Two things

opportunities.
I may join in on a mystery quilt thing. I have struggled feeling connected here in blog land though I've found great inspiration in some blogs I've read and begun to follow.  I've learned a lot and it's fun to see what others are doing craft wise. The first step was to check out my blues. Well, I have a bunch as it turn out. So now I have to decide if I'm going to hack into it and start the first step.

The upper squares are my current project. I'm not sure I'm eager to push them aside to start this new thing, but I'm nearly positive I can't do both at the same time. Ahhh, the issues that confound my simple mind!  The lower pile are my delicious blues.

I found a twenty dollar bill in the street yesterday and my mind has been awash with what do do with it. Before I realized I had enough blues, I was tempted to purchase more blues. We shall see.


Waste.
I'm horrible about throwing things out. I gulped hard pitching three pieces of yarn that were about a foot long. No good in my crocheting project. But I become a little aware, maybe hyper aware, of all we throw out and I just despise waste.  This is why I have so much fabric that was given to me years ago. Some needed some tlc so I couldn't pitch or donate because I was certain no one would see the prize inside like me. (Arrogance anyone?)

A true reset

Blueman is my port in a storm. Truly. He's mild mannered to my moodiness.

 As a person who loves words, I'm often inspired, touched, moved, or even sometimes a manipulator of words. Last night we were watching a show together and the therapist said something to the effect of, "her internal hoard is almost as large as her physical one".

Now we know what a physical hoard looks like. Sometimes it's garbage, sometimes clothes or shoes or collectibles, but in all cases it's more than you need or can handle and usually in a space not designed to hold that much. An internal hoard. That took me aback. What was that? The therapist answered. In that particular case, she mentioned the hoarder held all of her hurts inside, collecting them until they were too much to handle.

I considered this and even yesterday's post where I said much the same thing.  I think I hold these hurts and dramas close as though it will insulate from newer ones happening. They will still happen, regardless. For health's sake, I must learn to wash off the prick of the memory nettles and scab up.  We all have scars from past hurts.

Blueman let me talk this through offering input when necessary. He lets me walk my mental path out loud, using his words to add depth to the journey. I truly love this man.

In need of a 180 or as the kids say, "do-over!"

I think it all started early yesterday. In the last 24 hours:

• A young man I trained was promoted. I'm pleased for him. It's a job I would have reached for had I still been in that state at that company. Happy for him but frustrated that I haven't let my tenure there go yet. I thought it was behind me.
• My knitting project which has been torn apart twice, is still too short. 
• Started another random project and was pleased with the beginning results but alas, it too, was too short. I have no more matching yarn in the stash so just adding is not an option.
• Over indulged in dinner. Hadn't done that in quite some time so trying to shed the shame of that
• Woke up with dreams of someone from my past that morphed into being chased down by monster trucks solely for the sport of trying to kill me. Perhaps I'll have the wherewithal to interpret this dream later but right now...not so much.

So. I need to turn this around. This is where faith is supposed to step in and I should divest myself of my burdens. Trouble is, sometimes I think I'm more addicted to hurting myself in this never ending cycle than I am serious about growing and starting the next chapter of my life.  The next one is going to be hard.  I've always shied away from difficulty though end up in the middle of it anyway!

No one looks at this blog so it may be time to end it. Lots of things to consider today.

June completes part two or complete slackery

I did it! Finished the cafe con crema project. I think it could be either smallish afghan or wide-ish prayer shawl. I really like it and it used six or seven partial skeins of yarn given to me in the great yarn stash takeaway a couple of months ago.

As I was editing the picture, I noticed a photo bomber and kept him in!

Passively aggressive

My laid back cat has periods of being passively aggressive. Normally he'll just go lay down right next  to his "brother" and then slowly nudge him until the other cat just gives up and moves. Yesterday he decided that wasn't going to work so apparently using his brother as a pillow seemed the best choice!

Its so easy to manipulate others with our behavior. It's easy to misuse the skill. Luckily, I'm pretty sure I don't physically sit on others and I'll try not to acquire the habit!

Besties

I spent a few hours with a good friend today. We celebrated her birthday which was last week and had a dessert that I'm kicking myself for not taking a picture of. Bananas in a cinnamon and sugar spring roll sliced diagonally and placed upon banana mousse. To one corner was a scoop of vanilla with caramel sauce and adjacent corner had sliced strawberries with strawberry syrup drizzled over. She'd have been okay without it but I felt the need for a treat.

