DIAMOND PAINTING, STITCHING, AND PILLOW FIGHTING....OH MY!

 

As I live and breathe, Dearies....if you would have told me that one day I would watch the Professional Pillow Fighting Championship on the TeeVee while stitching and then diamond painting, I would have told you that you were nuts.

Progress continues on the Spring Songbird, and I hope to complete him in the next day or so. Such a delightful stitch, and I might have accidentally picked up the coordinating bunny pattern as well to start once the bird takes flight. 😬

The diamond painting was another amazon impulse purchase....this one was about four bucks, I think, but the end result and the hours of peace it gave me go well beyond that.  As with stitching, I enjoy the process of creating these rather than stress over a final finish, so I'll just pop this into a portfolio with all of the other ones I've finished and move on to the next.

Early morning appointment for me today, so I'm looking forward to spending the rest of the day with needle and thread!

Happy Monday! I hope your week is off to a roaring start!

 

I LOVE IT WHEN A LESSON COMES OUT OF IT

One of the things I've learned during this little for-ay into diamond painting is PREPARATION IS KEY. 

I watched a lot of the YouTube when I started doing DP, and two terms I learned were "kit up" and "kit down". (Or words similar to that effect.)  It means exactly what you'd think...before playing with a new piece, you have to take the time to organize all of the parts so that you have them readily at hand.

In DP,  you need to un-bag all of the little bits and label the colors so that you can easily select the one you need at the right time.

I've translated this into my stitchy life, and I find that it's yielding great results. By taking the time to set up my threads, I can enjoying stitching more by just selecting the one that I need. My Bitsy Bob (the thingie you see in the bottom pic with the threads in circles on it), makes things super organized and tidy.

I like that.

So, Dearies...I'm ready to start stitching for the day, and after dinner (a salad with grilled salmon on top), I'm going to see if I can finish my DP.

Happy Weekend! Do something that blows your skirt up and come tell me all about it!

GOODNESS, GRACIOUS!

We've had an interesting few days, Dearies!  Sunday brought us massive storms with devastating winds and quite a bit of destruction.  I can honestly say that there was a moment there when I honestly thought we were gonners.

The lights were out for about four hours, but like any good stitcher, I was prepared.

I think I've confused everybody with all of this diamond painting business. Imagine a cross stitch chart printed on a canvas and then covered in a light layer of stickyness.

And the symbols correspond to different colored "drills", or little pieces of acrylic (either round or square) that you attach to the canvas with a pointy-ended pen that you've put a little bit of putty or wax or sticky dots on to hold them.

Believe it or not, oftentimes the color numbers of the drills are actual DMC numbers, so there is something that feels very familiar about this!

The thing I'm enjoying about diamond painting is that a) it's something new and different and b) so far I've managed to just keep things very very simple, uncomplicated, and affordable. I figured out a very good system and have stuck with it, haven't gone crazy amassing a huge stash, and the time I spend doing this new craft has been stress free!

 On the stitching front, I am just LOVING this little bird. The chart is in the etsy: nathnolu. Please note, though that I am not following the colorway on the chart...I am using Colour & Cotton fabric and threads from my stash.

 

Dearies, I have a kinda sorta update on my ick-ness. It appears that the thyroid was causing all of those scary symptoms that kept sending me to the ER thinking I was dying. As for everything else, my liver, pancreas, and gall bladder all seem to be on the fritz. Oddly enough, I scored an S0 on the liver fatty scale, but an F3 on the liver scarring (cirrhosis) scale, which is severe. The gallbladder needs to come out, but if we can get the symptoms under control, postponing that would be preferable to undergoing surgery at this point, and the pancreas is problematic and susceptible to pancreatitis because of my kidney meds. 

BUT!

With proper meds and a massive lifestyle change (in effect since March 5), I should be able to get things a bit back in whack to the point that I will start to feel better. Fatigue and the screaming mimi's are the biggest issues I have, as well as protecting my BellyBean, but eventually all will be well once again.

Thank you for your prayers and notes and happy thoughts and wonderful cards in the mail (looking at you Robin!). Time for me to just pull up my socks and trust that the plan is good and I finally have docs in place to keep an eye on things.

If you're in the path of these darn storms again today (as we are), please don't be afraid, but stay safe and prepared! Then, when they're all over, please check in and come tell us all about your corner of the world today!

BIRD BRAIN

 

WEEKEND PLAN

 

IT WAS A GOOD FRIDAY

First I had a lovely salad with grilled salmon:

And then I finished my next diamond painting:

 

CUE THE MUSIC...WE'RE HALFWAY THERE!

