This month I’ll be reviewing past posts about Family and Friends. I’ve tried to further split these posts into categories, but you’ll find there’s definitely overlap. I’ve also discovered that some of my Life in General posts are actually about family, so those are included here too.
For those of you new to Retired Introvert, these posts should provide more information about my life.
Friends
I thought I’d begin with the posts focused on my friends. If you’ve read my posts about books, you already know I’m in a book club. The members are also my friends. One of my early posts talks about how we changed things up a bit by going to a movie together.
It was only appropriate that we see the movie “The Book Club”. It was a good movie with well-known actresses. If you haven’t seen it, you should check it out.
I also write about a group of friends I’ve had for most of my life. I met one of them in first grade. We see each other once a year, but we catch up like it was yesterday. I can’t imagine life without them. We’ve been getting together for a weekend every summer for many years now. One member of our group is currently going through cancer treatments, so I’m not sure what our plans for this summer will be. Read about my Friends for Life.
I have a couple of friends that I met at work and several years ago we started GNO (Girls Night Out) but instead of actually going out, we took turns cooking dinner for each other. In fact, we just had a GNO last week. It will be our last one, as one of the girls is moving to Florida in a few weeks. She just retired and is following her dream. Hopefully, she’ll be back periodically and we can still get together. (Read the GNO post and you’ll also find a couple of good recipes at the end.)
Holidays
I chose to call this group of posts holidays, but they’re mostly about family, with a focus on holidays.
Some discuss the impacts of blending families. Not always easy, and subject to changes and growing pains along the way. Anyway, we started out doing things one way – Changing Holiday Traditions. Holidays changed not only because of our blended family but because as kids get older, they introduce new members to the mix.
Eventually, circumstances changed how we celebrated holidays with Tim’s kids. As Too Much Togetherness discusses, it was becoming more than holidays. Sorry, it was too much for me. And I actually think our holidays are more fun this way. A lot less tension.
The post, Christmas Traditions isn’t specifically focused on family, but it does highlight certain traditions in our family. This is one of my last posts of 2021, so it’s pretty new.
Family
Grands
My grand-niece was born two years ago and because I wanted to know exactly how to describe our relationship, I wrote about family relationships. It was pretty enlightening and I realized we haven’t always used the correct terminology. Read more in What Do I Call You?
I never thought I’d be a grandparent, but thanks to Tim, I’ve become a grandmother! It’s the best. Here are a couple of posts that include fun times with the grandkids.
Tim and his family
The post Off My Routine talks about a trip to Arizona to visit Tim’s family but also includes a few other topics, including my mom’s knee surgery.
In 2019, Tim, his son, and I took a trip to the Big Ten Football Championship in Indianapolis. It was a fun weekend and I hope we can do it again sometime.
In late 2019, Tim injured himself at work. He tore the bicep tendon in his arm and it required surgery. Unfortunately, workers’ comp claims aren’t easy (or fast) when you work at the post office. First, I talked about our experience with that. Then I talked about the surgery itself, but it didn’t take place until a month later.
After a few months, I thought it would be good to update everyone on Tim’s status. That’s the focus of What About Tim? It was quite a year. Bicep tendon surgery and two carpal tunnel surgeries.
My family
In the days before electronics entertained kids during long car rides, we had to think up our own games to pass the time. We made up a game based on license plates and what the numbers on them meant, specifically the county numbers in Iowa. Unfortunately, this game can’t be played anymore, as Iowa no longer includes county numbers on their plates. But we had a great time and laughed a lot at some of the names. Read about An Old Car Game. You can also learn a little Iowa history!!
Unfortunately, a few days after Tim’s bicep tendon surgery, my mom suffered a traumatic brain injury as the result of a fall down the stairs. Initially, I wrote Life Happens to explain what happened.
Brain Injury Recovery addresses her condition about a month after the fall. A Mom Update is two months later.
We realized my parents could no longer go back to their house. We wanted to keep them together, so we tried assisted living. That didn’t work well for my mom but my dad is still there today.
Next steps involved going through their house and getting it ready to sell. Due to COVID, my dad was unable to leave his apartment, so it was up to my sister and me to take care of everything.
My mom ended up in a care center and unexpectedly, passed away in December of 2020. Remembering My Mom was a tribute to her. Due to COVID, we postponed services, which we finally held in August of 2021. Moving On is my final word.
During this time, we also had a few funny moments. The first, Pharmacy Fiasco, talks about how things got all messed up when my dad stayed with us for a while at the beginning of COVID. The second was when my dad “lost” his glasses and how we ultimately found them. It was a good thing we had a few things to laugh about.
Since my dad has been in assisted living (two years now), my sister and I have called him every day. We’ve gone through various stages of visiting as we’ve progressed through COVID. Now, Tim and I go once a week and my sister goes several times a week, since she lives much closer. Something to Talk About is my take on how difficult it is to talk to someone every day when there’s not much going on.
OK, that’s 25 past posts about family and friends. I hope you might try to check out a few.
Happy blogversary!
Thanks Marty!!!