Sunday Summary

I'd like to thank everyone who left kind thoughts for my husband on Wednesday's post.  It is very much appreciated.

My husband's surgery went well though it did take twice as long as expected.  He is dealing with more pain than I felt after the same operation two years ago.  I didn't bother to fill the prescription for pain medication that I was given nor did I even take so much as a Tylenol.  He, on the other hand, is counting the minutes till he can take the next dose of his pain medication and still feels such pain that he is unable to lie down.  He spent his first, second and rhird post-op nights sitting up in his rocker, well padded with pillows and with a blanket over his legs.  I'll be calling the surgeon this morning to see if this is within the normal range of post-operative pain.  I foresee the need for lots of TLC in the immediate future.  I had planned to spend most of the first three post-op days very close to home, going out only for items he needed or wanted, anyway.  So this is a hermit weekend for me and I expect I'll get some more stitching done in between nursing and pampering my patient.  I am afraid he may need me into the work week as well but I am hoping to see some improvement on Sunday.  I only work a five minute commute from the house so he can call me back at need and I was planning on checking on him at lunch time anyway but I am a bit worried about leaving him alone at this point.  We shall see what Sunday brings.

 Thursday at the hospital: The entire day, from arrival at 6:15am to departure at 4:45pm, was spent in various waiting areas, sometimes with my husband and sometimes without.  I brought a combination of simple to difficult projects, something to suit any environment as it came up.  As it turned out, I worked on only one project during my waiting time: The Primitive Needle's Thy Needle.  At least it served to keep the boredom at bay while Bill was in surgery and PACU.  Once he was back in a room in the Same Day Surgery Unit, I was able to sit with him.

Friday and Saturday: I continued stitching on Primitive Needle's Thy Needle.  The first photo shows what it looked like before the hospital stitching and the second photo shows the present state of affairs.  It looks so much better with the few touches of color.  This piece will remain my go-to project for waiting rooms since there is still lots of repeat and fill stitching yet to be done: the angel and the coin shapes still need to be filled in.  After that is done there are just a few geometric motifs to be stitched round and about the text.

Sunday: I switched back to the Mystic Smalls' Stitcher's Pocket and plan to work on that for the remainder of the weekend.  Here is a photo of my progress thus far.

And I just have to mention a new-to-me designer that I learned about by reading Nancy of Glory Bee's Designs blog: the designer's name is Pineberry Lane.  Now, I know I had pledged not to buy any charts this year and that I had already fallen off the wagon once when I bought the Cedar Hills rabbit chart. But I fear I shall fall yet again.  The Pineberry Lane designs have a similar feel to The Primitive Needle and to Not Forgotten Farms designs, both of which I enjoy.   I have fallen in love with the Pineberry Lane Fancey Blackett series as well as a few of the other designs, specifically Mehitabel's Redwork and Tansy-Yarrow-Rue.  And I love the names, all straight out of the 17th century.  I used to volunteer as a kitchen docent  in an early 17th century Dutch house preserved by our local historical society.  The herb garden had tansy and yarrow and rue.  These plants were common ingredients in medicine, dye and pest control "receipts" of that period.  The whole Pineberry Lane website is a joy to browse and I have spent a very pleasant quarter of an hour doing just that.  I recommend it highly.  I also recommend Nancy's blog and have embedded links to both the Glory Bee blog and the Pineberry Lane website in this paragraph to make it easier for anyone who wishes to visit.  Hey, if Nancy is going to enable me, I may as well enable others in my turn!  It's a shared sickness.