 

IN WHICH WE HAVE A LOVELY SUNDAY, INDEED

 

My Lady Irish are doing their thing against Michigan, I had a great scrubby shower and donned my comfy sweats, and now it's time to stitch! Rich will be home after the game for steak pizza iola (salad with grilled chicken for me, Betty), and that will be that.

What are you up to today, Dearies? Come tell me all about it!

IF THE HEALTH DEPARTMENT SHOWS UP...IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT, DEARIES

OK, you actually ARE the boss of me.

Today, I am lounging in my pajamas under the blanket, with stitching, damn good, my book, and diamond painting near and Robert DeNiro on the TV for company.

I have a clean sink and a nicely loaded dishwasher, the trash has been duly collected and placed in the can to put outside tonight, and I have prepped my veggies for my salad tonight and put them in their little fancy storage containers that I bought in a frenzy three years ago and then immediately regretted the purchase, but that's as far as I got.

The floor and countertops and Kitchen Cart 'O Crap That Needs Purging and everything else that needs doing will just have to wait for another day, because my better angels (looking at you, kids) told me to stop my nonsense already and just...rest.

Thank you for your excellent advice and care and concern and for the proverbial whack upside my head to get me re-pointed in the right direction! It's very helpful, when you are a Spinster of a very tiny little brain, to have fully-adult supervision to rely on!

What are you up to today? We're cold and blustery here, with more of the same predicted for the next ten days, so I guess we'll just have to hope for a warmer April! 

That's the report. Do come tell me all about your corner of the world today, and if you're in the path of these terrible storms or have been affected by them, you have my fervent thoughts and prayers that you are safe and well.

OH FOR PITY'S SAKES...

Dearies, this is, quite possibly, the dumbest day I've had since Stewey convinced me to try landscaping around the back patio and I dug a four-foot deep moat that my sister swore was going to end up being where she dumped my body when the time came.

I am a) not feeling well and b) a hot crock pot full of stress while waiting for test and lab results, so I decided that today would be a good day to deep clean the bathroom to within an inch of its life.

What. A. Stupid. Idea.

Part of me not feeling well is that I don't have any strength or stamina. By that, I mean that standing, walking, moving, etc is exhausting, and it seems that the amount of energy it takes to shower is about all I've got for a day.

But did I listen to my inner voice that said "Dumbass. Cleaning that bathroom is going to kill you. Take your shower. Get another cup of damn good, and get in the chair with your blanket and stitching and behave yourself."?

Nope.

Here's how the last several hours of my day have gone: Clean. Pant. Sweat. Sit. Breathe hard. Curse. Clean. Pant. Sweat. Sit. Breathe hard. Curse. Cry. Clean. Pant. Sweat. Sit. Breathe hard. Curse. Cry. Slurp cold brew. Clean. Pant. Sweat. Fall down. Cry. Crawl. Curse. Apologize to the BG. Pray. Clean. Sweat. Almost black out from chemical fumes. Give up. Guzzle water. Shower sitting down.

So now that that's all over and out of my system, I'm going to eat my salad and go to bed.

Tomorrow....the kitchen!

EASY LIKE A TUESDAY MORNING...

Rich is over on campus doing his thing this week with the ushering, so I have lots of time to do my spinstering with pajamas on and the birds sweetly tweeting their little heads off out there in the semi-cloudy sunshine. It's supposed to be near 70 degrees today, but in the 30's again by week's end, so I'm not too frantic about flipping my closet to warm weather clothes just yet.

My routine is on the verge of becoming a rut, but for now it's what I need to do. Things are still running amok, so I am using every ounce of patience I have to behave and wait for THE PLAN. 

(Sometimes I think that THE PLAN is stuck in a far-flung Department of Wellness and Sanity somewhere, and we're waiting for an intern to find it under his/her desk before running it to the Highly Grandly Exhaulted Poobah of All Things Medically Solvable, but in the meantime...here we are.)

(But to answer your question...no, my parents were not brother and sister. I was, however, hatched in a toxic waste dump of petro-chemical contamination, also known as what used to be the fifth largest oil refinery in the country, and my family history IS the history of heart disease and colon/esophageal cancer...so I've got THAT going for me.)

But I regress...

I have update photos to share, but for some reason cannot upload them here today. Bear with me while I go in search of a solution.

Happy Tuesday in March, Dearies! I hope you are happy and safe and well and doing all the things that blow your skirt right up today. Come tell me all about it!

