WOYWW #437- The Escaped from Hospital Edition.

Yes, I'm finally free, and hopefully will stay that way. I'm so sad at missing the crop, and all the people I'd have met for the first time, but fingers crossed another chance will come along soon. I'd gone to the GP on the Friday evening, but he couldn't find anything wrong, but I spent Saturday lay asleep most of the time on the sofa, and Sunday, apart from getting up for a shower, I spent in bed. I knew something was wrong, but not what, so I kept my appointment on Monday to see my Oncologist at the local hospital. Who took one look at me, standing there with sweat literally running from me, and told me he wanted to admit me. Which became even more important when he got a nurse to take my blood pressure and it was 88 over 63! Considering they've been treating me for High Blood Pressure for two years- regularly 200+ over 120+- was a bit of a shocker. Straight away got me a wheelchair, told me to sit, and stay sat, as he didn't want me hitting the floor face first!
 Turns out I had a UTI/Sepsis incident, and have had two weeks of IV antibiotics, which have gone a considerable way to helping. I still have some infection in the flap of skin that was created after my bowel surgery, but they are trying to get me seen by someone at the QE for that, as the level of surgical expertise involved is way above theirs at the local hospital.
 One really odd thing, as I said, they'd been treating me for High Blood Pressure for two years. They took me off my BP meds 10 days ago, to get my blood pressure to come up, and it's now sitting at what is a perfectly normal reading, and has been for the last week. Go figure!

So, the photos of my desk are as they got left two weeks ago,all my purchases at Art From The Heart waiting to get put away, which I will do over the next few days. I'm not showing photos of the rest of the room, as I have stuff to put away I'd packed to bring to the crop, and it looks a complete mess right now.
 I also spent time thinking about crafts while I was stuck in my hospital bed, and one thing I did manage to come up with was a couple of plans for Art Journaling. I've wanted to dip my toes in this for a while, but was at a bit of a loss for how to start- ideas, themes and so on. I decided that I can do one that concentrates on different techniques, for starters.
 For a second one, the idea came in a bit of a convoluted way. Someone on the ward had a radio playing one morning, and one track- an old 80's one- that got played was Ian Dury & The Blockheads Reasons To Be Cheerful, (Part 3). Which I took as a brilliant idea for an Art Journal- Reasons to be Cheerful! So, having a notebook, I started jotting down ideas, setting out pages alphabetically with Reasons.  So still an idea in the bud, so to speak, but coming along nicely.
 Huge thank you's to everyone who sent me good wishes on Facebook, I did read them all.
 Looking forward to this Saturday, when I'm off to Amelias Creative Crafts, to do a workshop with Eileen Godwin. She's on the DT's for Lavinia Stamps, Sweet Poppy stencils,Designs by Ryn, and now Visible Image, and has a very distinct style and use of colour I love. Plus, back in 2010 when I first started blogging, Eileen was one of my first, if not the first, followers, and encouraged me greatly, so I've wanted to meet her for a long time now. So I'm really psyched up for that, there will be photos next week!

WOYWW #321

So, what have we all got to show for this weeks WOYWW, then? I managed a couple of posts about my Brusho playtime over the last few days- more than I've done for ages, lol. There has been crafting going on on my desk since then, but as it's a card for an upcoming birthday, I can't show it till after it's been sent and received. All I've got to show are a couple of gifts that arrived in the last week.




 First one is a gift from Beloved Hubby- another adult colouring book- that sounds quite saucy, doesn't it, lol- as he saw it and thought I'd really like the images.

Love The Cat in his Garden!







LLJ, you'll love this one- Two Hares.

                                                                                     
   This one is called Dragonland.
There are only 8 images in the book, they are hand drawn then reproduced by a lady called Gwen Davies. From a slip in with the book, she is working on a second one.

 Second gift I received is from Desker Diane Baker Williams, of A Focused Journey.
I'd commented on the Art Journaling magazine on her desk a couple of weeks ago, saying we had nothing like that over here, and the lovely lady offered to send me a copy. She also added a copy of The Journal Junkies Workshop, both look fabulous, and I know will give me many happy hours of reading. Diane, you are a true star, thank you so much.

Last weekend, we had a break away, and went to visit The Eden Project, in Cornwall. Been there once before, must be about 10 years ago, and it's amazing. For the non-Brits, the area was a disused clay pit, and has been reclaimed, has two enormous biomes, with sections featuring the various climates of the world and their plants. Outdoors is typical English plants, along with some foreign temperate ones.

 The whole project is as 'green' as possible- even the toilets use rainwater for flushing!


These are the 'biomes'- you can tell how vast they are,compared to the size of the people.

By the way, Bridget Larson, you'll be getting a postcard from here as soon as I can get to the post office.

In the main outdoor area, they have some giant sculptures- loved this bee.




They also have one made from the 33.5 tons of electrical waste the average person will discard in their lifetime.( T.V's, washing machines, etc)

Some glorious flowers inside.

Me with my favouritest plant in the whole world- Arabica Coffee beans!

Beloved Hublet admiring the cacti.

They also had an amazing display of Animated Dinosaurs, and they were incredibly well done.




I started off Tuesday morning in a bad mood- I had a letter from the surgeon I will be under at the QE, cancelling my Thursday appointment with him! He wants me to have a PET scan, and a new MRI first. I fully understand he wants up to date info, but why on earth didn't he arrange for these after we saw him last? I was expecting the need for these scans would push everything back by at least 6-8 weeks, which is why I was so angry. I was about to start organising going back to work for a few weeks, but that may not happen now.Anyway, a couple of hours later, I had a phone call from the PET dept, and I have an appointment for my PET scan on Thursday morning, at 10.00- really shocked me! I don't have a date for the MRI yet, I phoned earlier to ask if they could tell me the date. She did say that they hadn't had a request yet, but that they usually came in late in the day and went onto the system overnight, so if I call again on Wednesday, they should be able to tell me.I did explain I wasn't being pushy, but that Beloved Hubby works nights, so usually needs to juggle his shift a bit to take me to appointments, and still get enough sleep. I'm guessing he has requested them as a priority, as I've got the PET scan so fast, so hopefully it won't be too long. The only upside to the cancellation is that it means I definitely won't be in hospital now for mine and Dougs birthday, on the 14th, which had been bothering me- I didn't want to spend my 60th in hospital, or even worse, under anaesthetic!It takes around 5 days for the info to get back to the surgeon, she told me, then they will still need the MRI results before they have an MDT meeting, so it looks to be at least 2-3 weeks before I'll get called to see him again. And make no mistake, I will be telling him in no uncertain terms how badly he handled the last appointment!After all, effectively, I'm putting my life in his hands, and it's not going to go too easily if I have misgivings about him. So hopefully that will get straightened out, and he'll understand how to tell me things properly. Anyway, time to let you go to Julias place, The Stamping Ground, and carry on your visiting.