WIP Wednesday

We're still here on the planet.  I was just too tired to post last week.  Not much creativity going on.

I put a few stitches on my floral bell pull this week.  Very late I remembered about TUSAL.  Just really busy the past couple weeks with appointments and still more paperwork comes pouring in.  Still waiting to get dates for the orientation for home care.  Looks like sometime in July before I get a check.  Will have to call to follow up again tomorrow. (sigh)

Yellow and green threads added to the jar. Yes, that is Easter chocolate.

I finished the merino/silk and am working on my friend's llama fiber.  It's going to be very rustic looking.  This fiber has been carded.

More interesting things.  Here's Dammit with his paws around Betty, hugging.  Dammit spends every night sitting by the O2 concentrator, guarding it, from what, who knows.

Bootsy likes to ride on the back on Duane's wheel chair.

and watching the baseball game with her Pop.

A very happy kitteh now that she has her Pop.

We have babies, yet again.  That makes 13.  Duane checks them every day.  He's waiting for the fourth egg to hatch.  They've been going through seed and spinach likes it's going out of style.  I can understand the one's with the babies, but the other seven have increased appetites.

Duane made lasagna Monday night and we had my friend that drove me back and forth everyday over for dinner.  Here it is pre-oven.

Here it is out of the oven. Yes, my stove really is the size of an Easy Bake Oven.

WIP Wednesday

Another week gone by.  I  have some great news at the end. First, we'll start with what's fiberly.

I'm going for a garden shot while we can still enjoy my flowers before they burn up.  It's one o'clock in the afternoon here and already 96F/35.5C.  Supposed to get up to 98 today, it will probably make it. Just going to get hotter from here on.

I'm using the pattern Lacy Cable Knee Socks with Fleece Artist merino that the wonderful Nikki sent me in a care package.  I've started the second calf increase.  It's almost finished, then will start right in on the second one.

I finished spinning and plying the BFL/silk.  Will post a picture on Friday.  So, I started on some merino/silk that my friend from Phoenix brought down to me when she visited while D was in ICU. (too lazy to look up that post.)

Since I have a ton of handspun yarn, not too much fiber left in the stash though.  I told her after I spun it up, I would send it back so she could knit something with it.  She said she had planned a to spin a laceweight.  Sadly, she is currently wheelless.  Also is a faithful reader of my blog. *waves*

I wish I knew how to use the macro mode on the camera.  Don't know where the book is that came with it.  This is the single next to a strand of size 30 cotton.  I'm taking my time to do my finest spinning both in quality and thinness.

Here it is plyed back on itself next to the stand of cotton.  There is four ounces here, which I split in two, then split those two in half again, making sure they all went from top to bottom in order.  I should get around 850 to 900 yard minimum, I'm trying for 1000.

 Since it's too damn hot to think about knitting a sweater, much less wearing one, I've started a tank top.  Not much here to show.  It's another one of those just start knitting and make it up as I go along.  The yarn is a cotton/rayon from Henry's Attic that I dyed in peach, pink and lavender.

The New Moon was last night, so that means it's TUSAL time.  Just a strand or two added from the cross stitch I started last week. Not much more was stitched on it to be worth another picture.  My ort jar pictured between my candles on my freshly dusted stereo.  It needs a doily there.  I thought I should hurry up and make one before D gets home and clutters it back up with cd's.  However, there's not enough time for that.

The great news is at three o'clock we are having the official discharge planning meeting.  Hopefully, sometime next week, he will be home!!!  They said it could be as early as Monday or Tuesday but more likely later in the week.

They need to get a hospital bed, wheel chair, walker, commode, shower chair, and oxygen concentrator plus who knows what all else in here.  Glad we have a two bedroom.  Which means I need to clean out his office enough to fit the bed in. Feels like I'm opening my skilled nursing center right in the apartment.

I have a ton of cleaning to do in a very short time period.  My stomach has been in agony since Sunday, I'm sure it's just nerves.  However, it slows down my progress, which adds more stress, more stomach pain. Just a viscous circle.