Later...finally figured out how to add my progress pics:

FINALLY, AN ANSWER!

 

TWO DOWN...ONE TO GO

Two tests completed today, so I'm home and enjoying some beautifully fresh air and sunshine while contemplating my ToDo list for the day.

Ready?

Eat. Stitch. Futz.

That's it.

What's on your lists, Dearies? Come tell me all about it!

(Laura J Perin posted this on the Facebook, and I just couldn't pass up a chance to re-post it. Isn't it fabulous?! Thanks, Laura!)

AND THEN IT WAS MONDAY...AGAIN

 

I've been spinstering while Rich visits his mom in NJ, and as much as I'd love to tell you that I've been busily crossing things off of my ToDo list...um...not so much.

Laundry is sploshing away, and I did manage to get the big girl sleigh bed changed yesterday, but all of the other stuff?

Nope.

What I HAVE done, is sleep. And eat really really really super duper I can't believe it healthy and light. (*) And I've stitched and diamond painted every day, and I started a new book (Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver), and today I stood outside in the fresh air and sunshine for a full eight and a half minutes before my crazy downstairs neighbor started puffing her ciggie on her patio below while hollering into her cell phone about having Legionnaire's disease.

(Is it me, or does crazy just seem to follow me wherever I go?)

(Which reminds me of the old Dr Melfi joke..."You tell me that everyone around you is an asshat. But what do they all have in common?")

OK, so maybe I'm the one that's actually crazy and the Walter Mitty part of my brain turns everything into a cartoon fantasia of talking fish and whatever else magical things were in that movie.

Tomorrow is inspection day here in the complex, and they will come in with their paper booties and test things to make sure they work. I'm sure that some people find this a bit intrusive and a pain in the neck, but I find it...comforting. The screeching of the smoke detectors might hurt my eardrums, but knowing they work gives me one less thing to worry about.

Speaking of worry...only three tests this week. One will be a specimen sample that I have to collect here at home that under NO circumstances am I going to talk about (if you know, you know), the second is a liver scan, and the third is an endoscopy.

So, Dearies, by the time I get the results from this round, if there are no answers, then I am convinced that it's the universe's way of saying "Sorry, kid. This is it." and I'm heading over to the IU/Notre Dame Medical School and offering myself up as a test subject and to sign all of the paperwork to donate myself to them once I've gone to the big needlework shop in the sky.

(Hopefully in more than a few years!)

But...in the meantime...the sun is shining, the breeze is lovely and warmish, and the birds are tweeting sweetly. Who's happier than me?

AND THEN IT WAS SUNDAY AFTERNOON...

 

SHADES OF 1989

My goodness gracious. I haven't fretted over this many tests since my Senior year at Notre Dame.

(For the record, I was NOT a great student there, but I earned every single C and C+ my tiny little brain was able to accomplish. College was a complete disaster for Yours Truly, but I tried really really hard and despite being entirely too stupid and socially inept to be there...I'm glad I gritted it out and got that diploma that looks almost like my dad's.)

(Except his was signed by Fr Hesburgh, was for Mechanical and Electrical Engineering, and had all kinds of fantastic grades and wonderful collegial memories built into it.)

(Sigh.)

And because I wasn't completely done with traumatizing myself, there was the LSAT testing that I was certain would kill me.

(Again...disaster.)

But I digress.

Next week will be an adventure through my torso parts...liver, spleen, pancreas, and gall bladder. And just to make sure not one single square inch of me is not inspected thoroughly, there will also be 'oscopies all over the damn place.

We're narrowing in, Dearies. By the time this is all over, I will have an EOB (explanation of benefits) as thick as a phone book and a small army of satisfied specialists standing in the photo booth with a little sign that reads "I cured the Spinster Stitcher of all that ailed her".

Back to stitching and diamond painting. What's new with you?

HELLO MOJO!

Just when I thought my stitchy career was over...the mojo returned.  I've had a delightful few days of playing with the Sampler Game Board, and as soon as I post this here love note to you, I'm going to get back to it.

I await test results this week, and will visit with my gastroenterologist tomorrow. The pieces of the puzzle are still scattered about the table, but at least now I feel like we're going in three or four different directions instead of eleven.  

What's new in your corner of the world? Come tell me all about it!

IN WHICH THE SPINSTER STARTS TO GET TWITCHY

My stitchy life has been fraught with all kinds of boredom, dissatisfaction, and worry lately, Dearies. I plant my ample heiney in the chair every day with needle and thread in hand, but within minutes I'm exhaling loudly and sighing dramatically that whatever is in the q-snap in front of me just isn't blowing  my skirt up.

