Changes

So much has happened since my last blog entry! We have done a lot of saying goodbye. Last month we said goodbye to my dear (and last remaining) Uncle Brian, who lost his long and brave battle with lung cancer a month before his 70th birthday. He was a very sweet man, who used to phone me regularly and sounded so much like my Dad, his brother. Mum, my brother Rob, Anni and I drove up to Burnley for his funeral. Everybody was asked to wear red and white, to reflect his love of Manchester United. 

I met my cousin Susan, whom I hadn't seen since we played Sindys at our grandmother's home and saw my Uncle's two daughters. We promised to stop meeting at funerals and see each other in happier circumstances.

We also said goodbye to Peter's job! He now has some time to reflect on what he wants to do next and for the first time since he was 18, he has had to buy a car that isn't a company car.

I have to say, I rather like having him around all the time.

Last week was half term and at the end of it, we all went up to Edinburgh to see Tom. This was the first time Anni had visited him in over 18 months and she had never seen his new flat before. We had a lovely meal in Gusto on Friday evening.

It was absolutely freezing up there but we managed a brief walk up to see the castle by night.

Anni had been suffering with a very bad back and it was good to see her able to walk around, having spent 3 days of half term in bed. 

On Saturday, after breakfast in our favourite hotel, we headed up to Edinburgh Zoo, where we saw PANDAS!!!!

I didn't realise that pandas slept for 16 hours a day, so we didn't see them do anything, other than a giant green poo. Nonetheless, they were very, very cute and well worth waiting around in the cold for our time slot to see them.

It was a similar story with the koalas...nothing to see but a yawn and a stretch. 

My favourites were still my own now-not-so-wee monkeys!

I am finding that I am having to get my head round a lot of changes just now. Some of my favourite people at work have announced their upcoming retirements or intentions to move on. Then there is Peter's job; Anni is planning to go off to university; Tom is thinking of changing his course from Russian to German and I am having to learn how to shift from dealing with a teenager to dealing with a 20 year-old soon.

I am not good with change. I am trying to learn to embrace it.

In the face of it all I was encouraged by a sermon I watched on tv by a preacher named Joel Osteen. He was encouraging us to pray God sized prayers and not limit what we ask for to our own small vision: for example, not to merely ask that our children don't wander off the right path, but to ask God to make them do great things for Him. I love that.