Froggy

A Good afternoon to all.

Its damp and cool here this afternoon, was very foggy this morning.  You could not see into the field behind me, it was so foggy.  The Interstate was almost zero visibility. I had to make a trip into town to find a filter for my cool mist humidifier. I usually do not start that up until about December, but our air is so very dry here, we've had no rain for several months and my hands are splitting and I'm trying to quilt or sew with split finger tips. Ouch!

I was going to stay in town a little while to shop, but people where driving with their heads up their behinds, running red lights, following too close in the back, and driving too fast going nowhere in the fog,  so I got my errand done and came home.  I am always amazed at how stupid people are.

Today is a bittersweet day. My Dad passed away a year ago today. Its hard to fathom. I miss both of my parents very much.  I don't however, miss the disease that took them away. What a horrid, degrading disease Alzheimer's is to the human spirit.

D is still fighting with the work comp attorney for the other side.  He is getting very frustrated, and is in a horrid amount of pain,  its getting very hard to hang on to something that you do not know when it will end.  The other issue is, he is showing signs of early stage dementia, so my care giving duties are not done, by the least, Unfortunately, for D, with no medical care on the closed head injury, its past help.  The other side does not acknowledge the fact, even when its documented in the medical reports.  I have to be around to council, and help remind him of things. Its never ending.

We are hoping, if all this settles, maybe in Spring or Summer, we are still planning to move.  Our community is dying by threads each day. Nothing is going. Not sure if its just here or all over or certain areas of the country.  People are barely hanging on here.  A shocker for us here is, 75% of elementary school students in school are on the free breakfast and the backpack programs for the weekends, to make sure the kids have something to eat at home.  I am shocked we live in a country  and a State that has Third World problems, like hunger. We even have "food deserts" here in town, the middle of agriculture and beef production, we have hunger.  I am ashamed. I also won't mention politics, which I am sick of at the moment.

So, today, I am quilting and doing a little sewing to calm my blue mind.  I have a desire to go back to simpler times.  I found a book of my mother's, Tasha Tudor's Heirloom Crafts.  I have been reading it this morning with my coffee, to ease a weary mind and to dream of a move to a quieter place, even if its in a book. I stopped and read some blogs, I came across Morning Minion's blog, and I was wishing I could go and help her process apples, which she was doing.

So, I am hoping that all of you are well, and getting ready for Fall, it will not be long before Holidays and all the commotions that go along with Holidays.  Holidays are very hard for me to take anymore. D and I talked of taking a few day Holiday during Thanksgiving, and look over the area where we would like to move, to get away for a few days and dream.  Not sure if we can pull that off, but its an idea.

Well, I need to finish up some housework things and good old laundry.  I wish everyone a wonderful week and enjoy what you are blessed with no matter how small or large.

Hugs to all.
Denim


 

Under the weather but back at it.

Good Evening Everyone,

Again, my apologies for the absence. I had not been feeling well for quite some time, and this summer, was by far the worst I had felt. I took it that I was still recuperating from my care giving duties but was getting increasingly more ill, and then could not keep food down and was in a lot of pain.  I, reluctantly went to the Doctor, and went in for some testing, including imaging, and blood work, and come to find out, my Gallbladder was running at a poor 6%. Its supposed to run at around 35%. No wonder I felt bad. I was very concerned as I have had thyroid cancer in 1998 and worried that I had liver or some other cancer. In June, I had a colonoscopy and had one very small pre cancer that was taken out.  So, September 8th, I had surgery, and am now just starting to be able to sit and do some things. I am just now starting to drive again. Driving was a little painful, hitting bumps in the road. The Doctor thought that all the stress of care giving had finally caught up with me and I am now paying the fiddler.  I am hoping that I start healing and get on with life.

Other than that, very little going on at home. D is still disabled from his bull encounter, and work comp is still playing games. He has a new attorney, the other pulled out from under him, and we had to scramble to find a new qualified attorney. We did, and its pretty much square one again.  Its a tiresome game.

Our community is going down the loo, so to speak.  The Agriculture business, which is the heartbeat in our State is failing, corn and wheat prices are very weak, the railroad is laying off employees, and our town is now just a pool of dead water.  I know I think I mentioned that we talked about moving, but since D's work comp is not settled, and the real estate market is poor here now, I doubt we could sell the house. So we're making the best of it here as well as we can. At least we have a roof over the head and my sewing brings in a little income, so I can pay bills and put food on the table.  A Blessing that I'm getting well and hopefully stay that way.

