Surrounded by... Flowers

Now that our visitors have all left, we are left with our memories...

... and with flowers!

This arrangement was a gift of my mother's sister Marion in Edmonton.

The rest were ordered from a small home-based business, whose owner I know from Curves!

The last remnant of my mother's funeral - I hope they last a long, long time.

Discovering a New Ice Cream Shop

Exploring Ottawa's By-Ward Market, some of our visitors discovered a new ice-cream shop.

The cold weather didn't prevent them from ordering ice cream. (Coffee was also an option.)

These cones were "mini" size... or so my kids told me!

I tasted a bit... a soft ice cream cone with tasty bits added - then dipped in chocolate.

We're an ice-cream loving family... whatever the weather!

Everyone wanted to go back for more.

Beaver Tails

No trip to Ottawa is complete without tasting "Beaver Tails" in the market.

So one evening, before our visitors left, we headed over... (The whole line-up consists of family members!)

It was chilly - but they are delicious in all kinds of weather!

Funeral

Last week, we laid my mother's ashes to rest in a columbarium in a nearby church that our family has been associated with for a long time. Nine family members had driven or flown in from various parts of North America. After a month of planning, I was so engrossed in everything that was happening around me that I didn't take a single picture.

A few days later - after all our visitors had left the city - Terry and I went back to the chapel where the columbarium is located...

It's called the chapel of Christ the King.

The whole church holds a special meaning for me now.

Family Gathers

A week ago family members from Toronto, Kelowna, Edmonton and Texas began to arrive for my mother's funeral.

We don't get together too often...

Unfortunately, we only seem to meet at funerals, my brother from Texas commented. We should start doing family reunions...

In spite of the circumstances, we did enjoy going out to eat together, experiencing Ottawa in November - when the weather is beginning to get cold.

And meeting one of the youngest members of the family.

(The youngest is a newborn, two weeks old. He didn't make the trip from Texas!)

Ironic... Weather

A week ago I complained to my city councilor that our icy street had been neither plowed nor salted.

I was unable to safely walk down the street to pick up my mail at the corner.

They won't do anything, Terry commented...

Well, I'll keep at them until they do, I replied.

Then, before the city trucks arrived... the weather changed! Rain and warm temperatures melted the snow!

For the past few days, it has felt like spring!

Now I'm trying to get out and walk every day! Last week's taste of winter was enough to make me appreciate all this lovely bare pavement!

My Mother's Family

My mother came from a large family. She was third eldest of her mother's 11 children... though there were two fathers. (Another three children died in infancy, all the children of her first husband. So my grandmother Olga actually bore 14!)

My mother was two years old when her father, Theodore Guhl, died of typhus. A year later her father's cousin, Hugo Bartz, came to help out on the farm - and ended up marrying Olga. Their first child was named Theodore, in memory of her first husband.

Eight more children were born into the Bartz family, seven of them after they arrived in Canada in 1928.

Here is the only family photo that shows them all. It was taken in the early 1940's when the five older children had jobs, so life was easier than it had been a decade before. My mother, second from the right in the back row, was already married when this picture was taken, as was her sister Lydia, second from the left in the back row.

The five oldest, in the center of the back row, are all gone now. My mother's older sister, Lydia, died in her mid-80's, just before my mother moved to Ottawa. Erhardt, standing next to Lydia on the right, died four years ago, at the age of 98. Ted, in the center back, died while still in his early 30's, from diabetes complications. Herb, between Ted and my mother, died of lung cancer when he was in his 80's, only four months after Erhardt passed away. Their mother, seated in the front row, only lived to her early 70's, dying after having a stroke. But Hugo, remained healthy and strong, living to be 100!

The family was close and kept in touch all their lives... I enjoyed family get-togethers. There was always a lot of laughter!

It would be a lot of fun to have a large family, I remember thinking before I had any children. But later, with three young ones running around, I wondered how my grandmother had done it! She did love babies, and often babysat her grandchildren.

Large families are not as common these days - though I do know a few families with more than six children. But few parents have the stamina needed! It is a lot of work.

Interestingly, in this family of 11 Guhl-Bartz children, there were only 20 grandchildren.