The Power of Love?

Dear Luisa is conscious which must be a good sign. She's not out of the woods yet but we're all more hopeful. Still intubated and hooked up to loads of drips and machines. I'm off v early in the morning, not sure when I'll be back.

Thank you for all your love, support and prayers.

Please Help. Family Issues.

Hello all my blog friends.

My daughter's partner Luisa needs all your thoughts and prayers right now. I am flying over to be with K on Wednesday (earliest I can get there) so please do what you can. I know many of you are Christians and will say a prayer for us at this awful time.

The following is from my daughter's blog and the photos is of Luisa:

URGENT re LUISA aka LEATHEREAGLE

I am calling out for help, from anyone and everyone who knows and loves our Luisa, aka LeatherEagle.

I believe in the power of prayer, whatever your beliefs or lack of. So, light a candle, say your prayers. For the record Luisa's personal favourites were Green Tara, Kuan Yin and Ganesh. She also always loved the Saints, St Francis in particular. Thank you.

She is very, very sick. Having had surgery last Thursday (gastric bypass) she ran into complications over the next couple of days. By Saturday night it was obvious this was more than the expected pain/recovery so tests were run during the night leading to her being rushed back into surgery due to complications.

Bottom line, both her small bowel and stomach leaked into her stomach cavity/abdomen. That's meant to be a sterile environment. This means Luisa is now effectively on life support due to septicaemia involving massive medication (antibiotics, drips galore) and in particular medications to keep her blood pressure up and stop her heart (and other organs) from failing. This is as serious as it gets, the doctors have told us in no uncertain terms that she may or may not, make it through this.

Hence my imploring you all to take note, stop and spend a moment wishing her well.

Naturally this means she is unconscious so well wishes direct to her are pointless, however I WILL keep note of responses and messages so that - hopefully - she can read them when she's all better again.

Bottom line is she is VERY ill, in Critical Care for the foreseeable future until (hopefully) the sepsis recedes and she can fight back.

I am asking for ALL your prayers, wishes and candles (depending how you float your boat) to carry her through this and out the other side.'

I know you will all do your best for us. With thanks,

Gina
xx

Snug Photos at Last - Etsy Account

Last of the Autumn Colour at The Deenery

Snug

We have just about finished the snug at last. Jim has one or two little 'snags' to deal with and we have the photos and pictures to put on the wall.

I can't find most of my 'before' photos, but here are a couple of them:



Mucky fireplace and hearth and exposed central heating pipes, now all beautifully covered up by Jim.


Entering from the kitchen/diner. Old carpet gone.



The fireplace. The tv used to be in the opposite corner but is much better in its new location. We are rather pleased with the fireplace. Jim made the clock for Jason and Sam but they said it didn't work. It's been her working away ever since!


Oh yes, very relaxing!


Jim enjoying the paper in the lamplight. Under the radiator you can see where he has blocked in the pipes. I hated those!

We do need 2 new 2 seater settees but for now these will have to do. I really want ones with plain covers.


Our art deco mirror above Jim's desk. The wooden tray belonged to his Grandmother. You can see me in the mirror! The right hand door goes into Jim's office - oh, so does the left hand door! We think it must have been 2 rooms at one time but rather like the oddity of the 2 doors.

So there we have it. It's so cosy in there we've been spending far too long sitting and chatting and watching tv!

Etsy

I have opened an Etsy account and listed my one item - a little stuffed toy 'Santa's Little Helper'! Here he is:


He was meant to be Santa but didn't really look like him so he's become an elf. I must say I love his little shirt and trousers!

Raggybaglady is my name. I will be listing some of my bags later today.

Sandy

Sandy seems to live in my wool crate - talk about chilled out:



He looks so funny here - he's lost his ears!

Funny Potato

Jim got the giggles the other day over this potato he found:


Bottom or Boobs?

I hope everyone has a great weekend.

New Rag Doll, Dotee Dolls and Random Sky Photos

Crafting

Rag Dolls

I have just finished my 2nd rag doll. As I used rather stretchy material, she's larger than the first one!! Weird.