In other news, remember my little birds?  Two of the boys thinks it's fun to stand on either side of the door and lift it open.  They've gotten is as high as an inch.  Just enough for one of the other's to think it's a good idea to fly out.  Four cats, not a good idea.  I've put a bread tie on it for now, but they just chew right through it in a day.  I'll have to find a small lock to put on there.  Boy, can they chew up some bird seed.  Walmart up the street stopped carrying the bird seed so now I have to go up to Target and they charge almost twice as much for less.

Cristy from Turtle Girl's Blog said my place reminds her of the show My Name Is Earl.  This morning I heard one of neighbors upstairs in the courtyard yelling and swearing.  It seems, as witnessed by the developmentally disabled woman who lives across from the laundry room, that someone climbed over our stone wall at 2:30 in the morning, did their wash, then defecated in our washers.  WTH!?! I don't know what the manager is going to do about the washers, but he said he's putting a lock on the laundry room door.  Meanwhile, I have three loads I need to do.  It never ends around here, I'm telling you.

The lady who's been taking me back and forth needs to go back to San Diego on Monday and will be back on Wednesday night.  So, I have to figure out transportation for those days again.  No way I could get lucky enough for him to come home on Monday, you know.

I think these two have the right idea.

Never A Dull Moment

Yes, it's that same picture of Dammit.

At the request of the nurses, Dammit is making a visit to the nursing center tomorrow.  It should cheer up, D.  He really needs it.  Man, what a week.  I missed posting WIPW for the first time through all this, because quite frankly nobody would have wanted to read anything I would have typed.  It was a very bad day.

First of all, the call lights haven't worked since arrived last Friday.  They gave everyone these cowbells to ring. The rooms on either side of him are constant cowbell ringers, so the aides take their time about answering.  It sounds like a damn cow pasture, with all the cowbell ringing.  There is a respiratory tech, D and I go around saying, "We need some more cowbell."

So, Saturday through Tuesday he was gung ho.  Actually, thought he would be walking by the end of the week, he did.  I just shook my head and said, well, you go ahead and work for that.  Saturday, he could barely bend his knees or pull the blanket on and off.  I've been busy doing all the things for a person that can barely move.  The hospital just cold turkeyed him after having him on all those narcotics for all that time, dumped in the home with nothing.  That was fun, NOT.  After much yelling, we have him on a mild dose to keep him calm.

Tuesday night, he went without oxygen for almost 2 hrs.  The resp. tech was new and inexperienced somehow unplugged the cord and left him like that.  Wednesday morning, we had a care conference for going home planning and he threw a fit about it and that the call lights didn't work.  They worked on them from Wednesday afternoon and by Friday had them working for all of about 5 hrs.

Wednesday afternoon, he was a bear.  I was exhausted.  At one point, I was standing in the hall and a nurse asked me if I was ok and I burst into tears.  It just wasn't a good time.  That's why I didn't post.  He was snapping and I was snapping.  My worries were confirmed on Thursday.

He became listless and sleepy on Thursday, running a fever.  I kept bugging the nurse until she called the Dr. to order a chest x-ray.  That evening he desatted and the RN resp. tech and I worked on him for over 30 minutes suctioning.  The results came in that he had another small pneumo thorax on the right side and a new case of pneumonia.  There are other people on the hall that have pneumonia as well, and I let you draw from that what you will. Not saying much more.

The RN tech found the crispy cracklies up on his right shoulder and told me that was where it was and drew a circle.  She's really good and I trusted her so I went home at my regular time.  She writes both my numbers down on her daily sheet and promises to call, even at 3am if anything should happen, even an anxiety attack.

Friday morning I went in and everyone said, oh he's doing great, resting comfortably.  Then I saw him for myself.  The cracklies spread and he had a huge lump of mushy air under his right breast.  He calls it his man boob.  He was alert and joking around.  I think he was putting up a front so they wouldn't send him back to the hospital.  I pestered until they told me the Dr. would there in an hour to talk to me.

The Dr. was unconcerned and said he didn't need a chest tube, they would put him on antibiotics for the pneumonia.  On top of it, D was insisting he wanted to stay and not go to the hospital.  You know how I couldn't wait for him to be alert and making his own decisions?  At that moment, I wanted to knock him back out and tell them I insist he go back and get checked out.  But, I'm just the paper signer now.

We went from 95F on Monday to 45F and all day rain on Saturday.  My back has been killing me the past three days.  I've mentioned before how my sacral iliac joint is displaced.  The top left corner of bone sticks out a little bit and the right side is sunken in.  Tonight I put it back in place by helping to lift him up in bed.

