Hippity Hop

       I am going for hip replacement in two weeks.  I have had trouble walking, lots of pain, depression and overall it just plain ol' sucks.  I know about depression so I am trying and struggling to stay on top of it. I know to keep busy and when I finally got rid of some "male" excess baggage, it was amazing how some of my creativity came back despite the pain and depression.

I have a friend, D, who has been taking care and checking up on me since I came back from Alaska in mid August.  Since I have no family local, she will be taking me to the hospital and keeping an eye on me and my house.  Thank you, D.....you have been my life jacket, nurse maid and babysitter.  You don't know how much I appreciate all you have done for me.  It is difficulty for me to take gifts, show weakness and to be sad, in pain and depressed in front of people.

I have S, who will be taking care of my dog for almost two weeks.  S and I have been friends for a very very long time.  While she is a nurse, I do NOT want her to be my nurse during this.  She has supported me mentally for the past 12 years or more.  She and her dog, will be good doggie mom's while I heal.  Her bedside manner just isn't what I need and she lives 1 1/2 hours from me.  Sorry S!

I decided the way to return their generosity and to keep myself from driving myself crazy:  I am making them both a quilt.  I have enjoyed making both of them although they won't be finished in the two weeks I have left.  The top to S's quilt might be finished today or this week but D's won't.  The lady in the local quilt store recommended the pattern for D's quilt because it takes a lot of sitting down work that I can do while recuperating!

Here's S's quilt:
                                                                       

                                                                        From this:

                                                                        To this:



For D's quilt, you work each 15 x 15 inch square separately.  At first, it was hard to sew each piece but as I was told:  the more you do, the easier it is to do.  I agree, now!   I am working on each square separately but plan on leaving a few to cut while I am home recuperating.  D will not get her quilt before Thanksgiving....or maybe her birthday which is is mid November.  I won't have to send hers out to get it quilted which is a bonus.  So far, I love each of the three squares that I have done on her quilt.  It's been fun....

Two totally different quilts and I am having fun doing both!!!

Wow!!!  I have been thinking about this blog for a long time and haven't posted anything to it in a long time.  Today, I will post and hopefully continue to post for a while.

A lot has been going on but I am not going to try to write about all of that.  One major thing is that I spent two months in Anchorage Alaska teaching Montessori preschool for the summer.  It was the best experience I have had in a long time!!!  I have always wanted to be in Alaska and without much money, a job was definitely the way to go.  Last year sometime, I told my two children that I wanted to celebrate my 60th birthday by us renting  house in AK and everyone coming to visit.  I don't think that is in the cards because I have made arrangements to teach summers there for the next few summers.  So next year, my 60th will be in Alaska but I wont have to worry about my kids (age 29 and 23) arranging for a house!

When I got back, my house was a mess with mold and mildew,  I found out that I need a new hip and I broke up with a BF of 3 years.  Now that the dust is settling from all that, I am sewing and knitting again mostly because I am having difficulty walking.

I have arranged for caregiving when I get my hip and I am feverishly making quilts to give to my caregivers.

Here is what I am working on:

                                                              This is the patttern

                                                       These are some of the fabrics!

Gone for a while...now I am back!

I am not sure why I have been gone for so long but I am back. I haven't sewn since December when i was pumping out those Mug Rugs for all my friends and their friends. Did I burn myself out? Not sure. Today was the first time I went back into the Sewing Room and I moved stuff around and threw some things out. I also found some stuff. The picture below is a baby quilt for our guild. I had all the pieces together, now i should sew it up. Here it is:

Design Wall: UFO #5

This is my UFO #5, my reversible quilt. I have 14 squares completed from a workshop about two years ago at our Quilt Guild. Almost shameful, but I still love the quilt. Any suggestions welcome!

Vegan January: The Challenge

I have been researching what to do about my hip issue and how to age gracefully. Everything came back to weight and living a healthy lifestyle. So after about a month of research, I am giving it a try. I have been overweight most of my life and it has taken it's tole on my body. Now, with the issues I am having: as my mother used to say: It's time to "shit or get off the pot" and since the pot is losing my ability to walk and all the dignity involved with that, I am giving this a healthy shot!

Everyone in my family has been a vegetarian at one point of our lives. When I met my now ex-husband, he was vegetarian, my son became a vegetarian for a long while and for periods of her life so has my daughter. I always was the cook for them so, I know what to cook plus I really enjoy cooking!

I am giving this my best shot! Here's to my Health!!!

PS: I started yesterday and since I took all the diary out, I can breathe better. There is such hidden diary in foods. Although, I knew I was allergic to milk, it would slip in that way!

Here is a website to get you started on veganism.

http://happyherbivore.com/2012/01/new-year-new-you/

-e

Cheers!!!!!

I never felt very sentimental about much in my life. Now as I age I have grown more sentimental about my family and especially my children. This has been an interesting year yet I can't say it was bad nor can I say it was good. It just was!!!

Reflecting back on the year for me is not going to be easy, yet I think I need to do this because it will help me move on the 2012 if I put it down on paper.

Not much happened in the winter that I can remember except we had way too many snow days and it was a difficult beginning to the semester. I started going to the Y 5 days a week to help my hip and hopefully lose weight (I lost and gained 15 pounds a number of times in 2011). My relationship with my children was about the same. I had been struggling with some issues with my daughter and was hoping that they would be resolved by then but they werent. As a matter of fact, I think just this month, I am hopeful that we can have a better mother daughter relationship.

