Monthly Archives: February 2022

Accidents Happen.

Accidents happen to people all the time. Some are silly and not harmful. Some are terrible and cause much pain and suffering.  I’ve had a few accidents in my life. None life threatening, but painful, nonetheless.    Two of our grandsons were in a car accident right before Christmas when someone ran a stop sign and broadsided them.  One grandson had a concussion and the other one got his feet cut by walking on broken glass from the accident while he was stocking footed.  I was so thankful because it could have been a lot worse. They were going to get pizza with a friend.  A last minute decision and their mother didn’t even know they had gone until she heard about the accident and found out her kids were in it!    A parent’s worse nightmare.  I know.  That’s another story.  This past week was a week for accidents at our house.

We have had some ice around the house for the past few days, so David has been taking care of the chickens for me because I really don’t have good shoes or boots for walking on ice.  He’s been doing so good, then one day he slipped and fell.  He came in and told me he had fallen and I told him he should call the doctor, but he refused.

The next day came and David decided maybe he should call the doctor and he went to see him and was sent for x-rays.  Later that day the doctor had seen the x-rays and said he wasn’t a technician, but he believed David’s arm was just deeply bruised.  Today, several days after, David showed me the bruise on his arm and it’s pretty bad.  He’s been in a lot of pain, but he still lifted chicken feed and other heavy things the other day. Now I feel guilty that he has to do this for me.  So now I’m wondering if his arm is broken.  I think he needs to see the doctor again, but he’s stubborn.

I can’t say much about being stubborn. Forward a few days after David’s accident, I was working in my shop with all the pups sleeping in their crates and it was time to put the puppies, who are large dogs now, outside.  Usually I have Lucy and Sugar sit and wait until I open the cage door, but that day I just started opening the door and they lunged for it and slammed it against my shin, really hard.  I thought to myself, “I’m going to have a bruise.” After I got all three dogs outside I rolled up my pants leg to see the damage and to my astonishment, blood was gushing out and running down my leg soaking my stocking.  I looked around for something to stop the bleeding. Luckily I had just brought a new roll of paper towels out there so I grabbed a wad of them and held them against my leg. Immediately they were soaked in blood. Oh, no!   So I grabbed some more and held them tightly on the wound.  Then I took some torn fabric and tied it like a tourniquet around my thigh and tied a few paper towel sheets onto the wound.  I was so afraid I’d bleed out and David would find me dead on the floor in a pool of blood.  I sat on a chair we have in my shop and put my leg up and waited for David to get home.

While sitting there I thought I should go inside and make supper. So I did.  My leg was still bleeding, but not nearly as much.  I got supper ready and when David walked in and he saw me he said, “What did you do!”  I proceeded to tell him and he looked at the wound and said, “That needs some stitches,”  and I said, “Nope.”  I’m tough. It will heal and maybe I’ll have a scar, but who will see it?  So I didn’t get stitches.

I’ve had stitches before.  Many years ago when our boys were little, we took a trip to Colorado Springs with  them and my parents.  We pulled our camper behind and we all slept in it.  When we got to Colorado Springs,  we were setting up camp and the windows were rolled out and as I walked around the camper I hit the corner of my eye on the window.  My mother said I needed stitches so David and I went to the hospital and I got stitches and had a black eye the rest of our vacation.  People would look at me funny and I wondered if they thought I had been hit by some person.

Another rather gruesome accident I had concerned a piece of driftwood I brought back from Michigan one year. It was in the shape of a dragon, but the bad thing about it was it had a huge spike sticking out of it.  I kept it out by our above ground pool for years and no one ever got hurt on it. Then the day came I was working around the pool and took a step by the driftwood and ran the spike right up into my lower leg.  It was in pretty far and there was no one around to help me, so I pulled it out.  It was pretty awful.  I cleaned the wound and bandaged it and when David saw it he said, “You should have stitches.”  But we had planned to drive to Cincinnati to a Reds game that very night, so I said, “No!”  and we went to the game,  I limped the whole evening, but I never went to the doctor and my leg healed and I have no scar there which is amazing.

I’ve had enough accidents to know to keep my tetanus shots up to date.

So David has worn a sling all week and I’m keeping my wound covered with a large bandaid and we keep on doing what we do every day.

I could tell you of more accidents I have had happen to me or to others, but I think I’ve told enough about them right now.

Have you every had an accident?   Here’s to safety first.  Bye.

