Tea Party

Tuesday was the Tea Party for four manor residents.

Gene went to the grocery store for most of the party fare and bought cookies and cucumbers and thin white bread for buttered tea sandwiches.  He even found the Queen's recipe! 

For my part, I cleaned the patio and cut roses and whipped up scones, and made an ice ring with silk flowers frozen between layers of water.  During The Purge of Kitchen Doodads several years ago, our ancient handed down punch bowl, cups and ladle were dismissed with fond farewell.  So for tea, other utensil improvisations were in order. It all worked out.  More or less. Except we limped along without a ladle, pouring sherbet and 7-up punch from a pitcher into clear plastic cups.

This week I accompanied Julie when she went to her long awaited appointment with the ophthalmologist.  After the exam, he launched into a speil about how she would be having corrective surgery on her crossed eyes later in the summer at Children's Hospital in Denver.  I stopped him in his tracks when I brought up her winter flight to Denver for medical reasons, explained issues with pressure sores, the ambulance ride home that exacerbated the wounds, and ended my diatribe with the declaration that it would be very difficult to get her transported over to Denver.  

 

Long story, but the female ophthalmologist who corrected her eyes back in 1993 is still practicing in Denver and this current specialist with confer with that woman, reaching back 23 years into Julie's medical records and will likely, hopefully, be doing the corrective eye surgery on Julie in August.  Yes, Julie definitely needed a change in lens prescription but will wait for new lenses until after the eye surgery.

I am leaving today for Bangor, ME for the Cineast Scrabble Tournament in Castine, Maine.  It should be lots of fun, and I will be glad to get away for a week. Julie has been testy.

Father Isaac and Very Reverend Father Don Malin

It is our privilege to have become members of Immaculate Heart of Mary Catholic Parish this year.  Gene and I have grown in faith and have acquired new friends and spiritual partners in this parish.  The two priests serving at the parish are the Very Reverend Father Don P. Malin, V.F. and Father Isaac Kariuki, originally from Kenya. Here are a few pictures  of them over the past months.

Father Isaac Kairuki, fall of 2015 at RCI

 

Fr. Isaac, June, 2016

 

Fr. Isaac and Gene, June, 2016 at dinner

 

Father Don Malin, January, 2016, blessing our house

 

Father Don, March 2016

 

Father Don, March 2016 at Easter Vigil

 

 From this week at IHM:



'Just Believers'

Fr. Don Malin's band, 'Just Believers' will be performing after the 4PM mass at Immaculate Heart of Mary Church on Saturday, June 11th. The Knight's of Columbus will have a cook out and offer hot dogs and hamburgers! Come offer Fr Don and Fr Isaac a Happy Birthday!  

Fr. Don and the Just Believers, June 11, 2016





The Just Believers performed about a dozen pieces last night to an enthusiastic crowd.  Great meal, fun time

It is June

It has been a year since Julie has been back in Colorado and I was reflecting on May 30 a year ago.  (back post here)  

Personally, since last May, I am now able to eat and my appetite has returned.  Last year at this time, I was not sleeping very well, and now that problem too has somewhat dissipated.  My relationship with the Lord is stronger, perhaps through much more prayer.  And I became Catholic!

Julie has been hospitalized four times over these past 12 months, with another one upcoming.  She continues to live, and dare I say, thrive in her new environment. Caregivers, now friends, yesterday took her across the street for a meal out.  She loves that.  How kind these women are and continue to be.  After a long shift, they all gathered round and wheeled her not only to the hospice restaurant, but also for a blood draw at the nearby health care office.  They went above and beyond their manor duties.

This is a picture of Julie on Tuesday.  And one of Mercy.



Last year it was if I were just going through the motions of daily living, but now I am painting again.  Usually on Wednesdays at the manor, but sometimes at home as well.

Yesterday I made German Chocolate Pie (Pinterest link here). Gene is making bread and a main dish since tonight we are having dinner with two couples from the neighborhood.  Last year, I did not have the energy for entertaining.  Another positive change since last summer, energy-wise, that is, as Gene continues to share and provide with his excellent cooking abilities.

In two weeks, several residents from the manor are coming over with the activity director and several staff, now friends, for an afternoon tea.  We are scouring up hats for party time for the women to wear; they look forward to a few hours away from the manor, and I want to make it special. 

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Life is returning to a new normal.  God is good.

And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things, at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work.
(2 Corinthians 9:8)

Views from the Porch

Flowers planted in 2012 for my wildflower garden have grown. Some have not flourished, and a few have succumbed to over-watering and too much sun and summer heat.  The picture above shows most of the original plantings, plus a few others. Bluebells, where are you? Was the soil not to your liking?  I have been putting used coffee grounds around the wildflowers every morning to increase acidity uptake.