Today, he just slept and didn't eat any breakfast or lunch.  I stopped Fry's on my way home and got the stuff to make my meatloaf.  He doesn't eat more than a few bites at each meal all week.  I joked with A of how I was going to work my butt of to make a meal he would only eat three bites of and be done.  He ate seven bites of meatloaf, three bites of mashed potatoes and a half of a baby carrot.  I meant to take pictures but I'm such a slacker. He says I make the best meatloaf, so I'll share the recipe.

2 lbs ground beef
1 can diced or stewed tomatoes
1 package Ritz crackers crushed
1/2 chopped onion
2 eggs
1 1/2 tsp Coleman's dried mustard (that's the now not so secret ingredient)
dash garlic powder
dash of kosher salt
dash of freshly ground pepper
many strips of thickly sliced applewood smoked bacon

Mix all the above ingredients together except for the bacon.  Form a loaf shape in a baking pan. Arrange the bacon strips on top to cover to the loaf.  Bake at 350F for about 1/2 hours.

Tonight when I helped the aide lift him up in bed so I could feed him his dinner, the darn bed broke.  It was brand new bed.  I know this, because they kept telling me it was a brand new bed from the time we arrived. It was a comedy trying to fix the bed then find a new one.  Put him in a recliner, move the old bed out, the new one in.  That got him alert and amused.  He said it was the most fun and entertainment he's had since he's been there.  Weirdo.

He'll be reading this at some point.  I told him how I've been blogging this whole time.  He didn't have a problem with it and was glad I was keeping it documented for him to read later.  Quite upset about losing over 45 days of his life, says he doesn't even remember being.  Had me take a picture for him, so he could have a before and after picture.  I'll let him post that.  Then he asked me if I took a picture of him in the ICU.  Weirdo. I said, no, I was afraid it would freak out the nurses if I had.   He doesn't need to see that anyway, it'll just scare him.  Hell, it scared me every day I went in.

He's really working at his dexterity, wants to play the guitar again.  Grateful that I was exercising his hands while he was sedated. He's planning his guest blog post. Well, he's giving his website to everyone who will listen, so I'll post it here. Planet Moderan  Go take a look, he'll appreciate it.  The music he made himself and there is his stories and recipes.

Since this is supposed to be a fiber arts blog, there has been some knitting through all of this week, believe it or not.  I know, I'm amazed too. Had to have some knitting just for insanities sake.  I would be further along, but I went to far on the foot and had to rip back a couple inches and re-start the heel.  I'm using the heel from this pattern. (Rav link)

It's April 10th and I'm just starting to take April pictures.  I'm such a slacker lately, somebody should come beat me. This is my TUSAL picture, it's a week late.  Hopefully they don't hold it against, considering, you know.  No threads added.  I do find a few skeins of floss here and there that Butterscotch finds to play with.  I just pick them and sigh.  How I would love a quite afternoon in my chair to stitch.

If you don't have a sense of humor, stop reading any further.  I probably shouldn't write this as someone could take it the wrong way, but seriously if you can't take a joke......

Wednesday when I had my breakdown, the nurse told me to spend more time at home to rest.  It will harder when he comes home, she said. You don't think it will, but it will.  Saturday, when it was so cold and rainy and I just didn't want to go back out for my evening shift, I thought about what she said. Then I thought, no, it would be nice if he were home and I didn't have to go back out.  Just send him home with the same narcotics they are using. When he gets all antsy, I can just say, "Here honey, have some butterscotch pudding."
Him: "No, I don't want pudding. I want ...... (name it)"
Me: "But I made it, just especially for you." (said sweetly)
Him: "No, I don't want it."
Me: "Just eat the damn pudding."

On that note, I'm taking my sore, aching back to bed. It's supposed to warm back to the 80's tomorrow, I can't wait.  Yes, I'm fitting in the eating, drinking and sleeping thing in.  I am tempted to just take my dinner to bed and let the cats feed me while I sleep, they would eat it though.

TUSAL March and You Pick It

Feels like a year has gone by since the last New Moon for my TUSAL post.