Yesterday we'd yammered on for 40 minutes and today it began when I picked her up and we didn't cease until I left her safe back at home. Being as it was 240 degrees outside, I came home a little fatigued.  I was sharing my outing detail with Blueman and it hit me.

She is so encouraging to me. If I said I wanted to tattoo dinosaur eggs, she'd tell me that I was so creative that I'd be sure to succeed.  I rarely think poorly of myself in her presence.
Then it occurred to me that my other best friend does that too. They are very good because sometimes  I don't even realized I've been boosted until later.

Now here's where it gets dicey, I have to believe that they wouldn't offer up this philia love without receiving something from me in return. But I wonder how I can be more adept at offering this back to them without some big momentous declaration.  I shall definitely seek out an answer to this. My friends are truly sisters of my heart.

Lazy days

After two days of feeling awful and fearing my brains might be leaking through my nose, I am finally feeling better. I took a day of lazy today.

While I wasn't actually stretching across the floor like Wink, I did chill out in the chair with some good company and relaxing activities.

I tore out a knitting project that just wasn't singing to me.
I started reading a fluffy mystery.
Napping is a requirement during lazy days so I had one of those.
Tomorrow is a "do everything you have to before it gets hot" kind of day.
Glad I chose today to be lazy!

In process, a Pollyanna exercise

I was so frustrated yesterday. Seems like everything I cut yesterday had an issue. I'm one three inch square short for a bigger square so I have to decide if I use two pieces or scrap the whole square because I just kept cutting the three inchers too small. Arg!

Today is a new day and I'm focusing on the overall project and not the bump in the road.

Material in line for the next squares. The beige one is the only purchase, the rest is donated stash. I hadn't realized I had so many flowered fabrics so I liked the idea of making a field of fabrics.

I call this my one two three pattern. My first experience with one inch squares.

The solid color is light green, not sure why it comes out looking like a sad gray.

Yes, another chocolate post

The last candy bar in the drawer bit the bug one today. I said it was to be used in case of an emergency and today qualified. Mother in law visit. (Cue scary or ominous music...bum pum bum...). I did the church thing, and I learned so much. I'm finding I enjoy the teaching sermons almost more than the anecdotal ones.  I'm wondering if the synod is doing this across the board or if it's just our tiny church doing its best to raise more disciples.

But I digress. MIL visit. Red alert. I came home and started cleaning. Then I cleaned some more. Then I rested and figured screw it, it is what it is. I even sat in the front room being domestic and knitting and waiting. They were an hour late. Then watered and pottied, they left two hours later.

Why do I make myself crazy about this so a poor candy bar had to sacrifice it's life? It was a snickers bar. And if you've seen their wrappers lately, they ask a question about how you act when you are hungry. Tired, pouty, etc are options.  Mine may appear as annoyingly appropriate...but maybe that's just me.

Well, it's not chocolate

I turned in my points on my credit card for a gift card. Gifts made up from gift cards are a delight. I used it today for the following:

Okay, I had a lovely meal first of orange chicken and even brought enough home for supper. But this just sounded good. Blonde brownie on bottom with caramel cheesecake and salted caramel topping. Does it sound rich? It was! And I shared it so it's not like I pigged out on the whole thing. I even left three bites, though somewhere a chubby angel wept, I'm sure.

I shouldn't have done it. I had to pay for it outside my gift card with REAL money but... At least it wasn't chocolate!
We don't often go to this establishment but I must say it was good.

The cookies are gone from the house, but I still have my emergency candy bar in the drawer should I need it.  A practical girl is always prepared.

Coming down

That demon inside that led me to buy sugary sweets is slowly getting scrunched back into the box. That wave of crabbiness is starting to ebb for which I'm grateful.

Sugar sensitive. I read a book on it once years ago and I've had various periods of proof that I have this.

In my first apartment, I was poor. Food was either what I could earn from the restaurant or what would get me the best bang for my few bucks. A bag of potatoes was cheaper and lasted longer than anything else. Generic box of Mac-n-cheese and hot dogs. Bread and milk rounded out the top five purchases. Now that I'm grown and I know what "carbs" mean.....Woooo doggies.  I finally lost it at work, crying for hours while manning the drive through window. It was awful.  I can remember sitting in the dark and listening to my friends downstairs laughing and having fun and KNOWING the laughter was directed at me.  Years later my friend told me they wished I'd come down and shared some of what the laughter had been about.