Iris are blooming

Penstemon are almost ready to bloom

Jupiter's Beard *transplanted two summers ago from slips*

Phlox that will go into earth at the end of the season

A new painting started (oils) from this reference photo:

And from the kitchen:

Rhubarb for this recipe (a yum, thanks, Marianne)

Mrs. Tittlemouse, do you recognize your pretty crochet?

Julie is coming over today from the manor.  We have had quite a few days, and maybe that is why I have neglected blogging for a while.  Last week, she had an optometry appointment that was a bust.  Her wheelchair would not go through the door of the examination room because of its width, 36 inches.  The optometrist was a bit embarrassed since his offices were supposedly "wheelchair accessible".  But she did finally get a referral to an ophthalmologist, which she needed to begin with, but the manor Powers That Be would not listen to me.  It might take another few months to get that scheduled, however.

Then there was the issue of dealing with Julie's headaches that lasted a few days...nothing more to report than worry resulting in a natural resolution to her headaches.  And then another visit scheduled to the surgeon who first helped out with the diversional colitis resection, which has still not been resolved.  That appointment will happen at the end of the week.  Perhaps infection is still evident?

I leave you with this verse that struck me from Sunday's homily, referring to Romans 5:1-5:

...affliction produces endurance, and endurance, proven character, and proven character, hope, and hope does not disappoint because the love of God has been poured out into our hearts...

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Freya Hite Shares Art

Prolific artist Freya Hite has won numerous awards at the Brush & Palette Fine Art Shows. Hite paints landscapes, figures, portraits and abstracts. Freya believes that art is a strong form of communication of ideas, emotions, and states of being. And, of course, it feeds the soul.

Hite demonstrated her abstracts using a product similar to water based oils (Flashe paints). Her painting might look "random" but her composition is far from random as she lays down paint on the canvas.

Some highlights to remember from the Hite demonstration that you arty people might want to refer to in the future:

• Using the Golden Triangle in art composition... link here for the Rule of Third
• and here for more information and good examples (a Vermeer painting is cited
• Flashe painting was briefly mentioned, using transparent type acrylic paints
• Source: The FLASHE range, distributed since 1955 by LeFranc & Bourgeois, is one of the first modern painting materials to give artists other means than oil painting to express themselves. Its optical characteristics allow the effects of old tempera paints and primitive painting grounds to be reproduced. The paints are matte, velvety and opaque.
• Hite mentioned the Zorn Palette, named after Anders Zorn, as he used the following four colors for his palette, resulting in good skin tones and varying shades of greys: : Yellow Ochre, Crimson, Black, Titanium White. "That's it! Just 4 colors. You can vary your palette by the type of black and red that you use." (source Gagnon Studio)  
• These are some of Hite's small canvases where she used Zorn Palette colors:
  
  
  
  
  
  

Thank you, Freya!

Mini Art Show Winner for the month of May was Cynthia Grover, shown here with her painting:

Reyna Shawl and Lunch Out

Linking with Ginny, here is the finished Reyna Shawl.

Comments: Giving myself a C- grade on this one. Instead of knitting a slip slip knit, which is tedious, instead the trick for me was to knit through the backs of two stitches (after the center spine). Note to self: too difficult to maneuver this and dropped too many stitches along the way, thinking I had caught them up when, in fact, they elusively slipped from sight.  Then I saw the dropped stitches too late.  Bad knitter.  I will not knit this scarf again.  The colored clips denote places that need to be fixed.

On other notes:

Yesterday was the first time in a year, since Julie arrived back in Colorado, that we went out for lunch at a public restaurant.  I was apprehensive on many levels.  But the excursion bypassed most of my worries, and even the sun came out for a while. Julie, of course, has no qualms about anything. She merrily drank a marguerita and had her meal with just a few mishaps that certainly did not bother her in the least.  I came home weak kneed (Gene went, too, bless him) and thankful I did not misbehave with too many aimed corrective behaviors.

Going to the manor now for our little art class so will look at other YarnAlong entries later.

A Mother's Day Thought without Flowers

One of my favorite sermons concerning Mother's Day was delivered several years ago by a Lutheran pastor.  She spoke a few words in a heartfelt message about Mother's Day, and how it is not always a happy time for many individuals, especially for women who had lost children to death, to drugs, to estrangement, or to legal intervention which placed children in other homes or institutions. And women who chose abortion as a means to end an unwanted child were also mentioned with sadness by this pastor: how, indeed, would that female remember Mother's Day and her prior actions to prevent the start of a life from shortly becoming one of her own children?

This pastor went on to say that not all people were lucky enough to be born to exemplary mothers; some people were not nurtured with love, with bed-time stories, with chicken soup and sweet kisses on hurts, but instead had only painful memories of their mothers. And those unpleasant memories were brought to their attention and in juxtapostition by Mother's Day being joyfully celebrated by others.