Copying Cookie, pick your title:

1. I did NOT ask to ride this roller coaster

2. I should have packed a clue-by-four today

3. Can we check out and possibly resume this on Monday

4. Birds- Natures little prozac.

First I'll get the TUSAL out of the way.  This is my spaghetti sauce jar that I purposely made spaghetti just for the jar.  I think there is more thread this month from working on my Dahlias in the beginning of February.  It seems like a year ago, so I can't remember for sure.

The other night, my neighbor almost fell off her couch when I was telling her about all the clueless people I run into all day, mainly on and around the elevator. I said, I need to pack a clue-by-four to hit some people. She'd never heard that before.  Need to come hang out on Ravelry, it's where all the cool kids go.

New nurse last night.  Didn't care for her, didn't have the energy to deal.  Went home and prayed for the best.  Slept through the night with constant nightmares.  Attempted murder on the alarm clock at 7am.

Stupid thing said to me last night, the anal night nurse told me to "have a good one" as I was leaving for the night.  Yeah, I'll get right on that.  (my snark factory is working over-time)

Walked on the unit, stopped at the desk long enough to say a cheery, "Good morning, and thank you."  I have them fooled into thinking I'm a cheery morning person.  Sponsored by Folgers and the fact that I can be good actress at times.  I deserve a Golden Globe for pulling that one off.  I have also found that the more people you have believing you are a reasonable, sweet little lady, the more seriously they take you when you have to pull off the mask and show your true evil self.

(que the Theme From Jaws:)

Then I walked into his room.  He was all turned funny in the bed and exposed for the world to see.  Looked like someone had just picked him and flung him onto the bed like a rag doll.  Sedation medication way high, him out cold and his glasses off and found by me on the med cart.  I covered him up and go out into the hall and stand in front of his door with my arms crossed.  His nurse comes out of her other patient's room, looks at me and says, "His a-line crapped out.  Nothing else has changed since you called an hour ago.  I'll talk to you later."

I went back into the room fuming.  You know these past two weeks, I've had some personality clashes with a few nurses, but the care wasn't lacking so that I was ready to go to the nurse manager and request a new nurse.  The palliative care team came up to his room door and was talking so I went out and vented my concerns to them.  Besides figuring out the proper sedation, pain and anxiety control, they are also my liaisons when I'm about to blow up.  If you have ever read my post, Eleven Years Ago, you remember how little patience I have for what I consider low quality care.

While I was speaking with them, his nurse went into his room.  We all walk in, so they can do their liaison thing.  She has his radio by his head turned way up, dancing to Michael Jackson, while messing with his a-line.    Not cool.  That might look good on Grey's Anatomy, but so not cool in real life.  Especially, when the patient's family is ME. His sedation was turned down, I put his glasses on and we went on from there.

Because I'm a grown-up, she was able to gain some of my confidence as the morning progressed.  It took a lot of energy on my part.  D always tells me, "It's hard to be the few grown-ups in a world full of really big children."

During rounds, the Dr. went into the room and talked to me about the possibility of a trach.  He's not progressing as fast as they need him to. Good thing, Rudee warned me last week, or that would have thrown me for a loop. They are going to see how he does over the weekend and discuss it on Monday.  I'm counting the days on my fingers, and guess what happens on Monday?  Yes, a new attending should probably be coming on.

D was pretty alert during that conversation.  I asked him if he understood any of what was said.  He shook his head, no.  I said, "I love you and I'm doing the best I can to make the best decisions for you."  He nodded his head, yes.  Which brought tears of relief.  Yesterday, he would only respond to the nurses questions.  I was afraid he was angry with me for letting them stick all those tubes in him.  Which I feel would be a reasonable response waking up after two weeks to all that.

The resident dr. from Renal didn't want to do dialysis today.  He wanted to skip a day and see how he does.  The attending for ICU said, he wants it done every day, that D is still pretty water logged and he believes the x-rays are showing a build up of fluid in his lungs.  He wants to get him to a dry state.  I agreed with ICU dr. and told him so.  We do not need renal dropping the ball yet again and fouling the everything up causing him setbacks.  If they drop the ball again,  I might pick it up and whip it right at their heads.  (sorry, my evil side showing)

That's the past 24 hrs.  Woke up feeling like something the cats beat up over night.  Right now, I have the energy to take on the world.  Right now, that is.  Who knows in another hour or so.