I hope that all of you are doing well.  I have missed blogging, but sewing takes a lot of my time to make a living, so that has to come first. But I finished up sewing projects  yesterday, and I thought before I rest for the night, I would pop in, say "hi" and that I'm still here. 
I miss all of you and what all of you have been up to.  I hope to keep up with all, since I feel better.

Well, I'm tired, a unfortunate side effect from surgery, its getting better, but I tire pretty easy, so I will bid all a good evening, and a wonderful rest of the weekend.

Love and Hugs to All
Denim

Back into the Light, slowly.

Hello dear friends,

My apologies for not posting since November of 2015.  A lot has gone on, since I lost my parents, and have had  to deal with estate issues, and trying to come up with money to pay for legal fees from the guardianship and other legal issues that came up with the nursing home and the false accusations. All it did was run up a legal tab that I will be unable to ever pay off in my lifetime.

Right after my parents funeral services, on November 1  of 2015, I opened up my industrial seamstress shop downtown, thinking I could sew and make some extra money to pay for all of these legal fees.  I was sewing at home, but we have an ill tempered neighbor who will call the cops every time a strange car comes into the street and that makes for uneasy feelings with the neighbors.
I was sewing on heavy items, like Carhart overalls, Wall overalls, bikers road leathers, replacing big zippers, and general repair.  I do not do alterations, I am not a general seamstress, but I can work on this big stuff as I bought a Rex industrial sewing machine, a behemoth , and took the old motor off and put a newer Servo motor that I am able to slow the machine down to one or two stitches and you can handle the machine better.  I was busy all through the winter, had stuff come in over my eyeballs. It was going good up until March of this year, then the town started a down hill spiral due to the layoff of a lot of Union Pacific railroaders, this due to the shutting down of the coal mines and the Obama's war on coal.Our town now is dying and people are leaving and the town is drying up, including my business.

I had 6 new railroaders who were transferred in from other areas, a few months before all this happened, did a lot of work on their work clothes, some of the work totalled over $100 a piece, I needed that money so badly to pay my estate bill, but instead, stiffed me using debit cards then cancelling the transactions.  My attorney went in immediately to retrieve the funds, using a new attorney in the firm, working pro bono, as I just could not afford any more fees. I was told that most of the money has been retrieved, except for one, but I think the firm put a lien on his paycheck and I should get that soon.
So, I got mad about that, and shut the shop down, and went back home to work.  But everything is totally slowed down to almost nothing, no one is spending money or anything.    

Because of the town drying up, and a few other issues about being in this community, which I cannot take anymore, because my parents are not here anymore, I have no family here, and the town is literally going to pot.  We have nothing here anymore but meth, and sexual predators coming into town by the hundreds.  Also, D and I cannot afford the property taxes anymore. He cannot work anymore and the house taxes are beyond our incomes, so we are planning on moving hopefully sometime in late summer or early Fall.  We are looking at the NW area, Washington or Idaho.
We are hoping to be able to sell the house, with all of the layoffs, and get out of here. We'll move everything, animals, everything. I am clearing out my parents stuff from the house, we had a huge garage sale last Friday and Saturday, got rid of a ton of stuff. I still have to go through small items, and most of that will go to GoodWill or the dump. I cannot hang onto things anymore and if we move, I can't take much.  So that is what I'm doing now, going through and clearing out everything.

I have lost a lot of my beautiful cats also.  Old age, cancer, other ailments, so that has been sad. I miss them all. But life goes on and the ones I have left,  they will be moving with us to a new home I hope soon. Dogs too.  They are old and ill, but will come with us unless they go down hill.

Well, thats it for now, in a nut shell.  Almost too much to talk about.  It seems like life has just jumped by, it almost runs day by day, and its a blur to me. 
The only thing that keeps me focused is the fact that we're  planning on moving, and it keeps me going to plan something new.  I am excited, scared, not even sure if we can move at our age.  I'm also nervous as my eyesight is very limited now, because of the retina tear, I have distortion in the left eye and my driving is limited. For me to drive a moving van with a car in tow, and animals in crates really bothers me.  But we will cross that bridge when we get there.

 

Well, I will leave you all. Wishing all a wonderful week.  I will try to post more often.  Oh, that was the other reason, I was having problems with Blogger and getting logged back into it.  That took me a while to figure out.

Hugs to All of you.
Denim