But if you are lucky enough to have children who give you esteem out of love, or even simple duty, then you are blessed.  And blessings to you if you have or had a mother who did not abandon you, and who more times than not, gave you love.

Simply being reminded that motherhood is not all ribbons and bows is worthy of thought.  And it makes one careful of calling out "Happy Mother's Day" to female strangers at the supermarket, since it might evoke an untoward response.

On Sunday afternoon at the manor, the activity directors sponsored a tea for all mothers at the facility.  Refreshments and flowers were well received, and we heard some amazing stories about elderly resident mothers who were honored that day.  One son told of his mother having read the entire Bible each year for 48 years.  Forty-eight times she had read the Bible, and lived her life with those lessons in mind.  He and his dad are there every day for a few hours at lunch time, honoring their mother, cajoling her to eat, giving their attention to her. She is truly blessed.

Julie gave me potted tulips in my favorite colors, and a wooden carved face to place in our garden.  She gave Gene's mother flowers, and then we had his mother and part of her family over for dinner in the evening while Julie stayed at the manor.

Gene advanced pups Mercy and Libby some money, and they gave me presents he said they told him to purchase to thank me for a year of being a good dog momma.  Gene made this picture of them:

A Plaintive Little Cry

It was warm late Tuesday morning, and Julie and I were sitting outside on the home patio, sun beaming down from the east on Julie's back as she faced me in half profile.  She was enjoying the first of the warmth provided by the spring sunlight. I was a few feet away in the shade, perched on a painted wooden rocker with legs folded while I removed woolen socks, hand knit a decade prior. "It is hard to part with a sock one has knit oneself with a good quality yarn," I thought to myself as I critically reviewed the wear on the socks.

Silently lamenting that fact as I pulled off one sock, then the other, folding them and stacking them, I said aloud to Julie "it is about time to use these socks as rags."  The old variegated wool had been washed way too many times, first as a hand wash, then as time went on, they had been tossed into the machine for thorough washing without further regard for the pilling process.  And the pair were indeed pilled, fine wool strands finding other similar worn yarn strands, knotting themselves together to create long errant pieces of extraneous fibers, an aesthetic bane to both knitters and wearers of wool.

Julie was listening to me, watching, contemplating my musing. Glancing over to her as she leaned back in her wheelchair, her head down as she was likely glancing at her iPad to see if a new WordChums play was ready for her response.

But she had heard me, and said "Don't use them as rags, given them to someone at the manor."  I was thinking that if this well worn foot apparel was eschewed by me, it would be unfair to offer them as a gift to one of the other residents. Julie then said "Lots of people there are continually cold, no matter how much the heat is cranked up." Then, under her breath, her head still turned downwards, and in a quieter, more high pitched voice, she said "I'm cold.  I'm cold."

I must have gasped because in my mind's eye, I saw the very elderly woman who lives on Julie's same wing at the manor.  Let's call her Ethyl.  "I'm cold, I'm cold," Ethyl laments in her chair parked outside the door to her room. I could very clearly picture Ethyl sitting in the hallway in a passive demeanor, waiting for the next activity to be laid on her by an aide or a nurse or an activity director. Toothless and without aid of dentures, her head bundled in a soft cap that covers her ears and forehead, there was Ethyl speaking through Julie.  "I'm cold, I'm cold."  Julie had mimicked Ethyl's voice perfectly, and with a fair amount of empathy. And Julie has heard this plaintive cry so many times over the past eleven months that it sprung forth from her being as if Ethyl were living inside Julie.  It was eerie how Ethyl was being channeled.

And maybe I will re-think using those well worn socks as cleaning rags.

Another story about an elderly nursing home resident can be read here.  It continues to be revised.

Photographic Mistakes

Thinking I was achieving a modicum of expertise with the camera, I snapped about two dozen or so pictures at the April 21 meeting of Brush and Palette with artist Kay Crane kindly providing the demonstration.  With humility and regret I report now that, every single one was lost due to my error. During the editing process, I inadvertently erased the entire album from my computer.  Alas, even after consulting experts from Google and Picasa, it was confirmed that I did the biggest no-no ever by deleting the album with one wrong key stroke.  The April meeting will go down without any visuals saved for posterity.  And Kay presented so well.  And we had a different venue for the meeting, with colorful backgrounds.  It is like telling you I caught a big fish, but he got away.  Those pictures were pretty good, really they were.

I was humbled by this faux paux but struggle forward and continue to volunteer my humble photographic efforts.  On May 7, about 50 individuals will be receiving their First Eucharist at Immaculate Heart of Mary Catholic Church, and a photographer is needed to record their special day.  Yep, I will try.

Here is one picture of a baptism I photographed at the Easter Vigil service that has to be tops for sweetness and innocence appeal.

