Merry Christmas 2022 And Best Wishes To All In 2023
I am sure you have all been waiting impatiently for our annual Schwartz letter. It is running a little late this year, but it is finally here. We had five major events on our calendar this year.
In February we, the Matlocks, Carla and Tyler again spent the Family Day long weekend at Cypress Hills. It started to snow as we arrived in the evening and by the next morning there was about eight inches of fresh snow. A weekend of skating, snowshoeing, and tobogganing ensued for the kids (and for some adults) while the adults were more inclined toward puzzles, Mario Kart, and walks.
In July we first took Carla and Tyler on a Rhine River cruise (actually leaving on June 29). The plan was to spend a few days in Munich checking out the beer halls, then ride the train to Basel, cruise to Amsterdam and spend another couple of days. Unfortunately, there was a mix-up in our reservations and our paths diverged in Toronto. Celeste and I flew direct to Munich, arriving on June 30 as planned, but Carla and Tyler were rerouted through London and Frankfurt. However, their flight out of Toronto was delayed and they missed their connection in London. After waiting in line for six hours at the British Airways counter, they were told they were on their own. Fortunately, Tyler had a cousin there who was able to put them up for a couple of days. We investigated getting them a train ride, but the next morning Tyler was able to book a new flight, but not departing until July 3. So, they made their lemons into lemonade and managed to take in a couple of shows in London’s West End and see some sites
while Celeste and I toured around Munich.
Finally, Carla and Tyler arrived in Munich, and we began a concentrated beer hall tour. The next day we had a relaxing, interesting, and enjoyable train ride to Basel.
The following day we toured around Basel a bit before boarding our river cruise. Over the next week we stopped in Breisach, Strasbourg, Speyer, Koblenz, Cologne, the windmills south of Amsterdam, and then Amsterdam itself. We took the included tour at each stop plus a few more. In Amsterdam I was able to enjoy visits with Mom’s first cousin Siegfried Kandel, his friend Etta, and his sons Bastian and Benjamin on one evening and my third cousins on Dad’s side, Dominique and Govinda Deckers, on another.
We had one more hiccup on the way home. Our flight home was supposed to be Amsterdam, Zurich, Vancouver, Regina. But when Carla tried to check in, the flight to Zurich was not there. After a couple of hours on the phone we learned that that flight to Zurich had been canceled and we were rebooked Amsterdam, Edmonton, Vancouver, Regina. But when we arrived at the airport the next morning, we learned that we were on standby! Fortunately, we all got seats, although Celeste and I had to sit separately. The root of all our troubles at both ends was the explosion in travel coming out of Covid. The airlines were overwhelmed and had to cancel many flights due to personnel shortages throughout the aviation industry.
All of us except Carla had had some cold symptoms on the cruise and, sure enough, we tested positive for Covid on return. Our symptoms were pretty mild, but Tyler’s hung on for quite a few weeks due to his asthma.
About ten days after returning home, we were off on our second adventure of the month. We drove to Calgary, picked up Sue and the boys at the airport, then drove to Lake Louise. They were on their way home from the cottage in Ontario. Darren had returned home to Vancouver the previous week and drove to meet us at Lake Louise. Meanwhile, the Matlocks had left a week earlier and visited Cypress Hills, the Calgary Zoo, Calaway Park, and other points of interest. We all spent several very enjoyable days camping at Lake Louise.
On one day the parents went on a monster all day hike while we had the grandkids for a fun day of playing, hiking, and visiting the ice cream and candy stores. Matlocks also stopped at Drumheller on the way home for the dinosaur experience. We only got to Vancouver twice this year, in March and October, so meeting the Vancouver crew in Lake Louise was a highlight.
We visited Vancouver in March and October, watched several of the boys’ soccer games, and attended a Whitecaps game.
The boys (especially Justin) love to play board and card games. We learn the rudiments of a few new games on every visit as we have our butts kicked. The boys demonstrate their cooking prowess at a couple of meals, and we visit some of our favourite neighbourhood restaurants. We love our visits but don’t stay as long as we used to because the boys are in school all day now that they are older.
The rest of our year was pretty tame. We made a couple of day trips to join the Matlocks when they were camping nearby. I walk the girls to the school bus every morning and home every afternoon and drive them when the weather is exceptionally ugly. We stay with them in the afternoons on the days that Laura is working. Occasional sleepovers are also good fun. One of our favourite events is our weekly Sunday supper or brunch with Carla, Tyler, and the Matlocks. The only downside is that we miss Darren’s crew.
In addition to managing the homestead, Celeste likes to watch renovation shows on TV, British detective shows, movies, and follow her Instagram feeds. She is still a little wary to venture out into the world while Covid is still around. We both subscribe to some news feeds from the National Post and spend a good deal of time keeping up with news and opinions.
I spend most of every day sitting at my computer doing self-imposed work. I still work on family history and run the Zichydorf Village Association, but I am disappointed in my productivity. Too many interests. Too many distractions. Too many projects. Too much reading online. Too much TV. I will have to take better control of that in the new year.
