Colours

And completed in 20 days. I just need to get this matted and framed. I'm happy with this piece and looking forward to the next one that I do!

The colours came out differently than I originally thought about. I was going to do the moose in browns, and he ended up in blues and greens, with an orange antler. That was fun. I also did mostly circles, which certainly gives the piece an interesting flow in the design. It has a Barb Davis head on it, an eye bead, a wooden bead from a Buddhist prayer bracelet, and a pearl that I have had so long I forget where it came from. I think that I found it on the floor at a bead show. Being vertically challenged, I usually find nice things on the floor at shows - I'm closer to the floor than many.

I had colours that blended from one colour to another colour, usually in the same family of tones. I used everything from 22's (meaning beads that are 22 beads to the inch) to 11's and some hexes.

This was an enjoyable project.

I've learned something new

I really enjoy bead embroidery. It might be my newest addiction. I traced around a moose that I had on some really thick Pellon and added the other shapes and lines. Those shapes and lines have been beaded with size 11 black seed beads. The moose will be completed in size 15 brown or black seed beads. The embroidery will be completely mostly in circular patterns, emphasizing the shapes that I have drawn.

I will be adding other items on the piece through it's completion, such as special beads that I have purchased through the years, perhaps some moose beads that I haven't use or one of the wooden beads that I bought while I was in Korea in 1999.

This is the first piece that I completed about 2 weeks ago. I really like the circular pattern that evolved around the Barb Davis heads. This piece is just one piece that will be placed in a "Bead Quilt" to be auctioned off to raise money for a breast cancer charity.

I'm pleased with the way that my piece turned out - with the yellow on the left representing the sun. The blue in the top stripe is the sky, followed by brown mountains, purple flowers, green grass, blue water and dark earth. I don't even know if I was consciously making these deicisons with the color choices as I was beading, or just picking up the colors that pleased me.

I'll update with pictures of the top piece when I complete it.

I've also recently inherited a great storage system for all those little bead boxes. Old wooden slide (like from a slide projector) boxes that the hospital was going to get rid of. I was gifted with 14 of these treasures!!! I can't wait to start filling them!

The saga just keeps continuing.

My mother-in-law, Sheila, has been in the hospital since very early on Thursday morning, Alan and I weren't going to cry "Wolf" until we knew what was going on - which we still don't know exactly. What we do know is:

Sam (father-in-law) called 911 late Wednesday night because Sheila fell in the bathroom and he couldn't get her up.

Her blood pressure was so low that the EMS drivers took her to the nearest hospital (Huron Valley), who transferred her to Henry Ford Downtown because of her medical records there and insurance.

Sam called me to find Alan because he wanted to go with her. Al had just left work, and he didn't hear his cell phone, so I called Paul to go over and check out what Sam needed. Sam, obviously, just got in the ambulance and went with her, but didn't tell us this.

She was admitted very early Thursday to a medicine floor, fortunately with physician that I know.

Sheila had a chest x-ray, Cat Scan and an MRI yesterday. They are looking for fractures of bones, and a mass that might indicate that she has had a stroke or series of strokes - THEY DON'T KNOW IF SHE HAS! They are just looking. This is on top of the kidney stones that we found out about that were blocking her kidneys last week. The stents have been placed, and hopefully she'll respond to the lithrotripsy (sound waves to break up the stones).

Yesterday, when I went to see her in her room, she was crying about how she couldn't get ahold of her husband - she was so worked up that she didn't know who I was for about 10 minutes. She was just crying and crying because she didn't know where her husband was. I later found out the reason she couldn't find Sam was because she was calling my house! I got her calmed down, she spoke with Sam. 15 minutes later, she forgot she just spoke with him, and she wanted to talk to him..

Last night, she called the house in hysterics because the hospital lost her clothes (she didn't have any, she was in her nightgown with no shoes when she went to the hospital) and she was going to go home. She said that she was in a hallway, she was in a chair, she was walking around, when the whole time, she was in the bed. It took Alan about 20 minutes on the telephone to get her calmed down. We talked to the nurse who explained that they moved her bed from one room to another because they had a man coming in, and two women (Sheila and another) needed to be put in the same room.

The resident in charge has my home number, my cell number, Al's cell number as do the nurses, and even the medical student.

Bottom line: We are working with the social worker on the floor who gave us a list of nursing home that will take the current insurance and will work with us getting her permanent placement in a home. Sam can't (or won't or doesn't know how to) take care of her.

So, how is your week going?

Edit Feburary 6- No cancer, no metastatisis, only minor changes due to aging on MRI, no changes in xray, no sign of stroke. No underlying changes. That's all good. Orthostatic changes due to dehydration. Will perform steroid test to check the adrenal gland, check for autonomic dysfunction.