On the daughter front, she is getting along.  Tomorrow will be the one year anniversary since her husband's death.  You can imagine how that is impacting Julie.  She bought flowers this week for Sunday services in their former church in Rock Hill, SC to commemorate that anniversary.

Knitting: Reyna Shawl, about 1/3 completed and linking with Ginny and her Yarn Along:

Click on the Yarn Along Box to see what others are sharing this week on Ginny's blog

Anticipation

While reading Jean today, she reminded me of a conundrum that I experienced last weekend: the sewing machine electrical cord and foot pedal went missing.  And I mean nowhere were they to be found.  The last place I remember seeing the clear plastic sack containing those pieces was at the repair shop. 

That sack was lying last Friday morning on the repair office counter next to the cash register.  Inert, innocently bagged along with my name and phone number in case it was separated from the Pfaff.  It was just there.  I was trying so hard for it not to be misplaced.  But it was lost, or stolen, or taken by someone who had not a clue that it was important.

Two phone calls to the repair place assured me that the parts were not in their possession; intensive questioning of the husband revealed nothing (he carried the repaired machine back to its cabinet). A thorough car and then garage search revealed not a clue to the whereabouts of the missing parts.  Had I picked up that sack when paying for the repairs? I just cannot remember. So there was nothing else to do except order the missing parts from an internet source.  Sigh.  $120 could have been better spent.  Nothing to be done now but wait and see if the newly ordered parts show up via USPS.

Today is the first day that Julie will be at our house for a short visit since the first of the year.  Her visit will include lunch of fried trout that Gene and I caught last week at Corn Lake.  Julie was last here at the house on January 1 when almost immediately she became ill with that blasted virus that hit the manor, quarantining the place for about ten weeks until it had run its course of infecting all those vulnerable residents. From New Years' Day until today, Julie has either been recovering from illnesses and surgeries or otherwise incapacitated to the point she could not leave the manor/hospital for a visit home.  That is almost four months, so today will be a real treat. Pray it will be a "successful" visit: i.e., all bags stay in place on her body and she does not need to be returned to the manor for nursing care that I cannot provide. 

One of her nurses said yesterday that back in the early winter, Julie would begin throwing up on the mornings when she was to come over to our house because of anxiety that all would not go well.  That made me so sad to hear that.  I will endeavor to make light of any untoward outward expression of appliance glitches today, because it is likely Julie feeds on my nervousness.

Yesterday, I waited almost an hour at the manor for Julie and her entourage of care givers to finish up with her care before our visit.  (I brought tamales for our lunch.) While waiting, I finished this little piece in oils and pen, 5" x 7". 

Further dabbling yesterday with pansies and poppies in acrylics turned out nothing worth saving.  Tomorrow my friend at the manor who also paints with me on Wednesdays may provide something worth sharing.  I'll take a picture of the cardinal she is painting for show and tell.

The weather is truly spring-like, and by that I mean it takes its turn being cold and warm, with last night temps going down to freezing. Here is a photo of a few cosmos seedlings this morning.  They have spent the last three nights under a south window in my study.

About half of the seeds germinated, so it must be time to start planting and nurturing a second batch.

Last week a newly ordered kit with yarn dyed by KnitCircus showed up in the mailbox.  It is Rainbow Trail by Christina Gihrlanda.  Lovely colors! The color is named "Quoth the Raven." It will knit up into a striped sweater like this:

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What Happened this Week

Best new recipe tried this week: Lemon Ice Box Cake  by 12Tomatoes to be served at RCIA tonight

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Finished Projects: A Line Vintage Dress (modified pattern) and Yard Clean Up ( trees, boxes, rose bush limbs) in time for city-wide trash pick up, likely today

source is our front sidewalk



Frustrations: Julie has been in bed two weeks; sewing machine tension is off, making sewing almost unacceptable; Julie does not keep her new phone charged

Successes: Julie was in wheelchair and playing cards in the manor activity room with only minor headaches Sunday and yesterday; Pfaff sewing machine taken to be fixed at the repair shop; went fishing today and we caught our limit of trout! Geese were present

Happiness Derived from Material Goods: New Merlot Leather Lazy Boy Recliner delivered yesterday so Gene and I now have Edith and Archie Bunker chairs

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Blooming:  Iris in front

144 seeds planted on April : progress of sprouting as of April 14. half are up:

Electronic Update: The Fire was knocked off Julie's bedside table on Sunday night and is broken beyond repair; new phone for Julie is working (but hardly ever charged when I need to call her)

Trying to learn how to use Jack's Camera (macro lens):

actual size: a 50 cent piece

 

Ollie the Owl: still here, seen most often at dawn and then again about 10 AM daily

Reading: Almost finished another Rosamund Pilcher's Winter Solstice, and Pain in the Tuchis

So what is up in your neck of the woods?