Lost in la-la land

My health problems have taken me on another journey and hopefully I have now returned.   I do not deal well with medications and even over the counter drugs can cause me problems.  I had to come off my pain killers, which was only a low dose over the counter type, but I had horrible withdrawal problems and oh the pain without the drugs!  I was only on a half dose but that has been cut in half again and I am now back in the real world again.

I still have a frozen shoulder and am unable to stitch but I thought I would use this time to learn to use my iPad pro and pencil.  But, I just have not been able to get that pencil working.  In desperation I went into the Apple store to find out what I was doing wrong.  (That is a 4 hour round trip.)  Turned out I was doing nothing wrong, I had a faulty pencil.  Now I have a brand new pencil that works.  What a great outcome?  I also went to the post office and just couldn’t recognise anything.  The girl gave me a lesson in the new self service model.  You live and learn.

One thing I didn’t like to learn was that the council has installed parking time limits in the streets where I used to live.  It was only a half hours walk from down town and now you can only park for 4 hours.  That was a bit of a shock as was the rise in parking fees in the city $80m for more than 2 hours.

I ended up parking in the street that ran at the side of my old home and was greeted with the heady perfume of the Jasmine vines I had planted before we sold the house.  They have now grown and cover the fence.  Now everyone who walks down the path beside the fence can smell the sweet perfume and admire the flowers.  Just as I had planned.

Grandma Duty

Sick children and school do not match.    So you call Grandma.

Luckily they are pretty sick because Grandma isn’t too good either, so we all sleep together.

But we made some pumpkins for Halloween.

 

And wrote our letters for Santa.  ( Santa is a long way from Australia and these have to be in the post by November 1st to catch the mail.)

A break

I am going to be out of action for the next week as I am going into hospital for a raft of tests.  I have been ill since February this year and although the Doctor thinks it is just one virus after another they are going to do the tests to be on the safe side.  See you next week.

Laid low

The last couple of weeks have been a kind of  a blur.  I hate being ill, but sometimes it just lays you low and you have to give into it.  For the first time, ever, I have  had to leave the children's holiday classes to others.  I just had to take to my bed.  But they did send me a photo of a finished embroidery. 

I am always blown away with what kids can do.  I gave them the design and said choose your own colours.  Look at this.  Just fantastic.

Spring

The weather is beautiful and I have taken some flowers from the garden to put around the house.

Some Grevillea for the breakfast table.

And I just love this maidenhair fern against the pinks of the Asaleas which are on the window sill in the kitchen.

I was sent home from babysitting as  my daughter- in-law and the girls have come down with a terrible vomiting wog.  My poor husband is playing nurse until my son returns from Sydney.  I don't think I could cope with another virus.

WIPW

Our tele-communcations tower took a direct lightening strike on Saturday.  No internet, no phones limited TV.   We haven't had a storm in months.   But it is back today.  Everyone one the island sighed a great sigh of relief.

I have done hardly any work over the last couple of weeks.  The pain level in my joints and muscles has got so bad that I have frozen up.  It got so bad I actually went back to my old doctor in town.  He went into overdrive.  Tests, scans, etc etc.  But some of the results show that after I had Barmar Forest Virus I caught Ross River Virus and Glandular fever.  No wonder I have been a cot case.

There are still a lot of tests to go but one thing he did for me was to get me cortisone injections in my shoulders.  There are working a lot better now and as a little bonus my legs are back in action.  I was actually able to reach down and touch the floor with no pain.   The effect only lasted a couple of days but I am loved every moment of my pain free status at that time.

I would like to finish my quilt but don't want to over do the use of the rotary cutter which makes me feel as if my shoulder will fall off but it is all sitting there and tempting me.

So I thought, maybe just a place mat or two.  This one isn't bad.

 

But it still hurts.  Better give that a miss.  I have a Kogin class to teach this weekend and with the loss of the internet I have a lot of work to catch up on.

The blessing of friends.

It is now over a week and Typepad was unable to address the hyjacking of my blog.  I have been with them for over 10 years now and all they can give me is "it must be your fault."  This has led to total frustration.  But this morning they got back to me and I am back as me not some widget.  (Big sigh of relief.)

I have had a few days away with friends up at Toowoomba.  This is the first time I have been away from home since the end of February.  I was a bit worried if I would be able to cope with the driving but I made it up there in one piece, even though I had to stop during the day and close my eyes.  I stayed an extra night so that I would be fresh enough to drive back.  Wise decision because once I got home I just sat and read a book. 

It is such a blessing to have friends.  Angela and Allan looked after me as if I was a princess.  Home grown and cooked meals, my lunch boxes prepared, (as were all my other meals) and just such love and care.  Plus the friendship and care shown by the ladies from the Zinnia Quilting group.  Also friend Teena who kept texting me to make sure I was alright.  I am so grateful for the love and friendship extended to me.  Millie the cat was not put out too much by all the attention I was given.

I did find however that I couldn't use my rotary cutter for too long, my shoulder just froze up.  Still I got a lot of work prepared and have made some progress on my sea side quilt.  I also realised that you really shouldn't work while you are ill.  Oh the errors I have made.  Still, they are going to stay as a reminder of the Barmar River Virus.

 

Marshmellow

Marshmellow is not my favourite sheep at the moment.  In fact I am giving him the cold shoulder.  He was so cute as a lamb.

Now I'm not talking to him.  He got out of the yard the other day and after nearly getting run down by a car I finally got him home.  I had to put down my phone to open the gate and he tried to eat it.

The screen is cracked and the case is cactus!!!

Monday blues

It is wet and cold.  I have three dogs to look after, all wanting my attention now!

I amongst all this I spied some early wattle shinning in the wet grey bush.  It brightens the kitchen and my mood.

I should have moved up to the apartment on the week end but too many dogs.  Instead I will stay at my son's house over night, leaving the dogs there for the day.  Then come back and pick them up at night and go to the apartment for the rest of the week.

I have 'one of those' neighbours there.  Complaining all the time , knocking on the front door, stopping me in the yard or on the drive to complain.  This time it was a noise complaint about the TV.  I had shut all the windows and doors, checked with the guests who were staying over that it wasn't loud.  Still he was banging on the door.  My solution, a pair of wifi ear phones for me.

and some ear plugs for him.

An explosion of chickens

It has been 4 months since I first became ill and today I was well enough to visit Hayley on her mini farm.  My friends Lollipop and Marshmellow still remembered me and ran to the gate to greet me.

The first thing I noticed was how many chickens there were, far more than there were 4 months ago.  Looking around I soon discovered the reason why.   Three of them actually, cocks.

Story-book is the king of the yard.

He is a very handsome cockeral.  He sits on the steps of one of the railway carriages and surveys his domain.

This chock knows who he is.

Then I spied another cock in another part of the yard.  Not as big but his feathers are beautiful.

These males certain win in the beauty stakes.

Then there are the chocks who know how to look after their broods and those that don't.

This one had 10 chickens but is a poor mother.  She just leaves them on their own and the crows, magpies and snakes have reduced her brood to one.

On the other had this mother keeps a weather eye on her brood all the time and 6 chicks are surviving, for the moment.

There are plenty of half grown chickens following their mums around, and so it goes.  An explosion of chickens.  I did suggest they would make good eating but this went down I like a lead balloon.  Looks like the snakes will be well fed.