Phooey.

I think I've put one or two stitches into three dozen different projects lately in the hopes that I'll find that "aaaahhhhh factor" again and just play with a piece until it's complete.

My poor WiP bin has been rummaged more than a thrift store, and I'm about thiiiis close to putting my shoes and socks on and hitting the Toll Road for a House of Stitches splurge, but the better angels of my brain kick in and I remember that spending the rent money on silk thread is not very adult-y and I put the checkbook away.

Last night I stitched the two stitches on a WiP that I think has to be at least 20 years old...The Drawn Thread's Sampler Game Board:

After I did the two stitches, I decided to do a thread pallet instead of just chucking the whole thing back into the basket, so there is a bit of hope that this might make a return appearance this afternoon and evening.

In case you're new to the whole thread pallet concept...it's basically a quilt block design board (that you can purchase or make yourself), that you use to park your working threads. I purchased this one from Fat Quarter Shop, and I used the little bobbin labels from DMC to identify the colors. 

I've also made thread pallets....a simple process of attaching batting to a piece of mat board and then glueing fabric around the edges, and instead of DMC labels, I've also used little round stickers with the color name indicated, but you can do any method to suit your fancy.  I just find that having the threads readily available makes the stitching time that much more enjoyable.

(Another great tool is the Bitsy Bob, but Kelly is no longer making them, sadly, and most of the ones I have are already assigned to other projects.)

(But you all are crafty and brilliant, and I'm sure you have devised your own methods for keeping things tidy and efficient.)

So.

That's my story for today. I have now completed all of my medical testing and am now waiting for the follow-up appointments to tell me which direction my little CrazyTrain of Medical Wonder will head next.

In the meantime, I'm going to just behave myself and remain calm. (hahahahahaha)

What's new with you?

 

 

Just a quick update, Dearies.

Tomorrow I'm taking some crazy breath test to determine if my gut bacteria is OK or if it's gone awry like my Craft Days of yore. Then I'll get the results of the sleep study (with Rich in tow so that I can firmly but politely say "I just want the results of the test and nothing else, please"), then pick up five new prescriptions, throw two away, get thyroid labs done again (because my last TSH was 11.8 😖),  and then get ready for more CT scans and appointments with four different docs.

(Yes.  I said a TSH of 11.8.  In the event that you're NOT an Endocrinologist (my dear Dr Cavanaugh who was mine for 35 years and saw me through thyroid cancer along with Mayo Clinic retired) and apparently nobody (including me) thought to check it)...a TSH of 11.8 is N.O.T.G.O.O.D. At all. As a matter of fact, I am now about 78% sure that the majority of my symptoms are related to everything just shutting down.)

(But I'm not a doctor, and I stopped attending Google Medical School, and now I let the professionals do their job.)

(And yes....I am desperately trying to find new professionals who will take me on as a patient.)

In between this mish-a-goss I am trying to remain calm, eat and sleep well, put shoes and socks on and do things every now and then (like go to a music performance or see my GodDaughters), and make sure to stitch and diamond paint every day.

No stitchy progress to show, since I get about three little x's in and then start rummaging through baskets, but here are a couple of small DPs that are done and in the portfolio/book thingie under my chair:

And now it's time for a nice long nap, Dearies. Thank you from the bottom of my pitiful little heart for all of your thoughts and prayers and notes and cards and wonderful, wonderful support. I am, as always, completely overwhelmed with gratitude for each and every one if you.

I'll be back as soon as I can!

Love,

coni

Until I get myself together, please enjoy a little beefcake. 

You're welcome.
 

AND THEN...SHE WENT COMPLETELY OFF HER LITTLE NUT

Today I had an appointment at Advent in South Bend to get a sleep study scheduled. My family doc is convinced that everything that's wrong with me is related to obstructive sleep apnea, so she wants a test to confirm this diagnosis.

(For the record...this is where she sent the referral. I'm not too sure I would have gone this route, but I guess there comes a point when I have to trust her...right?)

I've had two previous sleep studies...one in a sleep center and one at home. The first was an unmitigated disaster because I never fell asleep, despite the technician coming over the speaker hollering at me every ten minutes to "CLOSE YOUR EYES AND GO TO SLEEP". The second was uneventful and conducted in the friendly confines of the big girl sleigh bed. Neither revealed anything.