Here is Jessica:


Her hat is a bit in the dark but it's the same as Hannah's with the addition of a pink bobble on the end.

Here they are both together:



You can see Jessica's head a bit more clearly in this photo. The hair is sparkly beige but seems to have come out yellow here.

Dotee Dolls

I became a bit hooked on making Dotee Dolls. (If you want to see the inventor of these little cuties, click below). Dotee Dolls are an altered art doll created by Dot of http://dotslifeandart.blogspot.com




A little Japanese Dotee.


Another Japanese Dotee, with butterflies on it.


And this is the back. I reversed the pattern and coloured the fabric to match the front, adding 'hair' too.


Here's a Christmas one with sparkly hair.

I have done some others too but can't post them just yet. Shhhhhhh!

I am in the process of making a Santa at the moment. He's very fat!

Max - Buster's Mate

Buster has a friend called Max who calls for him quite often. We always know when Max is at the door as much squealing goes on from inside and out! Yesterday they happily trotted off together but later in the day, Max reappeared on his own. He was waiting for Buster to come out - they must have lost each other somewhere.

The cats are frightened of Max but all he wants to do is play. They teased him through the cat flap.


He's looking at BlackJack through the cat flap! Black Jack and Sandy were both growling at poor Max. I managed to get one of both sides of the door:


Poor Max, eventually he went away and Buster came home later on his own and very muddy. He hasn't stayed out at all since his long disappearance thank goodness.

Garden

As the sun set, the sky was quite dramatic yesterday, so I roamed around with my camera.


Red sky and swirly clouds over the living willow fence.


A line of cloud above Maghera (the hill opposite us). In the foreground you can just see a yellow hollyhock still flowering in our garden. Click on the photo for the best view.


The moon appeared.


The thin red line over Lough Graney


Moon Lines.


Doorus Sky - probably my favourite.


BlackJack and Sandy were keeping an eye on me!


A few leaves are still left on the Liquidamber.

We had a power cut last night at about 10pm. Jim brought me a Baileys, which sent me to sleep! I went to bed at 10 and woke up at 3am! So here I am. Cup of tea time.....

Trip To Worthing, Poppy and Sonny have grown

Sonny.

UK Trip

It was a blustery few days away! The day we set off (Monday) we had had a very stormy night but thankfully the wind had died down when we had to fly. When we arrived in the UK, we had caught it up!! We caught the train to Shoreham-by-sea and were picked up by Ali and Poppy. We went to theirs and had a few hours together. Ali was working the rest of our stay, so we were pleased to be able to have this time.

As you would expect, I took a few photos! Poppy has grown a little and has an amazing vocabulary. She also repeats everything a lot, which I remember Ben and Jack both doing.

Poppy playing with a dinosaur. Ali had a 'cube' of old photos and Poppy looks just like Ali did at the same age. Ali's hair went dark and with Poppy's dark eyebrows, I expect hers will darken too.


Playing with her Zebra.

After a while, Poppy had a sleep and when she was woken, she was a bit grumpy! Ali suggested we could go and feed the donkeys some carrots, which Poppy thought was a great idea. We wrapped up warm and off we went.


Poppy proudly carrying the carrots for the donkeys. Grandad towers over her!


Poppy feeding the donkeys. She has no fear of the animals at all.

There was a farm shop nearby and lots of chickens and geese (honkey honkey geese Poppy calls them) and some goats too, so we went and looked at them all.


Poppy liked this greyhound statue as much as the 'live' animals.


A fine, if rather muddy, cockerel. We said goodbye to all the animals and headed back to Ali's. Jim and I had a fine time with the Play Doh and Poppy. We rolled and made spaghetti and fed it to the dinosaurs! Then Joe (Daddy) came home and Ali drove us to Worthing and our house.

From one Grandchild to another, Sonny has grown and is almost walking. He just loves his Grandad and wants to be picked up all the time. He is a lovely little boy, really happy and fun.


