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About this blog

still sorting life out

Entries in this blog

General

Time goes by

This time of the year, mid winter, time seems to stand still. There is not a lot to do. A dull grey day doesn't encourage me to do much, a bit of gardening if it is sunny, a few hours in the shopping centre if it is raining. A lot of my spare time I read, get onto my computer, watch some television, often cooking programs rather than movies or dramas. I usually crochet as I watch TV so just look up occasionally to see what the dish being cooked looks like. I get out as much as I can and as much
swilkinson

swilkinson in General

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General

I hate winter viruses

This blog is not going to be happy and bright so stop reading it whenever you like.   I have a winter virus, it is one of those miserable streaming nose viruses. I have had it for five days and it usually goes in seven or so. With a virus there is no medication so it is paracetamol, good hydration, soft foods and hot drinks. It is also vast amounts of boredom if you live alone. No going out for coffee, no browsing around the shops, seems much like lockdown in Covid times. And no I don'
General

Family adventure

I have just come back from visiting my daughter and her husband and daughter in Kalgoorlie, Western Australia. To get there it is taking two trains to Sydney and then out to the airport then a four hour flight from one side of Australia to the other, from Sydney to Perth, over 2000 kms. Then after an hours wait taking an hours flight to Kalgoorlie, 335 kms inland from Perth. Kalgoorlie is a mining town and Kalgoorlie - Boulder is the city made by combining two small towns both built on a gold di
General

Where does my time go?

Just about to go into autumn here. I will be glad to see the end of summer, I haven't enjoyed summer this year, far too hot and humid and with the heavy waist to toe elastic stockings it's been soooo hard to combat the heat. I am glad the cooler weather is on its way but will miss daylight saving. I've enjoyed sitting on the verandah watching the light fade away in the evening in the last few weeks and the sudden silence when traffic dies down and the local commuters are all home at last. Peacef
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swilkinson in General

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General

Keep going, you'll get there in the end.

When I wrote this the blogs were not working. I am surprised the title posted although the content did not. I stand by this saying though. It is keeping on keeping on that gets us to our destination. That has always applied to my life.   A lot has happened since I last blogged, some good and some bad. I did have a great Christmas,  I saw all six of my grandchildren in December, the sad news was that I only saw Naomi at her other grandmother's funeral. That was on the 15th December. My
swilkinson

swilkinson in General

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General

Sunny at last

Well I posted in February that it was raining and that  continued most of March, it was the rainiest period in many decades. It did stop for a few days and then back came the torrential downpours and the floods. Some towns further north really suffered. It has eased back now but the run off  is still happening and the older, deeper drains are still running. Most people can't remember having the minor flooding as we have just experienced. Is it global warming or just the changes as resculpturing
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swilkinson in General

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General

Rain at last but too much of it!

It's raining here, it has been for days. There is minor flooding in the creeks locally and there has been one drowning death. A man who drove through flood waters against advice and his car washed into a creek. So sad. I have had to redig drains because of increased flow and patch a dirt wall at the top side of the house washed away by one of the downpours. My Ray set up some " temporary" drains 30 years ago and now I'll have to do something to repair the damage. Of course that is reasonable wea
swilkinson

swilkinson in General

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General

Shine

My word for this year is SHINE. I am not sure for the moment exactly what that means but I am determined not to let the new form of Covid take the colour out of my world. The numbers of cases is high, the government in its wisdom no longer publishes statistics or areas affected so we live in ignorance BUT I will not be afraid. Fear is why my three grandchildren in Adelaide have not come up to stay with their mother this summer holiday. Fear is why there were no Carol services and we are back to
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swilkinson in General

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General

Three weeks to Christmas

Since we've been out of lockdown the time has gone so fast! There is so much more to do than housework, crocheting and gardening. There is more social activities in my Iife and more charity and pastoral care work. I did get away to Armidale for a week which was nice but in that week weeds sprang up, spiders got busy spinning webs and there seemed to be so many extra small tasks to do when I came back. So the weeks fly by.     I have been writing Christmas cards and starting to collect
swilkinson

swilkinson in General

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General

Roll on November

As of the first of November I am allowed to travel . It has been a long time coming. I have been fully vaccinated since the end of June but the State government has been slow to release us from the Greater Sydney area.. But that is set to change on November 1st. We will still be masked and social distanced but we can move around again. Now that is something to be happy about.   During lockdown and the past three weeks my life has been very routine. Gardening has been a life saver, some
swilkinson

swilkinson in General

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General

Keeping busy in lockdown

I am still in lockdown, just as we were due to come out of lockdown our numbers in our local government area (LGA) began to rise. Only about 25 a day but with all the other late winter ailments that send people to hospital ours can't cope if numbers get too high. So the stay-at-home order continued. I am disappointed that once again I will miss out on a visit from any of my grandchildren for their school holidays. I so look forward to Trevor and Alice coming but once again that is impossible.
swilkinson

swilkinson in General

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General

Trying to keep positive

It seems a long time since I last posted a blog. I have been in what feels like imposed solitude since June 26th along with 5 million or so other people. We are in a huge area known as Greater Sydney, we haven't had many cases but because so many people commute from the Central Coast to businesses in Sydney and the surrounding areas whenever parts of Sydney go into lockdown we do too. It annoys the locals as we don't get the benefit of living in Sydney just the side effects. We will not come out
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swilkinson in General

