Maryanne, thanks for the Jackie Lawson Advent Calendar and game. It looks beautiful and entertaining.

This morning I went with a friend to our local Costco to stock up on supplies for Christmas baking. I don’t have a membership but she does and has told me many times that she’s happy to take me anytime I want to go. I was able to get most of the things on my list, plus a few things that weren’t on the list, of course. Overall I did pretty well sticking to my list. Now I just need to find the energy to actually do the baking, lol!

For $35 to his PAC you, too, can have this:

Helene610 wrote: »

We were away a few days to celebrate BIL’s 80th birthday. It’s a long drive to NJ but DH really wanted to be with his brother for the birthday. And they were so happy we made the trip down. The ride home was 8 hours but it was worth it to be with family. It was a nice surprise to get the Advent calendar. I’ve already made the puzzles and played games.

I'm so glad you were able to get to see family. I don't know if I'll see any this Thanksgiving, with my baby brother's wife having recently had cancer surgery and my other brother annoyed with the world at the moment.

Yesterday we were invited to what was originally planned to be a Friendsgiving brunch, but the time was changed to mid-afternoon and became more of a Happy Hour gathering. Either way, it was fun and a nice time to share with our friends.

I’m both happy and sad for one couple who have been looking for a new home. Happy because they finally found one that they are very happy with, and sad because it is in Reston, VA. Their daughter and her family live in DC and they have decided that they want to live close to them to be able to be more a part of their grandchildren’s lives. I totally understand, but we will really miss them. They’ve been looking for several months, which was difficult since they live here, but every time they visited their daughter, they also looked at houses. My friend was in DC 2 weeks ago because her daughter attended the G20 meetings in Rome, so Grandma’s help was needed for the grandkids while she was gone. While the kids were in school and daycare, she was able to house hunt, and this time she found a house that was nearly perfect for them. She made an offer and wrote a check on the spot and the offer was accepted. Her husband flew up last week to be present for the inspection, and they are set to close on it the day before Thanksgiving. Their house here will be listed for sale probably before the end of this week. It’s a beautiful, fully updated home, so I expect it to sell immediately. I’ll be surprised if they are still here in January.

Today I am baking an apple crumb pie for DH to take to a church gathering tonight. Otherwise, I’m just taking it easy for the rest of the day.

I took my first Boniva (monthly osteoporosis drug) this morning. My stomach is mildly upset but nothing major. Crossing my fingers here that this works.

I totally lost yesterday. I took my first dose of Boniva Monday morning. Was fine except for a little bit of an upset stomach until about 3:30 am when I started to feel miserable. I don't usually get side effects so I was unpleasantly surprised. I'm a lot better today so hopefully I can et some work done!

I was just reading side effects of Boniva. There’s quite a list of proper way to take it. To list a few items, it said take it when you get up with a full glass of plain water. Take it 60 minutes before any food or other medication.Swallow it whole and remain sitting upright for 60 minutes. I see it’s monthly. The website says to mark your calendar and take it on the same day of the month. It also lists foods and meds that can interact if taken too close together. There’s my librarian background showing up researching your medication.

WHOA! What happened to this website?

Thanks for all the input! I followed the instructions and, in fact, didn't eat for hours after taking it. Supposedly, the symptoms decrease over time. I'll try it at least one more month since I got a 3-month supply.

Here's the story I got from my endo --

She told me you only take any drug in the bisphosphenate (SP?) category 5 years before taking a break.

I decided to try this first because according to her Prolia means 6 month appointments for life since you can never stop taking it (unlike the bisphosphenate drugs, it's impact dissipates shortly after you stop taking it).

Time will tell!!

I’m not having any issues accessing this thread, but it looks weird. Maybe they figured out that we are all seniors and need the bigger font, lol?

We start the trip south on Wednesday. We originally planned to spend several days in SC , have Thanksgiving dinner with my sister and brother and then continue on to FL. My oldest sister lives in FL and she’s been fighting cancer for the last year or so. She recently entered Hospice care at home. My sisters went down to visit with her last week. They told me she’s very weak, in pain and pretty much bedridden. They don’t think she has much time left. We make a few overnight stops along the way because we’re not able to drive more than 400 miles a day. Even with that, we’ll be paying a price for the drive in aches and pains. We normally spend about a week at my brother’s to break up the drive. We decided to skip Thanksgiving and continue on to FL to my sister’s home. wWe’ll only spend the night at my brother’s and continue the drive the next day. I don’t know if we’ll see my SC sister this trip. She’s about 20 miles from my brother but if she doesn’t come by his house before morning, we’ll have to catch her on the return trip. We’ll get to Okeechobee a week from Sunday. She knows we’re coming. I’m hoping she has the strength to hold on for a final visit. Whichever way it goes, it will be a sad trip. She’s 82 and there are 5 of us. It’s amazing that we’ve had this many years together.

Helene - I'm so very sorry about your sister! Someone asked me a question the other day which essentially boiled down to why are they trying to get "her" able to have hospice at home? I sort of thought "who wouldn't want hospice at home if they could"? I hope you do get some time.

I really, really hope you don't get snow so that you can get this time together!

I made the mistake of looking to see if there's a listing for my family home. The bank sold it to a "flipper" and yes, they've already got it listed. My mother and sister are turning over in their graves. They just ripped out all the rhododendrons and azaleas in the front. As DH says, it took 30 or 40 years or more for those plants to grow to that size. They also took out a mature pine tree. Nothing but dirt in front of and beside the house now. They didn't even replant anything. They also did NOT replace the disgusting, aging sidewalk.