I'm back.....

I just can't believe it was the end of January since I last wrote.  I was remarking to my mother the other day that women CAN'T have it all.  Sure, if we could afford to have cleaning ladies and personal chefs we would be able to put delicious meals on the table every night for our families and have sparkling clean homes to live in.  But, can the average woman work full time, or in the world of a small business owner, work time and a half and still have all the other good stuff?  Home cooked meals, clean homes, organized closets, time to work out?  I don't think so, but alas, we do still try our best.  

My absence from my blog this time actually has a bit of an excuse.  If you follow us on facebook you will know that we had some health issues.  Mom fought having a colonoscopy until the ripe old age of 74 and she says she'll have her next one in 74 years.  All went well, but during the procedure they told her she has an irregular EKG.  So, after several heart tests she found out that she is fine, they are just attributing it to old age.  My sweet little Mother spewed words that I cannot repeat here at the nerve of those doctors to make her go through all of that to tell her she is old!!  How dare them!!  

Around the same time I started developing neck pain which comes and goes for me.  Most of my life is spent hunched over the light table or punching or hooking so I always chalked it up to part of the trade, but this time was a bit more, so I picked up some of those electro-shock massagers for my neck.  Well, a couple days after I started using those I developed the most debilitating neck spasms.  It was unbearable....so bad that I cried and I rarely cry....from pain anyway.....show me a sad animal commercial and the tears flow but not pain!  I like to think I have a strong pain threshold.  These spasms felt like a red hot poker at the base of my neck and radiated over the top of my head and pulsed, pulsed, pulsed.  It was unbearable!  So, 2 trips to the urgent care clinic, 3 trips to the ER, being told I have bone fragments near my spine, no I have a pulled neck muscle, no it's disc degeneration, doping me up on pain meds to get me through it, sending me home with a pat on the butt and telling me there is no cure to just deal with it, here I am.  The spasms did stop after about 6 days and with the aid of heat and a strong anti inflammatory medication here I sit.  That was about a month ago and though there is still some pain in my neck, it's bearable and I am able to carry on. 

So, now that Mom and I are back in business we forged ahead and prepared for our first show at the Woolwrights Rug Hooking Guild in Lancaster, PA.  

Since I last wrote, we've been super busy making neat little things for the hook-in and creating new designs for Spring.....

Bubble Charms

Crazy Doodle Egg Wool Applique

Crazy Doodle Egg for Rug Hooking

Crazy Doodle Egg for punch needle

A took a day to paint myself a new sign for our booth...(see later tomorrow in the booth photos)

A new hooking pattern, yet to be hooked...."Laundry Day"

A cute little summery pillow...."Little White Pitcher" for rug hooking

Some cute little pins made from silk sari ribbon....

"Spring" finally finished out the seasonal series...

Tattered Stars for rug Hooking

Tattered Stars for punch needle

 

Tulip Manor for rug hooking

 So, as you can see, despite some health issues we have buckled down and gotten some wonderful new items made up.  Everything you see up above is on the website or will be added today (sari pins and more)

We had a wonderful weekend at the hook-in, come back tomorrow to read about that and see a few pictures I snapped of some amazing rugs.  

Thanks for your patience with my absence, hope you are all having a sunny spring!

Until next time.....