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General

Thoughts from my isolation

We in Greater Sydney are in lockdown. This was supposed to be a great week with Trev and Alice here for her first week of the school holidays. They arrived on Saturday morning and left at 5pm on Saturday afternoon. This was due to an order that came out that we were going into lockdown because of cases of Covid-19 increasing in Sydney, the  virulent Delta strain.They had two choices, get out of the Greater Sydney area before 6pm to go home and quarantine there in Broken Hill or to stay here for
swilkinson

swilkinson in General

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General

Feels like snow

No it is not snowing but the wind is howling around the house, the wind chill factor is making it feel around zero and I am only going outside when I have too. Sitting reading or crocheting or even mending which I hate is better than being outside. I wanted to do some gardening today but that will have to wait till the sun is out again. The weeds still grow regardless and I need to go on topping up the potplants but it is not worth risking a cold on a day like today. I get my second Covid shot n
swilkinson

swilkinson in General

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General

Short days of rain

It had to come, short rainy days, dark nights and I have to go out tonight! But apart from that life is back to being routine, I am going to meetings, out to lunch about once a week, keeping up with friends again. There are still people who go out very rarely but that is really motivated by their own fears. There is very little chance of Covid infection. I feel sorry for those who listen to the many rumours floating around about the vaccinations and are afraid to have one but I have had my first
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swilkinson in General

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General

"Darls"

In Australia a lot of service type people call older ladies "Darls" short for darling, an inoffensive term of endearment and often a substitute for other words such as "sweetie" (sweetheart) or "pet" which were often used a couple of decades ago. This morning a trolley boy took my trolley back to the trolley bay after asking if he could "take it Darls" and last week another young man offered to help unload my groceries. All this shows I am an older woman now, a fact given away by the grey hair a
swilkinson

swilkinson in General

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General

Rain and sunshine 🔆

I am person who is sometimes short on perception. This in my lifetime has caused some interesting discussion, like the time I prayed for rain and a furious man confronted me outside the church and said: "How dare you pray for rain when I start to harvest my crop on Monday?" So I am a little hesitant to give any kind of opinion or advice unless I know all the facts. So whoever's prayed for rain on the New South Wales coast will they p!ease stop! Elsewhere if you are still in drought go ahead no h
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swilkinson in General

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General

A little scare

I had my annual PET scan last Friday, then on Tuesday I got a phone call from my new Melanoma specialist, could I go and get another more specific CT as there seemed to be an "anomaly" on my liver! Well panic stations for me as I contemplated what would happen if this was related to my original melanoma. So I hurried into our nearest town and had the extra CT. As usual the staff there were very kind, used to assisting people who are expecting bad news. But they are not allowed to tell you anythi
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swilkinson in General

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General

Colouring my world

I wonder if  I gave you a blank sheet of paper and told you to draw me a picture of your world using colour not lines what it would look like? Perhaps you could do that today? Some of you would ask for a coloured sheet because to some people that flat white sheet looks threatening, not like their life feels like at all. A friend of mine is going through a bad time and  I think her background colour would be grey. None of us want black because that can be threatening too, because even at the wors
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swilkinson in General

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General

Where did that year go and what changed?

I am a very fortunate person, I love life, I have been lucky with my choice of husband, and with my three children. I have six beautiful grandchildren. That is the way I like to look at life. But of course there is much more to my life than that. And if you have read my blogs from the early part of my journey with stroke you will know of my struggles with the journey that Ray's series of strokes took us on.   My experience with the caregiver life along with the experiences I got on thi
swilkinson

swilkinson in General

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General

How can it be Christmas??

How can it be Christmas??? There are no carols because singing in church is banned. There are no greetings, no cheeks kissed, no hugs, not the usual shoulders presses that our shyer members use by way of greeting. That applies to the churches,  the shopping centre or wherever friends meet. No contact and social distancing has an impact on all of us do more people are depressed and seeking medical help for it now. There are fewer decorative Christmas lights, only two houses in my street have done
swilkinson

swilkinson in General

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General

Time flows

In December the TV presenters start to review the year that was. 2020 was a crazy year and unique in my life time. The presenters say this happened and that happened but it makes no sense to me and probably wouldn't to you because this was a year where we each made our own history. This was the year when I spent a lot of time alone. Time of lock down or isolation, whatever you want to call it. It was a time that went slow some days and yet at the same time seemed to go so fast with no landmarks
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swilkinson in General

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Family

Family matters

I have been busy with family the past three weeks. I went up to Armidale for a little break and while I was there my daughter misstepped and ruptured the meniscus behind her right knee. Luckily the injury required rest not an operation, that meant no work, no driving, no more than  a few minutes on her feet. Her husband took care of her the first week then I came home and was asked to go  for a week to drive her daughter to school, take Shirley to doctors appointments, physio etc and do the shop
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swilkinson in Family

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Thoughts on Covid

Now what? Will we be celebrating Christmas this year?

Just been talking to our assistant minister, she is my "boss" for pastoral care. We have a talk from time to time. We are both anxious to resume some of our church activities like our Playtime for Mums and kids, our Welfare programs and our night services but the current Covid regulations are preventing all of  that from happening. It is very frustrating. We discussed what we thought the future of our activities on behalf of the church might look like in the new year, with Covid or after Covid b
swilkinson

swilkinson in Thoughts on Covid

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Thoughts on Covid

Keeping a positive attitude

The Covid goes on. We still have restrictions but not as much as some countries do. We still have cases, in our State, New South Wales it is mostly under 20 new infections a day. It is a great result but it has come at a price. Many people are out of work, many can no longer afford luxuries like holidays so most stayed home this school holidays. Some older people are still feeling isolated as we are regularly told to keep safe, to keep away from crowded areas, not to gather in groups etc. I know
swilkinson

swilkinson in Thoughts on Covid

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