In May of 2011, my daughter graduated Wake Forest, my son and his fiance' came for a visit, we met her family, both my children and their dad had birthdays. In June, my boyfriend and I broke up and he started working in China. We started talking again via Skype.

I didn't get to travel this past summer and realized that I hate being in Wilkes County all summer long, so I am bound and determined to travel/live somewhere summers as long as I continue to work here. I did go to Maine with my old friend Denise for less then a week in July. Then back here for the summer. The school semester started hard with me having to teach not only my classes but my colleagues for the first two weeks of classes. August also brought my daughter moving to NYC for Grad School.

In September, my pap smear came back showing something and I went for some testing to see exactly what it is. The testing was hard on me and hurt a lot and then thru my hip out for which it still hasn't recovered. For the month of October, I worked part time so I could work on getting my hip better ( I literally couldn't walk without holding on to the wall for two weeks) and to be able to walk again without too much pain. The gyno wants me to have surgery to remove a fibroid. I can't do it just yet till my hip gets better.

In late October (I think), my son and his gf decided it was time to get married. They planned to have it in Dec. in California where she is from. This speeded up my will to get better and walk without a limp so no one would know how much pain I was really in. I started physical therapy in October, with that goal in mind. Physical therapy with my insurance coverage still cost me $53 each time I went and I went twice a week. Chaaaa-ching!!!

The wedding plans were coming together thanks to Monica and her sisters in November. Eric and Monica got married in Japan on 11/11/11. What a special day that is! They were also going to get married in the States in Dec. I was walking better in November but not consistently. Some days I would need some help and some days not. Finally, towards the end of November, I felt like I was able to hide my limp and pain enough to go to the wedding.

December comes: end of semester stuff for all three Firestone's. I was anxious to see my daughter who I hadn't seen since August was coming home, my exchange student was coming to visit and we were all flying to CA for the wedding. I am not going to go into the issues between my daughter and I but I thought they were on the mend, then one thing happened, and I feel it put a cabash on all the progress we made. I still don't know but I am much more hopeful that in 2012, things will heal. My China friend came back to the States for two weeks, while I was in CA. I didn't see him. What's to become of this relationship??? I question: is it a relationship? I can't retire for another few years, he needs to work in China for another year.

So moving on to 2012, what do I want to happen? Here is my list (not in any particular order):

1. Lose weight
2. Heal relationships in my family
3. Get out of debt
4. Work on good friendships
5. Walk without pain/heal my hip.
6. Simplify my life
7. Reduce stress
8. Think about long distance love relationships

And now for my bucket list:

1. Salmon fishing in Alaska
2. Visit Belfast
3. Retire
4. Travel in retirement


Wow, this sure seems like a sentimental post! Happy New Year and here's wishing that all we accomplish all our wants, wishes and desires. Cheers!

Old Family / New Family / New Beginnings and I got my first daughter in law!!!

This has been a world wind kind of week. My ex husband, my daughter and I flew out to California to celebrate his marriage to a wonderful woman. Monica has two great sisters who helped coordinate the wedding in California because Eric and Monica live in Japan. As I see it, the sisters kept in close contact with my new and only daughter in law so that they could fulfill her desires to have the wedding that she wanted and deserved. People came from all over: Japan, Arizona, Washington, New York, Chicago and more. Monica's family and friends all gathered together as one to give her what she wanted. It was so nice to see the bond everyone has to fulfill this goal.

Monica's mother and father welcomed everyone into their house with open arms. They were the best! Yuko (Monica's mother) was an inspiring person. She asked me if I would like to cook some traditional Japanese food with her and I jumped at that opportunity! The whole experience of watching her family of origin come together to make the festivities happen was a great experience for me. The bond between Monica's friends and her family was very strong and made this wedding happen. Her's friend's support and effort made Monica's wedding just as she wanted it.

She has a lot of wisdom and shared some with me. I think because she grew up in another culture, the wisdom she has to share with other women (probably American women) is what we American women need. I have been struggling with some family relationships in my life and I never mentioned them to Yuko, either she picked up on them or the word got out. Either way is fine. She came to pick me up one day at my hotel and we talked about how wonderful each other's children are and she shared a few of her experiences and used words like keeping it harmonious and having to learn how to do that as the mother of the family. I don't remember all the words she used but they were definitely powerful words. I think she is an inspiration to all women of all ages! Yuko has a lot to offer aging women. If I ever get myself together to do the Documentary about women aging and changing roles, she will definitely be part of it I want to become closer to her and her wisdom.

Lately, I have been struggling with what to do with my life and that there are two components to my professional background: children and families. Hearing Yuko's wisdom and being sick of my teaching teachers where I feel it wont make a difference to the children of my community has made me want to move the something with working with families. I would like my focus to be changing roles of women in families. Makes sense because that is where I am in life!

So back to the lovely wedding: Monica wanted it to be a bright and colorful wedding and she got that! It was the best wedding I had been to in a long time. They wrote there own vows to each other which just brought tears to my eyes, the best man gave a speech that brought more happy tears to everyone's eyes and everything was just great fun! It was truely a celebration of love and happiness!!!

Welcome to my family: Monica Firestone. Beware: You made my family fall in love with you too!
Congratulations Eric and Monica!!!


Now for pics: