Before and after

So two years ago I was working as a cleaning woman at an office building that was remodelled. Two other ladies and I were cleaning up the mess the builders left behind. One day at lunchtime we found a room with some hard hats, and one of them was the same blue as the top I was wearing. So I put it on and my co-worker took some photos with her phone. Only after she emailed them to me did I realize that I am no longer my usually slim self.

 

I would not have minded the extra pounds if at least some of them would have come in the shape of muscles. But I my flesh was soft and wobbly, and it didn't feel or look right. At the time I was busy with having my daughter move back with me and start her schooling, plus the cleaning job was a temporary one, and I needed to find a long term workplace. But as soon as I had a permanent job and a rhythm to my life, I decided to visit the gym on a regular basis. So that is what I do now. For almost a year, I go for TRX, spinning and stretching classes at least twice a week. Results? I lost a bit of weight and what remained is strong and firm. Just a little bit of pouch belly to go, but nothing urgent. I took this photo a few days ago, wearing the same top. What do you think?

A walk with angels

 Warning: non-stitching related but picture heavy post follows!

Almost mid-month April WIPocalypse report

March had been a pretty hectic month and a particularly unlucky one for our family, so I am glad it is over. Here's hoping it will never surface again. Not only were most of us really sick last month, my baby was also bit by a dog very badly. I will never ever get her screams of pain out of my head for as long as I live. Never. Ever. It's been almost a month since it happened, but I wasn't ready to talk about it until I could see it healing. She was bit on her thigh and most of the minor bruises are almost gone, but two big holes where the dog's fangs have pierced the skin are still healing and will take at least another month before they are closed. For now, we change bandages several times a day to make sure the wound gets some air too. My girl still refuses to look at it. It seems the horror of being injured is multiplied by the disturbing sight.

And now for the regularly scheduled stitchy news. 

My turn

Now that my girl is doing better and will return to school on Monday, it is my turn to cough my lungs up and I am fulfilling my duty in flying colours. I've been coughing non stop for three days and no sign of getting better. None of my medicine seems to work and every time I take a breath I feel something vibrating inside my chest. Feels awful.
On the other hand I managed to scan a few pictures I wanted, watched a DVD I had for ages but never played, caught up with my e-mail and fixed the bluetooth gadget, so I can once again transfer images from my cell to my computer. Which is great as memory was full already.
I've done a nice amount of stitching on my CJC projects, but I realised I will have to put them aside for a bit. Almost a year is gone since I started working on my secret project, and although I have made nice progress, at this rate I will not finish in time. Problem is, I can only work on it when my baby is not at home, as no one in my family can keep a secret, and she's the worst. :) I wish I could show you pictures.
I am so fed up with this winter. I wish I wasn't cold all the time.

Back to my old self

Breaking news: my favourite pair jeans fit me again! Yay me!

Kinda gone, kinda back

I know I disappeared from blogging, but I'm all right. I have done a lot of things in the meantime. I have been stitching too. No finishes, just progress on various projects, including the super secret surprise project. No progress photos now because I don't have the brains to browse on my hard drive.

Somebunny to happy dance

I have finished the Somebunny kit! Isn't she lovely? Mom and I are still arguing about the framing. She insists on red, but I prefer something light. We'll see what's available and what I can afford. 

Below is my ballerina progress. I wanna thank all for the advice you gave me on bleaching her hair, I didn't have the energy to check my floss stash to see the colours yet, but I will definitely do it this week. I was really sick and I am now recovering. Now it's DD's turn to sneeze and cough. Poor bunny is doing her best.

Back in the habit

Again, I had a period in my life where I wasn't blogging, partly because I didn't have the energy to come up with a coherent English sentence, partly because my depression made me think no one is interested in what I have to say anyway, and partly because I spent so much time with my girl I wasn't near the computer. Also, the Chinese spammers are still attacking my blog with full force every day, and they get increasingly annoying. But I didn't give up stitching and I kept reading all your wonderful blogs and e-mails, and they helped me a great deal.
Another thing I had to deal with was something I have never experienced in my 36-year-long existence. Weight gain. I was always a skinny one, whether I liked or not. Usually I didn't, because while it may be fashionable and undoubtedly a must for Hollywood dames and models, for a mere mortal like myself it makes shopping for clothes a pain in my tiny @**. But in the past 10 months I suddenly put on about 25 pounds that I didn't need. And I don't even eat that much. See that bulging belly on the picture above? That has never happened to me before. Not since I gave birth. Not to mention that I prefer wearing tight fitting clothes, so over half of my wardrobe was utterly useless.

