Over Half Way!!!!!

I hope I don't run out of room in the sunroom. I'm surrounded by my "stuff". Before surgery I collected projects in the spare bedroom to work on and as I finish, Chuck brings me another one. It's worked well, but there's barely room to get thru here. When Mary and Anne get here today, I'll have to have them carry some stuff downstairs.

Speaking of downstairs, yesterday (while Chuck was here) I "slid" downstairs on my rear. It was easy and I wanted to scope things out because tomorrow the top is coming for my cutting table. Somethings needed to be moved out of the way so under my direction, Chuck stacked here and there to make room for the carpenters. I tell you, I have seen a whole different side of the guy this past week. He's always more than willing to do stuff for me. Well, to be honest, he always had 2 jobs and we had the kids who could help out so I guess he never felt a need to be available. And I've never really been in a situation like this where I couldn't actually get where I needed to go. It's been a good experience. I do have to remember that the week nights are different than the weekends. When he gets home his head is full of work and he can be a little "short". I'm short too because I'm frustrated with my disability. It's taught us to be more tolerant of each other...and that's a good thing.

Back to downstairs. Chuck carried the walker downstairs for me to use. The coming up was easy and he brought the walker back up. But today, he's not here so he brought a short rope in the house for me to tie on to the walker so I can lower it and then pull it back up myself. Just being down there yesterday gives me itchy fingers to work on something on my sewing machine. Or even just a change of scenery. Those of you who quilt will understand; the rest of you will just be shaking your heads.

This week should go by fast. My sister is coming today, the carpenters will be here tomorrow, Wednesday I'll be getting birthday gifts wrapped and my pie started for Thursday. Thursday in DM, Friday home, Saturday we're going to Iowa City to see friends, Monday I go back to the surgeon and get my stitches out. Mary will drive me down - we may make a day of it.

My agility is really improving. I got my shower this morning in record time and am actually going to style my hair today. That will be a huge improvement. During my down times I'm watching Christmas movies on the Hallmark channel. The way I see it; it's downhill from here.

Til later

WHERE THERE'S A WILL----THERE'S A WAY!!!

Week 1 is over finally and I think I am progressing pretty well. A few unexpected crisis, but I have been able to overcome them.

I finally figured out how to transport 'stuff' with me. I put this bag on my walker and I fill it up with whatever needs to move with me. I'm sure I look like a bag lady. It's worked pretty well, other than Wednesday when I put my phone and my water bottle with cranberry juice in it without realizing that the bottle wasn't closed tightly. Needless to say, my phone got sweet juice inside of it. I cleaned it out as best I could and left it open to dry out. It worked (with an occasional hiccup) the rest of that day. By yesterday it was OK. Imagine me in my condition and no way to talk to people.




The other problem I had was getting food. Of course, starting Monday, I didn't have Chuck to wait on me and I was trying to figure out how I could get food transported in a Target bag. Most of the time it didn't work well, then on Wednesday I came up with this ingenious tray on wheels. Well, ingenious to me. If you get hungry enough, you finally find a way. Now someone needs to invent some way to have a tray hook on to this walker. It's probably already out there; I just don't now it.


Don't know what the problem was, but I was able to finish downloading the rest of my project pictures. These are all things that I made about 10 years ago and finally had them quilted. Got the bindings all on and now I think I'm may sell them. If I can figure out Etsy I think that would be a good way to go. I really need to find someone to set an account up for me. I hate doing that stuff. I've decided I need to get serious about weeding out some of my stuff. After all---I don't plan to live forever and my girls have told me they don't want to have to go thru all that "stuff"!






This could be a small table mat or I put a pocket back on it so it could be used as a pillow. The star is gold wool. The size is 16x16.












This wall quilt is 33 x 40. It's very graphic and my quilter did a nice job of quilting on it.















This small wall hanging consists of 4" log cabin blocks. It's a little dark in the picture, but I applique'd a red candle in the lower right corner. It measures 23 inches square. It too could be used on a table.












This is a really early piece I did. It was part of a Thimbleberries Club Project that I taught in Des Moines. It can be used all year and has patriotic feel to it. Could be on the wall or on a table. It measures 25x29.


The pine tree table mat that I posted the other day measured 45x45inches. It looked really nice on my harvest table.


I'm practicing promoting these things for when I put them on Etsy. I have such a terrible time getting rid of my stuff. Even when I make something specifically for someone it's tough for me to see it go. I know I have a problem......


And Last: A couple more pictures of Braylon's birthday party.



Grandpa and Grandma Rice can't get enough of him!


The presents just kept coming......









But, he really wasn't that interested in the cake!

DAY 5...

Well, so much for the last 4 days. My surgery took place on Friday morning and I thought for sure I would spending my time since then stitching, blogging, catching up on emails and just having fun in general. In the past, outpatient surgery has been pretty uneventful and I've been able to pretty much resume my normal activities within 24 hours. The surgery went fine, it look several hours to come out of the anesthetic but I continued to be drowsy and nauseous for the next 3 days. On the plus side - I have had NO PAIN. Thanks to the pain meds, however, they were the reason I have been so drowsey. GOOD NEWS. I weaned myself off the meds and went to bed last night with out any. No pain so far today so I'm thinking good old asprin will get me thru the rest.