As promised, The Parakeets.  I can hear them all the way into the parking lot when they are really chirping, that's with the door and windows shut. They are usually very quiet when I walk up to the door, then they hear it open and they get all excited with really loud chirps, jumping from perch to perch. It always makes me smile at their greeting.

They chose not to be very active for the camera yesterday.  But I will get them yet.



Thank you keeping up with me through all this. Pray that he gets a good nurse tonight.  I don't want to have a reason to take my sweet little lady mask off.

FO Friday and TUSAL

Two for one posts.  This month my TUSAL jar has some floss in it.

One 8 oz skein of the BFL/silk fiber finished and wound into a skein.  I think I got about 600+ yards and when this is washed and thwacked, I have a strong feeling it will puff out to a dk weight.

This will be knit into a nice cable cardi. Have to look through my stitch pattern books.

If you haven't already, check out yesterday's Name My Birds contest. You have until Wednesday at 5pm Mountain time to enter.

For more fabulous FO's, you can go to Tami's page.  Thank you for all your well wishes. I'm starting to feel a bit better. Plus it's supposed to warm up to a balmy 65F tomorrow.

TUSAL Time January

It's the New Moon so time for a picture for TUSAL.  It's a Totally Useless Stitch A-Long hosted by Daffycat.

This one that even I could keep up with.  Just take a picture of my ort jar and post it every New Moon.  Don't even have to have anything added to it month to month.  Because I may be Rosanne Connor's lost baby sister, my jar is a Ragu jar, I bought and made spaghetti just to have a jar.

From Knitting Kitties

In there is the yarns bits from Hat Hell, some floss from the tree skirt that I stitched for all of two days, some size 30 threads and some pink stuff that I don't know from what.

From Knitting Kitties

Birdie picture update as of a few minutes ago, 10pm Tucson time.  D took the picture, he thought you all should have a daily update.  Ladybird is spending more time out of the nesting box now.  The big one seems to keep the others warm for her.  D is calling that Huey Jr aka Herbie.  I'm really quite thrilled as it looks like they are going to make it.  Unlike those canaries when I was five.


I did e-mail Intense Debate Help today.  They weren't much help.  I didn't really think they would be.  They blamed it on my theme, then on the fact I had too many pictures per post.  Please click on the title of the post if came to the main page and comments will show up.  Now, I have to put my blog back together and decide if I want to keep Intense Debate.  I do like being able to respond to the comments left.

From Knitting Kitties

Mama's really quite a mad woman, you know.

TUSAL

I'm still the knitting maniac over here.  I'm taking time out to post about this stitch-a-long I found on a new (to me) blog I'm following, Tangled Up In Stitches.  This is something even I crazy needleworker and pet caretaker can keep up with.  This will be like when I came up with the brilliant idea of my New Year's Resolution to make no more New Year's Resolutions.  It's been over a decade and I haven't broken that one yet.

What is it? Totally Useless Stitch A-Long.  You take a jar, put all your bits of threads and yarns in it. Take a picture every New Moon and post it to your blog.  This has me wishing I still had one or two of those huge pickle jars I was saving back in NY.  I have until January 4th to come up a jar and probably will have to upgrade it at some point.

What about my ORTs, you ask?  That's easy, I'll just go around and pick them off D and company. They should be quite relieved to be no longer decorated with all my spare bits that are floating around the place.

If you are interested, go to Daffy Cat's and sign up.  You have until the first New Moon in 2011 to decide. She has all the dates of the New Moon's for the year listed.

From Knitting Kitties

Did you hear that high-pitched glass shattering sound go through the atmosphere this morning? That was me, sorry about your dishes. I noticed that I had tied off only one side of the skein I dyed for hat #2.  It's a complete tangled up mess.  This is going to set me back on my pace.  I'm onto the decreases of hat #1.  It would have been finished last night, but I was distracted by all the interesting blogs I like to visit.

All totaled, I believe it will have taken me 5 days to knit this first one.  I should have those other two and an afghan, plus fudge ready to mail out in 11 days, right?  Yeah, I really need to run along.

Thank you in advance for visiting with me and leaving your comments. I really do enjoy reading them. If you have a blog, I promise I'll make a return visit.