See me in these jeans? That photo was taken last November. Coincidentally, that is the same time I was able to wear it. Not that I couldn't button it up any longer, I couldn't even pull it halfway across my thighs. I couldn't believe my eyes! For years I've been whining about not being able to gain weight, and now that I did, I don't like it. They don't say "be careful for what you wish for" for no reason! LOL
By the way, it isn't the weight that bothers me, it's that it's out of proportion and bulging. I tried to convert some of it to muscles, but the local gym was full of tattooed, bald musclemen, and while I had absolutely no problems with them, it made me feel rather weird and lonely, being the only female and the only one not drinking those suspicious substances that are supposed to make you look buff.
Anyway, I do my little workout when I muster the energy (=rarely) and I will join another gym as soon as I can afford it, but I am still unemployed. I'd be completely broke if I didn't win a small amount of cash in a dial-in TV quiz show! That money was a lifesaver.

I am completely useless in the kitchen, so I didn't delude myself thinking I can make healthy food, so I signed up for daily food supplies at a company that delivers diet food. I must say, I didn't regret it, because it is cheaper than my feeble attempts at creating something edible, is tasty, healthy and it works! I really did drop some weight! I don't know how much, because I sacked my scales right after it gave me the 25 pound bad news, but my favourite pair of jeans come up on my thighs like they should, although they are still not comfortable, and my inner thighs brush each other when I walk, which is also a new sensation, but I am getting there, ladies!
And now I will close this post before it gets too long, and start a new one!

36

I'm back and I'm blogging again because I don't really have anyone else to talk to.

When DD and I wake up in the morning, the discussion usually starts with her going "mom, wake up already, the sun is shining". Yesterday her first words were "happy birthday mommy"! How adorable is she to remember my birthday first thing in the morning? Even I didn't remember that! And neither did most of my family, actually. :( How sad is it that I get more b-day wishes from strangers on my Facebook wall than from the ones who knew me all my life?

I have managed to do some stitching on Feasting Frenzy. I joined a SAL on one of my favourite groups, Stitching Sisters. This month we have a bird/insect themed SAL so I jumped on the opportunity to dust off FF and join arms with my online siblings. I hope to make some really nice progress and maybe even finish!
Today I even managed to fall in love again. No, it's not a guy, I've had quite enough of them for the time being, thank you. It's - what else? - stitching. Heaven And Earth Designs, to be exact. I tried to avoid their website for months, knowing that a, I cannot afford a new chart, b, I already have some of their designs in my stash that I didn't even start, c, I have a HAED WIP I haven't touched in a year, d, I signed on for the HAED bookmark SAL 6 months ago and haven't even started yet. I only printed the first parts of the chart.
But I visited the page today, and oh my heart, it's captured again! Mostly by Linda Ravenscroft's work, who as long time readers of this blog may already know, I'm a big fan of, but also a few more designs. Here, let me share some lovely pictures that have captured my attention.
I will upload these and the rest to my HAED wish list to my picasaweb album later today.
Okay, what else was I gonna chat about? Oh, yes, I have experienced an unusually large amount of hair falling out every day in the past months and I got fed up with it. I tried all kinds of home treatments but none of them really stopped my hair getting thinner. So I decided to take extreme measures and visited an expert. He started my treatment earlier this week. It is rather painful and there are no guarantees it will work, but I am hoping for the best. He is injecting minor doses of steroids into my scalp. I am terrified of injections so you can imagine how desperate I got if I signed up for this treatment. I have the next one scheduled in four weeks and we should see results by the end of summer. I really hope it was gonna be worth it.
I have also been hitting the gym in these few weeks. I just realized that I gained 5 pounds, which would not be a tragedy as I was too thin anyway, but all of it is on my butt and thighs, so I can no longer put on most of my pants. I have to admit it, it came pretty much as a shock to me as I didn't recognize the process of gaining weight, as much as I could tell, I have been eating exactly the same amount that I always have. Which is why I am not going on a diet or anything, I just work our 2-3 times a week in a local gym and also do some exercising at home as well. I know I wouldn't put on a bikini right now. I look like those funny kiddie books where you can mismatch the top and bottom half of the body. No fun at all.