I do know, however, that I snore loud enough to rattle the windows, and with weight gain it gets worse, so I kinda sorta see where she's going. I have, very much indeed, come awake gasping for breath in the middle of the night, and I'm sleepy enough during the day that I can fall asleep standing up...so OK...let's do a sleep study.

Raise your hand if you've ever taken your car in for an oil change and the guy comes out with a clipboard containing a list of crap that you REALLY SHOULD GET DONE and that it just so happens that they're running a special on this or that doohickey that your car REALLY NEEDS, and then there's the insinuation that if you don't opt in for the $600 air filter or the $700 timing belt or the bazillion dollar whatever thingamagig they are trying so hard to sell you, that driving one more mile without this crap will result in certain death.

Yup.

That was this appointment today.

I've calmed down a bit, but I have to tell you...I have never been more disappointed in a medical facility in my life. A hard sell at a doctor's office? When did this start? I've been to used car dealers and felt less pressured! 

I got the sleep study scheduled, but I am already dreading the return appointment to get the results when they try to sell me more stuff.

Again...I went there because my doctor wants a sleep study. But in the course of a fifteen minute appointment, the nurse practitioner did a scope of my nose (which I didn't want and should have just flat out refused), told me I have serious malformation of my left nasal passage, prescribed antibiotics for an infection I don't have, told me I needed a CT, and suggested that I needed a balloon angioplasty of the sinuses. She also told me to start using a nasal rinse (which they just happen to sell there), and then told me that when they got the results of the sleep study and was diagnosed with apnea, that there was no way I was going to tolerate a CPAP, and would probably need an oral appliance instead that costs $4,000. 

Somehow I came to my senses as she kept going on and on and on, and I basically interrupted her and said "Let's just get the sleep study done for now, and I will check with my transplant team about all of this other stuff" and that was the end of the consultation.

Now I'm just feeling a little sick to my stomach, because I made the mistake of reading online reviews of this place, and almost every single one of them mention exorbitant charges, insurance issues, and the fact that after very similar experiences to mine, people received bills for thousands of dollars.

Damnit, Gumby. 

Sometimes it's just not easy being me.

(On Page Two, by the way, we have my Gastroenterologist who basically shrugs his shoulders and says "Eh...you've got reflux" and on Page Three, we have my IU Transplant Nephrologist who says "Lose weight".)

(Meanwhile....I actually think I know what's wrong with me. I think I have a carcinoid tumor or carcinoid syndrome, because if you plug my symptoms and last year's issues into Google they are a 100% match.)

(I'm just posting this, by the way, so that when they finally figure it out and prove me right I can get all smug and self-satisfied and have TOLD YA engraved on my tombstone.)

I'm tired, Dearies. And I'm frustrated and terrified and sad and mad and...at the end of my damn rope. I am walking around screaming like a banshee at Rich and I swear if one more thing goes wrong I might not come back from it. Nobody is listening to me, I'm seriously starting to feel like the World's Biggest Hypochondriac, and if I could find the gas money I would get in my car and point it in the direction of either the Cleveland Clinic, Mayo Clinic, or Dr Weil's Center for Integrative Medicine.

OK.

Enough.

I'll get it together...I promise. I know that I just need to calm down and have faith and know that all will be well eventually, so I really appreciate you putting up with my nonsense. I'm going to go offline for a bit and just...be. I think a few days of stitching and reading and diamond painting and praying and watching Ted Lasso. All of these things might be better for me than this constant state of panic I'm in trying to fix myself and the doomscrolling that I do all night long because I'm terrified to fall asleep because I'll suffocate to death in the middle of the night.

Thank you for the love and prayers and notes and comments and...everything. I'll be back soon...hopefully better and back to myself.

AND THEN...SHE WAS ALMOST NORMAL AGAIN

 

First up...a diamond painting finish. This was the kit that prompted me to start diamond painting in the first place, I think. I seem to remember that it popped into my Instagrams and I thought "I should try that".

I'm so glad I did.

I honestly don't know what came over me yesterday, but after my second cup of damn good, I decided to try to push myself to "just do one thing" and change the sheets on the bed.

Before I knew what hit me, I had not only done that, I had cleaned the entire apartment to within an inch of its life and did about seven loads of laundry to boot.

(Yowsa.)

I managed to get a long hot shower completed before the water heater decided to fritz out (emergency maintenance technician Robert reassured me that it was a good thing I called him), and I spent the rest of the night watching YouTube videos about the Philadelphia Mob with JB while Robert putzed and futzed about in the utility closet, declared that it was unfixable, and turned off the gas and water "just to make sure nothing blew up".