I did get a shower on Sunday while Chuck was still here to pick up the pieces if necessary. But, I felt like my plan for wrapping my foot and covering with a plastic bag would take care of any possibility of getting the bandages wet. I used my new potting bench to sit on and was able to wash my hair... and get some clean pjs on....oh my that felt good. However, I could probably have sold tickets to the feasco that ensued during the process. Anyway ended up right side up and that was the most important. I didn't realize, tho' that I had gotten my bandages pretty damp. I really didn't feel like doing much of anything except going back and forth from the couch to the bed to the sunroom for those days.



Yesterday was better. Kayla and Kelsey stopped for a couple of hours in the morning. Mary came about 10am. I told her about getting my dressing wet so she went right to work removing the old dressing, cleaning up my foot and getting a new dressing on. Anyway, I got to see the incision. 3-4" on the inside of my heel and lots of stitches. It'll probably heal pretty clean.



The biggest challenge for me is trying to manuever that walker. My arms are pretty strong from doing laps in the pool, but my palms are very sore. I'm able to get most everywhere, tho' (except for my sewing room) and have even mastered getting in and out of the sunroom. In fact, I told Jennifer this morning "I feel too darn good to be tied to that walker!"




Yesterday Mary stayed until almost 4pm and we worked on getting bindings on some quilts. She's finishing up a new baby quilt for her great-grandson and I finished bindings on 5 small pieces. I can't believe I made these 10 years ago when I still lived in DM and worked at a shop. They were shop models. I like getting these checked off my list.


For some reason I'm stalled again with downloading pictures. I'm going to go ahead and publish this post and see if I can go back in and that way.


Wanted to show a pic of Braylon at his first birthday party. That was last Saturday in Cedar Rapids. He was really good considering all the people and all the gifts. He wasn't interested in playing in his cake, so mom disappointed that she wasn't able to get some of horrible messy pictures.

WHERE TO START???

I have to say, This year has turned out to be the most bizzare year of my life. I have never felt so unorganized and disoriented. It seems like eons ago that Chuck and I made the decision to buy this acreage. And since that day I feel like it's been one situation after another. But I'm holding fast to Chuck's comment over the weekend "Are we in heaven?" We truely do feel that way the biggest share of the time and believe that if we just keep working in that direction, we'll begin to feel 'settled'.

For those of you that have never lived in a rural environment, it's important to remember that there are lots of things that must be handled differently than if you live within the city limits. Fortunately, we have lived in both worlds, however it's been awhile since country living for us and you forget about the obstacles that must be overcome.

Back in the 'old days', we didn't have to worry about being connected to the internet. That might not be a problem for most people, but when you've had the convenience of instant and high powered internet connections, it takes some getting used to. I thought that a connection thru my Blackberry phone would be the answer, but turned out not to be an option because I wasn't able to download pictures to my blog. So we decided to go with a satellite connection, but had to wait for the providers to get us on their schedule. It's done now and I'm ready to go.

Speaking of country living, our garden produce was just awesome this year. Everything got planted in a hurry and then afterwards I wasn't sure what was growing where, but here's some of our crop of Butternut squash. The green beans were awesome, just not enough of them. The tomatoes were so,so - but I'm motivated for next year as I've reading up on mulching, etc. to prevent blight.

Last weekend I was busy traveling to Kansas City to visit our 'little girls'. Bailey played in a powderpuff football game (middle school) and Olivia (second grade) cheered at their last football game. It was a busy weekend. We always cram a lot into those visits. I went alone as Chuck had an Iowa game to go to.

This weekend I'm feverishly working to get things ready for my 2 week 'sabbatical'. I will be in Iowa City on Friday for a scheduled foot surgery. It will be an outpatient procedure, but I will not be able to use my foot for 2 weeks. In preparation, I'm organizing all of my unfinished projects to work on. I have high hopes that when the two weeks has passed, I will have the bindings sewn on 3 large quilts and 6 small quilts, the applique' completed on my Blackbird table topper that we received in Spring Green, and a couple of cross stitch projects finished.

I expect to post often on my blog because now I have a laptop. I will be able to keep up with emails and do some internet Christmas shopping. After the first week, I should be pretty mobile with my walker, but I won't be able to go downstairs to my sewing room. I look forward to having some 'found time' to go thru the files on my PC and get things cleaned out and maybe even figure out how to make my Blog look more appealing.

Anyway, I must go for now as I have a big day planned with lots to get done. Want to get a couple kinds of soup made so that I don't starve while I'm laid up. Chuck will take good care of me, but his idea of cooking is throwing a pizza in the oven or opening a can of soup. I'm sure I'll have lots of funny things to relay to all of you in the weeks to come.

Thanks for sticking with me. Bye for now.