My first house of my own was dark, few windows. Seasonally where I lived was not sunny 360 days a year like my current place.  Stresses and hormones and poor food choices like bakery cookies could send me into a tailspin of depression.  

So you'd think I'd learn. I'd take my lifetime of knowledge about how my body reacts and not go there. Alas, the inner demon that says "why aren't you working, you must be lazy" and "since you aren't working, your house should be spotless, but it's not" has to be silenced and the way to do so is to numb it into a coma with sugar.  Trouble is, after you got that little bugger da zed with sugar and stuffed back in his box, the aftermath is there. Broken or bruised relationships, missed opportunities, and yes, a definite feeling of shame that I wasn't strong enough to defend myself from that attack.

Recovery is one day at a time. Focus is key.

I guess I'll focus on this!

My boys sleeping on a creation of my mil

June completes. Part 1

First completion for June. A good friend has a birthday next week. In her retirement, she's begun organizing and tossing and donating.  She handed over a small bag of yarn with some expensive yarn inside. I decided to make some gifts to return it back to her. Perhaps not what she had in mind, but... Oh well. She can re-gift or donate as necessary.

What amuses me is that the washcloth (made from cotton and in foreground) looks as big as the potholder. In real life, it's quite a bit smaller.  Camera angles are fun.

Internet diagnosis

The internet is full of information. Some good, some not so good. I'd never expect to get a cancer diagnosis there but "what side is the appendix on?" Is a favorite question of mine. I just can never remember.

So yesterday I was considering my three day headache and whether there was a link to my fluid intake.  I googled dehydration. Guess what the diagnosis for dehydration is? Hydrate. Well, OK.

So I'll monitor my water intake and probably the resultant traffic to the restroom.
And I'll save more serious diagnoses for word of mouth discussions!

Always learning

Blueman needed to get his toe checked so an hour after our expected departure time we were off. It was not busy so that was blessing number one. Blessing number two came when we found no infection in the bone. I expect I should say the real blessing us healthcare. Knowing we could drive 25 minutes and get this resolved with no coverage questions is a help.

So it annoyed me no end when pink lady entered. She came in with a man pushing another in a wheelchair. I like to play the "who are they" game. I'd decided the man pushing the wheelchair, Bob, and pink lady were together and wheelchair guy was bob's relative. Bob checked the shaky man in, bob went back with him, etc. pink lady asked if she had to go back and bob assured her she did not.

Five cell phone calls later, I had the poop about pink lady. She was married to shaky man. Evidently he had money in an account that did not have her name on it. She was going to drain it by 80% (cause she had bills) and one of her big questions was that she wasn't sure how she'd get the balance after he died. She was quite vocal about how he'd made her life a living hell and she described how just recently he'd fallen and knocked over a tv. She'd apparently stood over him and told him she couldn't help him up.

I'd like to think that as long as I'm alive, I'd help Blueman, who is a head taller than me, if he needed me. Now I know I'm not perfect. I didn't push him hard enough on the wound care and it could have been disastrous. But I'll always be there for him. I wanted to blister pink lady with scalding reprimands. My inner wildcat wanted me to just skip the talk and punch her in the tit. In the end, I relayed my fears to Blueman and he gave the authorities a heads up.

May God watch over Rick and Bob and keep them safe from the machinations of pink lady.

Forgetfulness

Its getting worse. Everyone jokes about walking into a room and forgetting why, or something like that. I walked into the shower with my glasses on.  It took my two or three weeks to remember to look up community classes or tell my husband I'd taken a picture of something he asked me to.
Is this normal? Not being in the workplace, is my attention to detail slipping?

I put library books in the car, stop at the post office and then go to lunch forgetting the library books. The library is a block from the post office. *sigh*

I'm apt to forgive the maternal unit because she's aging. Forgetting things happens at 84.
What if I get worse? I'm the care giver for five souls. I can't be losing it already.

Last bikini when I was in my prime. I'm in the red.

Fun was a wash bin of water flung on each other with plastic butter dishes.