'Grandad' with Sonny.


'My library book' says Sonny (well, in his head I'm sure).


Pick me up Grandad.

I have a large fluffy dog which Sonny gets to play with as a treat. That's him lying on it in the top photo, my best 'Sonny' shot of the trip.


Here he's blowing raspberries!

All too soon the trip was over. Poor Jim had a root canal filling at the dentists and has been in pain ever since. It took an hour and a half to do. Today he says that it seems to be improving thankfully. Teeth, they're nothing but trouble.

We had another bumpy flight back to Ireland. It's been wet and windy since - although I did manage to get into the garden and do some tidying up for a few hours - in between showers.

I have been making more Dotee Dolls and have almost completed my 2nd Rag Doll.

I hope everyone's having a good weekend.

House and Garden Updates, 7.11.10

Leaf strewn path at The Deenery

House

We have been working on our 'snug' for a while. It's turned into a bigger job than we expected but we're trying to do it really well. The floor has been vinyl tiled and the walls are all a soft beige and the woodwork white. We ran out of white paint yesterday so I haven't been able to complete that part. It's all sanded, filled and ready though.

We decided to paint the old fireplace surround very dark brown and white. It's quite dramatic and I think it'll look great when it's finished:


Just a rough idea of how the fireplace will look.

Here's one of the white doors and surround:


It's all smart and shiny.


You may notice the shelves to the left of the boiler. They were behind the door into the snug but we've moved them to this new place as when you pushed the door back, it always hit the shelves. I like them there. So far only stuff from the snug has been dumped on them but when we've finished in there, I'll think about what to put on them. Jim's cup for winning the flower section at the Gort Show looks rather good on the top of the shelves I think.

We're off to the UK tomorrow until Thursday, this time to the Worthing end of the country to see Jim's children and Grandchildren. Ooh, lovely Poppy and Sonny. Less exciting is that we're both visiting the dentist! Jim took Buster to the kennels and he wouldn't get out of the car. Jim dragged him out and then Buster stood there shaking. Poor Buster. Then he howled of course.

Garden

I had a quick walk round today to see what was still in flower and look at the gorgeous leaves still left on some of our trees. A short while afterwards it started to rain and now it's raining and blowing a gale. It's good to be inside and warm.


Lovely colours still on the 2 acers and the Liquidamber.


A closer shot of this lovely small leaved acer. When we brought it from the UK it was about 18 inches tall. It obviously loves it in this spot.


I love how violas seed themselves in unlikely places and flower away! How pretty is this little one?


The Spring flowering primula 'Wanda' has got a bit confused with the mild Autumn weather! OK, it does look a bit tatty.


The laburnum leaves are a pretty yellow and my danglers keep their colour and sound all year.


The above mahonia blew down a few days ago so we put a stake in and tied it back up. It seems to have survived ok.


The red dogwood is showing its true colours. An old plough is in front of it.


Gorgeous pyracantha berries.


This pretty sycamore tree is a beautiful yellow up by the gate rockery.


I'm not sure how these dahlia have escaped the frost but they still keep flowering.



Fallen leaves on the lawn


The view to Lough Graney from our fence today.


The magnolia stellata is turning a lovely yellow/green and this rose still thinks it's Summer.


The 2 hedgehogs outside my porch door. The one on the left is now growing perennial alyssum! The alyssum has decided to seed everywhere this year, as has the alchemilla mollis of course:


I love it when things self seed in odd places.


From L - R. The sweetcorn bed, the arboretum with beds and the newly covered paths.

Sandy and BlackJack

Sandy loves to be really comfortable. I made the following 'joiner' of him:


In the first two he's in one of my wool boxes in my studio, in the last one in Buster's chair!

When I was in the garden today, BlackJack followed me about as usual:


He ran up to me as soon as he spotted me outside!

Well, he was on the grass in this photo, but now I can't see him!

Well I'm off to bed now as we have to be up early in the morning. I'll be back Thursday afternoon, after we've picked Buster up from the kennels.