Snow Days and Sew Days

We finally got snow!  Wonderful, beautiful, white, shining snow!  I was so happy. Quite joyful, really.  I know all you who have to get out and shovel and try to drive in snow weren’t as pleased as I was to see snow, but we haven’t had a substantial snow in soooo long.  I was really hoping for a blizzard and at one time as I watched the snow blowing off the roof of my shop and saw the snow so thick at times it was hard to see very far, but it didn’t last long and after a day it was over.

I’ve been wanting a day like this for a long time.

And looking outside my shop, I was so filled with happiness. Nothing is cozier than being inside warm and snug and watching the snow fall.

But we didn’t stay inside all the time while we still had snow. We went to the hills to watch grandsons sled down them.

Driving back roads, through woods and over hill and dale, we finally came to the hill where the grandsons wanted to sled.

Playing with snow is so much fun.

A lake lies at the foot of the hill and it was frozen solid.

Our grandsons and their father walked out on it. I was a little worried that it wasn’t solid enough, but our son-in-law grew up near the Adirondacks in New York and is well aware of how thick ice should be to walk on.

Ready to go.

Dad and son coming down!

Watch out!

 

Our daughter.  She is so photogenic.

Me, not so much.  I am always caught in the most horrible poses.  I look like I could bite someone here and I was really very happy.  I brought hot chocolate and marshmallows for everyone to drink.  Please, look away from the picture now before you turn to stone!  Some day I will show you a good picture of me. I’m really not that scary.

The snow will not last, sad to say. It’s supposed to be almost fifty degrees tomorrow.

We have done so much already this Winter.  We went to see a Van Gogh exhibit where you are immersed in the pictures. It was wonderful.

People sat around on the floors and watched as the pictures changed.

The pictures seemed to melt onto the floor.

I wore my Van Gogh shirt with these irises on it.  So I blended in well.

Van Gogh was a prolific painter, but he sold very little of his work.  He died a pauper.

At one point he was into chalk drawings.  The drawings appeared to be drawn on the floor at one point.  Some of the pictures came to life, it seemed.  Birds flew. Thunder sounded.  It was all amazing and wonderful.  I could have sat there all day and looked and looked. There was so much to see.  If you get a chance to see this, do.

I took one art class when I was in college and I liked it, but I have never been artistic in this way.  My art is in my quilts.

Speaking of which.   I mentioned I was hoping to have a Christmas sale this year so I have been very busy in my shop making things.

This is what my table looks like right now in my shop.  When I am working on a project fabric gets flung from here to there as I look for just the right fabric piece I need.

I have been making pillows.  I made several of these for Christmas and they were a hit.  I’m also making pillows of my own design.   I plan to make lots of pillows, aprons, pin cushions, pot holders,  small quilts, table runners and anything else I can think of to make.

And because I have been sewing a lot and because you NEVER have enough fabric when you are a quilter, I ordered more.  The line I ordered from is called She Who Sews.

I am absolutely in love with this fabric.   David ordered me a bunch of it for Christmas and I just got it this week.  A  late Christmas present.

Here are some of the other pieces in it.

Each piece has a Bible verse hidden in it. Can you find the one here?

I love, love, love this!

Believe it or not and I’m sure you believe it now, I have ordered more fabric from another company and am waiting for it as it was a pre-order also.  This company sends its fabric all wrapped up in this.

Tissue paper.  I love when companies give that little extra service that makes you feel they care.  This is a great company also if you are looking for fabric.

David got a couple of puzzles for Christmas from the Diary of an Edwardian Lady.

Winter and Fall. He completed them both in record time so I ordered him the Spring one.

And he finished it in a couple of days so he went looking in our closets for another puzzle and found this one.

Different quilt patterns.

Which was only 500 pieces and he finished it in a day and a half.  I’m going to sell this one since he’s done it.    I got my dining table back now and he’s going to have to find something else to do!

I had to buy this book.

It is a facsimile of Edith Holden’s diary she wrote in the early part of the 1900’s. She wrote about the flowers and animals all around her and did water colors of many.  She was an exquisite artist and married a sculptor later in life. She lost her life tragically while searching along a riverbank for some more things to draw, fell in the river and drowned.  She has left us this wonderful  book of her drawings and writings along with poetry and latin names of most of the things she drew.  She was very intelligent.

To be able to draw so beautifully is such a blessing.

Each page is a treasure.   She left us something wonderful to read and beautiful puzzles to do.

February is going as fast as January did so I will be keeping very busy in my shop until warm weather and then it will be time to get back outside and plant flowers again.

Happy Valentine’s Day to you all. You are loved so very much by the very One who made you.  Bye.