Christmas Card Club #17- A Winter Scene

 

Hello Ladies, sincere apologies for having missed two challenges, I'll explain at the end!

I hope these are suitable for Mrs.A's choice of a Winter Scene. The stencil is from Sweet Poppy, called North Pole. The top 3 were done in glitter paste- made by mixing my own glitter into various pastes. Having seen the price of tiny pots of ready made glitter paste, I had a go at making my own a while back, and it works absolutely fine. Plus the bonus is that as the glitter is mixed into the paste, there's no shedding!

The bottom three were done with plain white stencil paste- again from Sweet Poppy Stencils, and I added a little Diamond Stickles to give the snow a little sparkle. I managed to use up some off cuts of Christmas papers to cover the front of the cards, but don't really have space for a greeting on these.

 So, it feels like I've just stumbled from one medical issue to another lately. You may recall I had some real pain from my right shoulder, and being right handed that was not good. I thought it was down to my old injury when I snapped off the part of my shoulder blade where the rotator cuff joined, and it's not the first time I've had trouble from it. However, as it was taking forever to heal, and I'd noticed that some days I had no trouble, then would get up and be in pain again, I did what you shouldn't and Googled it. Turned out the most likely cause was actually a trapped/pinched nerve in my neck, and the fact I could wake up with it made me think maybe it had something to do with how I was sleeping. Added a second pillow,and within days it had gone! Next came a UTI, and thats taken 4 weeks to get on top of- at least I hope we're on top of it. Had a weeks antibiotics, and they helped, but two days after finishing the course it was back. So, I got given different antibiotics, and a sample was sent for testing. Well, these antibiotics did absolutely nothing, and I got worse every day till they got the results back. I was literally getting up in the morning, and laying down on the sofa, having naps, reading, wanting to go to bed about 9, then repeat every day. Once they got the results back, I was given a new antibiotic, and so far, that seems to have done the trick. In this time I also had a CT scan, which shows the nodule from the cancer isn't doing much, but also showed that the stent I have between my kidney and bladder seems to be blocked, which is probably whats causing the UTI, and will mean being admitted in the next 2 or 3 weeks to have it changed. Finally, not to be indelicate, but for the last few weeks, it's felt like when I sit down, I'm sitting on very bruised buttocks. So bad, that mainly I've been lying on the sofa again, trying to take the pressure off. Literally could not sit for more than 5 minutes. Anyway, my GP looked at the CT scan,and said she can see thickened scar tissue going into my buttocks, and is most likely from the bowel surgery when they took muscle & flesh from my abdomen to cover the area removed on my bottom! So, painkillers and painkiller gel, and trying not to sit on it for too long, and that does seem to be working, as it's nowhere near as bad as it was. Funny thing was I couldn't for the life of me figure out why it should have started causing problems, then last night I had a light bulb moment. The one thing that HAS gone my was lately has been losing some weight- I've lost a little over a stone, and ideally want to lose another half, to get to where I'd like to be. Suddenly realised I was probably feeling that pain as I'd lost some of the natural padding in that area I'd accumulated, lol. But, it seems much better, I'm still spending as much time as I can not directly sitting down, and that and the gel seem to be doing the trick.

I will be doing my best to keep up with the challenges, and am going to pop round and look at everyones from last week. Hugs to everyone.