(Well, that's reassuring.)

(They'll be here Monday to fix it.)

(Good thing I got that shower!)

So by the time I put my head on the pillow last night I said a teary thank you to BG* for helping me get so much accomplished, and I fell into what I hoped would be a good long sleep.

Nope.

In addition to everything else, I have started waking up two or three times a night unable to breathe, which then causes me to have awful panic attacks that "roll" throughout the day. I just can't breathe, Dearies, and if you know anything about me, you know that not being able to breathe is second only to being buried alive on my list of things that are in my NO THANK YOU column.

Then, just to make sure I'm paying attention, my abdomen is distended and so sore across the middle that I feel like I've swallowed a bag of wet cement studded with push pins, my hair is falling out, my skin is so dry it's cracked and bleeding, I fall asleep with a needle in my hand, I've screamed so much at Rich that I caught him looking for an Exorcist yesterday, and my face turns bright red every night at 8pm and feels like it's on fire. (There are about ten more unpleasant things going on, but I'm going to spare you, since I really start to sound crazy when I talk about it.)

(Besides...boundaries.)

(She says while grinning maniacally.)

I've diagnosed myself with everything from colon cancer to a pituitary tumor, and I'm pretty sure that if I tried hard enough I could pass whatever test you need to pass to have MD after your name, thanks to my attendance at the Google Medical School. Meanwhile, I have seven doctors going in seven different directions, I have so many new and different drugs to try that I'm seriously waiting for the DEA to execute a warrant, and my Facebook algorithm has changed from stitching and book ads to nothing but miracle cures and Weight Watchers Ozempic subscription information.

The best part of all of this is that I stand in front of Stewey's little box of ashes every night with my hand on BellyBean and I say "Boys, Mommie is decidedly unwell, so I need you both to do the things that you do to watch over me and help me make it through the night so that I can get better, lose 150 pounds, get my eyebrows done, and go back to doing the things I love while simultaneously figuring out a way to be worthy of all of the blessings of my life, pay them forward, and make a big fat difference in some small way in this wonderful world we live in."

And then I crawl into bed and wait for the panic attacks to begin.

So that's what's going on over here in Crazyass Spinsterville.  In between telling myself not to die and making a pot of chili, I'm going to try to get back to stitching Alphabets today.

What's new with you?

REST IN PEACE, DEAR MISS JEAN

 

I never had the privilege of meeting Jean from Attic Needlework, but once upon a time a million years ago, before I was a stitcher, I visited her shop with my sister. I didn't understand it fully at the time, but entering that place felt like walking into a cathedral. 

Now that I am a stitcher, I see just how accurate I was in thinking that.

My prayer is for Jean's family and the needlework family. We've lost a giant. May her memory be a blessing.

A FUTZINGDAY UPDATE

 

Dearies, I miss my old Futzingdays of yore. 

Remember when Stewey and I would awaken on a Wednesday and await what shenanigans were upon us? I seem to remember always looking forward to the mid-week point of things, and even though nothing was ever accomplished it felt great to progress through one more day and get closer to a week's end.

I suppose I am melancholy because I have big hard serious scary stuff coming at me from all directions. Most of it is medical...some of it is just situational...but all of it is stuff that I just wish would either get here and go already or just take a big detour and leave me alone.

Dr Yaqub, my transplant nephrologist, will be here tomorrow to poke and prod, and I've got a list a mile long of questions and observations and requests for him. I'm pretty sure he'll just pay attention to the kidney parts and leave all of the other stuff to other specialists, but I have some small hope that he'll just grab the ball and play quarterback for a minute.

Sorry to dump and run. I just need a few happy thoughts flung my way if y'all have a minute. 

In the meantime...back to Alphabets I go!

WOW....WHERE WAS THIS ONE HIDING?

 So I got the bright idea to fish through my WiP basket, and look what popped out, jumped onto q-snaps, and hollered "Will you just finish me already!"

Stay tuned...I actually stitched for more than ten minutes last night! Updates forthcoming!

WEEKEND PLAN

 

I MISS THIS LITTLE GUY

 Bosco Oliver Willowswamp

Sept 20, 2005 - Jan 22, 2022

HELLO WINTER, MY OLD FRIEND

 

It's been a long time since it's been this cold in these here parts.  If you are similarly affected, please be safe and smart and take care of yourself today! I'm staying under my Snoopy blanket with damn good and some stitching!

34-23. DAMN.