One distraction that has been greater than
normal this year is football. Although our beloved ‘Riders were horrible for the
last three-quarters of the season, cousin Larry and I added several playoff
games to our regular amateur football schedule. Our U of R Rams lost their home
playoff game, but our Regina Thunder won two home playoff games before losing
at home in the Canadian Bowl. Although the 'Riders were dismal, we did have the Grey Cup in Regina. I took in some of the festivities on the Saturday with cousin Larry and attended the game Sunday with our usual family crowd. For three quarters it was kind of boring, unless you like good defense. But the finish was one of the most exciting ever.
Carla continues to work at the Ministry of Education in their IT department. She loves that it is a walk of only a couple of blocks from home. Tyler still works on the production end of the local Global News, although it is surprising how integrated the various local studios are to create the final on-air product. Other studios play rolls in the Regina newscast and Regina plays rolls in theirs. The unfortunate downside is that Tyler works evenings while Carla works days. They normally have breakfast and lunch together and try to make the best of their weekends.
Darren still works for Teck but works in downtown headquarters now. He goes into the office two to three days a week, but otherwise works from home. Sue continues at AECOM on water and wastewater projects. She works from home most days but goes into the office occasionally and sometimes travels. Justin is now in grade 8 high school and rides the bus to a more distant school while Cameron is in grade seven and still walks to the neighbourhood school. The boys play soccer almost year-round. They also enjoy Parkour and Justin is becoming quite accomplished at Karate.
They all made their regular pilgrimage to the family cottage in Ontario in July, but Darren had to come home a week early, as usual. On the way back, Sue and the boys stopped in Calgary, where we picked them up for the Lake Louise sojourn. The family traveled to San Francisco in March to visit Sue’s sister’s family. This included a side trip to Lake Tahoe, where they have a condo, for some spring skiing. Sue and Cameron visited Sue’s parents in Palm Desert for a week in November. Justin went last year, but Cameron could not go because of Covid vaccination restrictions. They all made occasional trips to Kelowna to visit Sue’s parents and they make day trips and occasional weekend trips to Whistler for skiing whenever they can. This Christmas they are going back to San Francisco with another side trip to Tahoe.
Laura continues at her small neighbourhood pharmacy, normally three days a week. She loves the relaxed atmosphere, no evenings or weekends, and small staff environment. Brett’s principal changed schools this fall, and he followed her to the new school. It is much closer to home, and he often rode his bike to work in the fall. He thought he might ride in the winter too, but I have not seen that yet. ; ) The girls are all in school for full days now - the twins are in grade four and Louisa is in grade one. All three continue in Ukrainian dance. Louisa really enjoys Sparks (pre-Brownies) while the twins have graduated from Brownies to Girl Guides. (They are going to change the name “Brownies” to something else, but I don’t think the new name is confirmed yet.) Annabelle and Charlotte also take piano lessons. The twins are voracious readers, and all three girls love to do Lego and are quite artistic. Laura works a lot of extra days during the summer so others can take holidays, but they still love to make a several weekend camping trips.
In fall 2021 we tore out the Matlocks’ back yard in preparation for a re-do. As soon as the snow was gone in the spring, family and friends converged to lay down several layers of compacted gravel, a gigantic patio, synthetic lawn, outdoor kitchen, and a creek with fishpond. It was pretty much complete by the end of June and employed for a few gatherings over the rest of the summer.
Excitement is building for the big event of
2023. We are blowing Grandma’s inheritance to take the whole gang to Orlando in
February. The Matlocks have a week off from school, so the whole Regina crew is
going for two weeks. The Schwartz boys do not have a school break at that time,
and with Justin now in high school, they can only get away for one week. We
will all be there for three days at Universal and three days at Disney World. The
Regina crew will have three more days at Disney World plus a day at Sea World
and another at Legoland. I hope we can keep up the pace!
P.S. If you would like to see more of our European trip, go to celesteglenn.blogspot.com. Although the complete story shows up on the creator site, the publicly viewable pages only start on July 6. I have not advertised it until now due to this problem, but I think I have devised a workaround. It seems that you can access the individual posts at the links below. At ;east it works from my computers.
June 27 - https://celesteglenn.blogspot.com/2022/07/monday-june-27-2022-rhine-river-cruise.html
June 28 - https://celesteglenn.blogspot.com/2022/07/tuesday-28-june-2022-regina.html
June29-30 - https://celesteglenn.blogspot.com/2022/07/wednesday-29-june-and-thursday-30-june.html
July 1 – https://celesteglenn.blogspot.com/2022/07/friday-1-july-2022-munich.html
July 2 – https://celesteglenn.blogspot.com/2022/07/saturday-2-july-2022-munich.html
July 3 – https://celesteglenn.blogspot.com/2022/07/sunday-3-july-2022-munich.html
July 4 – https://celesteglenn.blogspot.com/2022/07/monday-july-4-munich-to-basel.html
July 5 - https://celesteglenn.blogspot.com/2022/07/tuesday-5-july-2022-basel-switzerland.html
Hoping you and yours had as enjoyable a year as we did and best wishes for the year ahead.
