. All the personal photos etc had come down for selling the house and we never put them back. Christmas Day was celebrated at Dave & Nicole’s, with Janet, Ian and the children. A good day – I had played the organ for the Christmas morning service. One day that week, Janet parked Grace & Emily with her excellent daycare lady, and she and Nicole came over to the new house and cleaned throughout. The house had been vacant since last summer, so was in need of some TLC. Moving in January can often be a bit fraught, with always the chance of snow, but we were lucky with the weather. On January 10th, our trusty auctioneers (who double as house movers) turned up and started the move. They weren’t the cheapest in the world, but with the company owner there in person to supervise everything, they did an excellent job. By mid-day, one of the helpers retired hurt (he was getting over some flu bug or other) to be replaced by the owner’s wife, who proved well equal to the task. After the move, we returned for a final cleanup at the old house, and on 14th, the new owners who moved all of 100 yards from around the corner moved in. We are very happy that they seem to appreciate getting a heritage property and won’t tear the place apart, as often happens with older houses. We turned our back on the old house with little regret and much relief at getting out from under the burden of maintaining the place, wondering what next would need expensive repair or replacement. The new owners say they are loving the place. For our part, we have settled into the townhouse well; and it is amazing how we were just able to drop our furniture in with little pre-planning, to find that most pieces just fit in the area selected. Anyway, that’s about enough of all that. We’re still highly involved at Trinity, Aurora – I’m still maintaining the website, plus a bunch of other stuff, and Mary is on Chancel Guild & Adult Choir. Emily was baptized at Trinity last November, but the service was really rather peculiar, as our Folk Music people were doing the music and various other oddities went on that morning. Janet is much of a traditionalist when it comes to church, and I don’t think she was too impressed.
That just about brings things up to date. Much of the house is now organized, apart from the basement, where we’ll have to get rid of a bunch more stuff before the end of this year. There are a number of pictures online at www.richib.com/denise.html All the best to everyone for 2011. Richard & Mary |
The first half of 2010 remains something of a blur, but I suppose we
were just carrying on much as usual. The most significant event was the
birth of a second grand-daughter on March 24th who is named Emily
Mary Caroline. The birth was by Caesarian at Mount Sinai Hospital in
Toronto, and Janet was almost convinced she was carrying a boy this time.
She seems so very different from big sister Grace and is now getting close
to walking. From the outset, she has been a contented child and may turn
out to be an independent soul, as she doesn’t depend on others to keep her
amused. Janet was on maternity leave for nine months, although not really
disconnected from SonyATV as she would have to deal with stuff from home
almost daily via the ubiquitous Blackberry which goes everywhere with her.
Speaking for myself, I don’t think I could adjust to typing at speed with
two thumbs, but a lot a folks do manage it. I have enough trouble with a
standard computer keyboard.
We were continuing to make plans to move house, and in April, called in
a local auction house to take off some of our clutter for auction. Unlike
many such dealers, they didn’t just cherry-pick the pieces they could
sell, but spent a morning loading up a lot of stuff which was not
auctionable to haul it off to the town dump for us. The auction raised a
handy $1,800, which promptly disappeared when we had a backup in our sewer
line between the house and the street. This entailed getting a contractor
in to dig up the line, which is some six feet below ground. He did a good
job and didn’t leave too much of a mess. Getting underneath our front
verandah was something of a challenge, but as he had already replaced
lines on several houses in the area, he didn’t seem fazed by it at all.
Following that, I repainted the front verandah floor, but gave up on
everywhere else that needed painting and called in a house painter to
finish the job. My mantra as a child was “I want to do it by my own” but
there comes a time when you have to abandon that notion. Even at that, I’m
up and down ladders quite often, especially when replacing light bulbs at
the church and the reaction is often “You shouldn’t be doing that at your
time of life”.
We had some preliminary meetings in April with real estate folks, but
decided to wait until after our summer trip to New Brunswick before
putting the house on the market. In the meantime, Dave & Nicole decided to
look for something rather nicer than the townhouse in which they were
living. They eventually settled on a 1950’s bungalow in the older section
of Aurora, which had been nicely updated in the kitchen/bathroom area, and
which has a superb deck and back yard. They never thought that they would
settle for such a property, but the gorgeous garden was the clincher. We
never really took to their townhouse – far too many stairs and a very
mundane backyard. Towards the end of June, they moved house and after 7
months, continue to enjoy the new property. Unlike the townhouse, it only
has a single bathroom, and they have plans now to renovate more of the
basement (part is already a living area) and include a second bathroom.
Janet is now back at work full time, Grace is in Junior Kindergarten in
an Oshawa French Immersion school, and Emily is now spending the days with
their daycare lady. Ian’s business seems to be going well, and maybe he’ll
expand a bit later this year.