Ring Neck Dove

Rather a good shot of a dove in our yard this week, don't you think?

Gene says it is of the invasive species brought in from Africa and Asia; it is called a ring necked dove. In Colorado, Fish and Game says there is no limit to hunting doves, but

TO HUNT EURASIAN COLLARED-DOVES, and other invasive species, you must have a hunter education card.

They also have a gentle nature, and are often kept as pets, so I will just look at them and listen to their cooing.  No dove hunting for me!

These are emerging from under mulched cottonwood leaves packed over by snow through winter:

 Columbine

Hollyhocks

Penstemon

Chives

Daisies

Julie sent me 2 dozen tulips by mail!

Forsythia

Crocus (March 19)

Six Days Later

Looking back over this blog, I realize this online journal is now mostly about daughter Juliet, not "Arts and Crafts".  And it has been almost a week since it was updated.  (Thank you, Sharon, for your text last evening asking about Julie and prompting me to write an update.)  Here is what has happened since last Tuesday:

Julie was taken by ambulance from Denver on Wednesday, a five hour trek over the Continental Divide, which resulted in more trauma to her pressure wounds.  She was placed back at the manor, sans IV medications, all being replaced by oral meds.  Good news: she was transferred from the hospital back to her "manor home." I returned a few days earlier back to GJ.

Since arriving back in Grand Junction, she has been kept on bed rest and on a special mattress and bed at the manor that shifts her body weight to try to help her heal the back thigh area. We have read half a book aloud since then: Virginia's Diary. And Gene reads his book to her.  We play Word Chums. 

Today she was angry, mad, and frustrated at being kept in bed.  She broke her iPad Saturday (it fell off the bed), so I got it replaced and found some little cord attachers that will keep her phone, her Fire, and her iPad all hooked up and disentangled from one another. Maybe.  And I bought a one year guarantee so that if she breaks it again, the warranty will cover it.  Bad news was that I got a glass cut from the screen; just glad it was not Julie that received the sliver in her hand.

And we have had several talks about hospice being brought in to help her.  These were not easy sessions, but realistic at this time. For now, the APH (atrial pulmonary hypertension) is being managed, but APH is a progressive heart disease under the umbrella of COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), a diagnosis that results in eventual death.  The good news is that the lasix are keeping fluid from building up around her lungs, and she is breathing easier.  We will not discuss the bad news.

And I finished the Promenade Shawl.  Never will I knit that again as those garter stitches never seemed to end.  But eventually, finished...

Free Time on My Hands: Promenade Shawl; Piper's Journey Shawl

Yesterday, I said I would be knitting.  And yes, I did just that.  

Almost finished with the Promenade Shawl.

And the (3rd, count it) Piper's Journey Shawl is well on its way to completion.  That pretty pink yarn is from Ginny, who dyed it with pokeberries!  I am joining in with her YarnAlong.

All this knitting is happening because Julie is still in Denver in the hospital.

The news last night, set to the background of Julie crying over the cell, was that the manor is reluctant to take her back as her "home" because she is on an IV.  But the IV is only temporary, we hope, and she should be on oral medications shortly.  Does this mean Julie will need to find another nursing home placement?  Will another nursing home here in the home town take her on, or will there be further reluctance because of her complications?  (She does require lots of assistance in turning in bed, electronic lifting into her motorized wheelchair, bathing, help with her two ostomy care bags, daily wound care, etc.)  Need I go into further detail?

So instead of biting my nails, I have turned to reading (again, PomPom, I am into the Tuesday readings with help from the Paraclete) and knitting, and even getting a haircut yesterday and planning on coffee with friends this morning.

And Julie stews in Denver at hospital.  Pray hard, friends, for answers to her placement here in Grand Junction.