Apologies

I realize I have disappeared from the net completely. I'm terribly sorry if I made anyone feel like I let them down, it is the time of winter when the days are shortest and darkness falls at 5 p.m.. So for a sun worshiper like myself, who is mainly solar powered, it means I'm barely vegetating. My soon-to-be-ex husband has moved out and I spend many time arranging stuff around, trying to figure out what to keep on the newly emptied shelves.
When I'm not cleaning or packing, I'm job hunting or preparing for the holidays. Most of the gifts haven't been bought yet. Mainly because if I'm not in my hometown visiting my adorable daughter, I'm lying sick. Do you wanna know the extra funny stuff? It seems I have developed an allergy to penicillin. Yes, the medicine I've been taking for the past 30 years now causes fingerprint sized, itching red patches all over my skin.
So when I have a little time and energy to sit in front of the computer, I can barely catch up with the hundreds of e-mails and blog updates. I wish I could answer those mails, and comment on all your wonderful blog entries full of the amazing projects you make, and write my own blog, but that is impossible. I recently keep a notebook by my bed and I'm scribbling whatever thoughts occur to me. This blog entry and the previous one were born out of those notes. Otherwise I couldn't stay focused long enough to type this.
It's not the only thing I'm behind with. It took me forever to buy, write and mail the Christmas cards for the exchanges I'm in. Which is embarrassing, but not as difficult to fix as my overdue paying of all bills. Now I'm trying to avoid having my electricity and heating shut down for the holidays. My bank account is two months worth of bills away from empty and I still cannot find even a part time job.
Still, that is no excuse to disappear just like that, but I hope you will understand if occasionally I retract to my shell. Because needless to say, depression is now a permanent flatmate, and I'm fighting my private war every day just to get out of bed and have some food. And most battles are lost, but the war isn't over yet. It will be one really long fight, but I'll be damned if I ever surrender.
At least I've done some stitching while in bed (see previous post) and watched lots of TV. My new favourite show is Flash Forward. It's brilliant.

Lazy needle

I haven't been stitching a lot lately. I got a bit lazy with my Christmas sampler, so now I'm stitching part 7 and 8 together to catch up. I can't take my time because part 9 is already available on Carole's website.
I don't know why I'm acting as if I didn't know what to do with all the empty hours of my time, but I did sign up for a HAED stitch-a-long as well! Not sure what made me do it, don't even ask! HAED simply makes me weak. I cannot resist their beautiful designs! Misery and cross stitching likes, what's more, craves company, so if you want to sign up, you can do that on the HAED message board, come along!
I spent four days at my parents with my amazing little girl. I missed her so much! She got better, waved her cough good-bye, so she is back in kindergarten again. Good thing too, she simply loves that place.
By the way, on this picture she is sitting on Granpa's head. Yes, she's allowed to do that. When she is at Gran's house, she is allowed to do whatever she likes. I'm not particularly happy with that, but what can I do? I need their support.
For the four days I dusted off an older WIP and took it with me. I worked on that single project for the time I spent there. Tamara was really delighted by my choice, because she loves tigers just as much as her mommy does. Here you go, this is my latest progress picture:

On my last day the family doctor gave me and my daughter the H1N1 shot. I never got a flu shot before. I didn't want this one either, but after I heard news that a few miles from my hometown an elementary school was temporarily closed due to a mass outbreak, I changed my mind. I thought, it is simply not worth taking chances. The doctor assured me that the vaccine is strong and has only minor possible side effects, such as light fever, muscle pains, tiredness and slight pain at the spot of the shot. Tamara did develop some fever and seems very tired and sleepy most of the time. In my case it's only the muscle aches and my right arm is very much in pain. I can feel a small lump under my skin where the shot was injected. I put some warm wet cloth on it, it does ease the pain a little, but I still can't do my washing dishes or ironing.

I think I have the perfect excuse to just sit on the couch and stitch a little.