Vacation

I went on vacation about 2 weeks ago and this is my first official paid vacation. It was really weird knowing that while I worked I got to be paid for it. The first week was basically like an errand week, I went to a Dr. to see if he would be my family dr. (I got accepted but I disliked him). I went through my stuff in my house and cleaned it up majorly and I just relaxed, I had been working for pretty much a full year so it was nice to relax. 

Near the end of the first week, my mom and I had made an agreement that she would come down to Red Deer for a few days and I would come down to Lethbridge. 

When my mom came to Red Deer I had Patty and Dr. J's retirement party to go to. It was hosted at Sharon Tebb's house (lpn) and her backyard was lovely. There was a really good turnout and we had lots of fun. Connie had set up a photo booth for people to take props and have funny pictures with. I did this with Nancy (spd) and Sage (lpn). It was a lot of fun, we ate, mom got to meet some of my coworkers as well as Jesse and we had a lot of good laughs. 

The next day mom, Jesse and I went to Browns social house for lunch, since mom has never been there. It was really good. After lunch we dropped Jesse back at home and we went to the museum to see the display Walking With Our Sisters. It was about the 1700 native women/children that go missing and their cases are never looked into or solved. Also to commemorate the children that did not return home from the residential areas. The display was really powerful. They made us wear a skirt to show respect to the fallen sisters and honour them that way. We also participated in a smudging ceremony, basically what they do is cleanse you with some sort of herb (they used sage.) to cleanse and bless us. They also gave us some tobacco to hold in our left hand and to give into one of the bowls to show our appreciation to our sisters. The main display shows about 1700 vamps..which is the front part of the moccasin to represent that they did not live a full life and that it was cut short. They were all designed by people that were affected by the missing women or children. The artwork that were on some of these vamps were beautiful. They put the names of the missing on some, they had beautiful beadwork of designs and pictures. They would not let us take any photos as they had made the display as if it was a sacred burial. But it was very beautiful and moving to have seen that display, especially with mom. I think she really enjoyed it. To me it made me sad because it looked like a mass grave with all the vamps. It really brings it close to home seeing all the vamps.

After that we began to head down to Lethbridge, mom wanted to go visit Aunt Linda and Uncle Chris before we went down though. We got to visit with them and we had a good chat. Aunt Linda gave mom and I tons of stuff to make cards with since we are so obsessed with that. It was just nice to see them it was good. 

After that we went back to lethbridge, it pretty much took the whole day to travel down to lethbridge with going to see uncle chris and aunt linda. So we basically just chilled that night. 

The next day we went over to Grandma's, she finally was going to show me from start to finish how to make her potato salad, since honestly…it really is the best potato salad ever. It was really nice to just cook beside her and see how she makes it. The secret is…its not the ingredients its the technique on how she puts her salad together and how long you let the potatoes cook for. But I know her secret now and I feel confident that I could make it myself.

 After we made the potato salad we went to go have a picnic at Indian Battle park since there was not a whole lot of people there, and there was a bit more shade than what there was at henderson lake. It was nice to get some fresh air and some sun while enjoying eating with my family. I think grandma enjoyed it as well. We then went to go look around the mall since it was still really hot outside. We then also decided to hang out with her the next day. I was really glad to have gotten that time with her though. 

Then Jesse and I came back to Red Deer. It was the first time that Jesse had let me drive from Lethbridge straight to Red Deer though and he taught me some techniques to not get so tired when you are driving on the highway which worked pretty good. 

Then when we got back to Red Deer. I had an appointment with another Dr. which I liked so much better than the other one and I am pretty confident that he will be my family Dr. now, as well as Jesse's Dr. and we just finished our errands for the week. 

And that folks…was my vacation!