Update III My Sister

Just got off the phone with my sister.

She met the Radiologist today, she starts chemo next week for sure. He also ordered x-rays done of her shoulders and hips since she has a lot of pain in both to the point where walking is becoming difficult.

She is getting the bone scan tomorrow and the MRI has been moved to sometimes in the next few weeks. Once she's had the bone scan and x-rays tomorrow, she is meeting her Oncologist on Tuesday the 17th. Feels like it's forever, but hopefully time will fly between today and Tuesday for her and myself.

My current job placement ends the 17th and I hope I have more work right away. Doing reception, you wouldn't think it would be murder on your hands, but it is. I've been given the job of sorting, collating and creating files for the A/R dept. The pile of stickers is long ream of pages and about 5 inches thick. I've already gone through 200 folders and I'm not even halfway through! I'd never gotten a paper cut from a file folder before, but I got several today. One was so deep it wouldn't stop bleeding. I didn't want to bleed all over the invoices, so I stuck a rubber finger tip over it and kept working. At lunch I took it off and it was completely full of blood. I couldn't believe it had kept on bleeding for so long. I got a couple of bandaids over the cut located on the tip of my left index finger just below the nail. Not a good spot to get a cut, that's for sure. Typing hurts! After lunch, I got a paper cut on my thumb and 2 more on my middle finger of the left hand. I look like a freak with all these band aids on! LOL I'm hoping to have most of the filing done tomorrow.

I find this image of what I guess this is supposed to be the image of the zen woman, but honestly, most days I feel like the one above. Frazzled by the time 4:30 rolls around and it's time to go home, cook supper and take care of my darling husband. Whoever came up with the idea that we are supposed to have enough energy to take care of everything seriously did not give it much thought. We're not super women, we're just plain women. Why does society expect us to be able to deal with everything and anything that gets tossed our way?

Now if only the weather could make up it's mind what it wants to do. This morning, I walked to work in 10C with wind doing it's best to blow me across the street. I heard several robins twittering in the trees, but couldn't see them. If they are supposed to be the harbingers of spring, they'd darn well better bring that warmer weather with them. Cause tonight it's going down to -15C with windchill! I hope they also brought their winter woolies, or they're going to be very cold birdies.

Circular letdown

I never thought I'd see the day when I would break a circular needle, but that's exactly what I've had happen last night. I was knitting quite happily on my sister's Adamas Shawl when the left hand needle of my 10" circulars suddenly didn't feel right anymore. I look down and *gasp* I see loose stitches and no cable! Sure enough, the cable snapped off where it joins to the needle. It's the only size 10 circular needle I have and I knew before I started the shawl that it would likely be too short when I got close to the end. I just didn't realise the weight of the shawl or the sheer number of stitches on the needle would break it. Live and learn I guess. You can see in the picture the cable just sticking up and the metal part of the needle capped at both ends so I don't lose those stitches off it. I'm just happy it happened on a purl row!

I stopped by the Hart store on my way home after work tonight hoping they'd have a size 10 circular needle but no luck. To get to the other stores that may carry size 10 circulars means waiting until the weekend to go since I have to take the bus. None of them are within walking distance. The joys of not having a car.

So right now I'm working on a bunny rabbit. The pattern is from Heart Strings. I needed something that was a no brainer and this did the trick for me. It's going to be cute, pink, fuzzy and loveable I hope...

Started a new placement today. Working reception and accounts payable for the next 7 business days at an HVAC company. Today the person I'm replacing was in to show me around and teach me the routine. Tomorrow I'm on my own. Should be interesting to say the least.

And this is Monsieur Remy LeBeau aka Gambit in all his glory on his new bed. It's actually our new settee, but Monsieur deemed it was good enough for him and took possession within moments of it's arrival in our living room.

Correction to my last update

I got some of the dates messed up. She's seeing the Radiologist on the 11th, the MRI on the 12th and her Oncologist on the 17th.

So much waiting, would drive a saint to drink! I swear!.

I just spoke with my sister tonight. The Dr switched her pain meds on Wednesday and she's been in so much pain since then she went back to the ones she was using before which worked.

Her breathing sounds laboured again, not quite as bad as it was a couple of weeks ago, but still not good. Her voice sounded a bit more normal this time though. She gets tired easily and out of breath even faster. She spoke to her boss this week past and since she has benefits where she worked, her boss is applying for long term benefits plus he's going to pay her the difference between what the benefits pay out and the salary she was making. That's really decent of him.

My brother surprised her with a new addition to her family of pets. They have a cat that belongs to the kids, a couple of love birds but no dog. My brother presented her with a gorgeous collie/lab mix 12 week old female. She has more collie in her than lab and my sister fell in love with her. As she told me, the puppy is giving her an excuse to get up and something to care for, so she keeps her busy in a good way.

Now for the Adamas shawl update. I'm halfway through the last repeat of the 2nd chart and then all that will be left is chart 3 which is 10 rows. This is going to be one big warm shawl, but that's what my sister asked for.

As soon as it's off the needles, I'll post pictures of it.

Spring is in the air! Or at least I hope that's what I'm smelling...

Update to the Update

I spoke with my sister on Friday night.

She is set to have an MRI on the 11th, followed by an appointment with the Radiologist on the 12th and another meeting with her Oncologist on the 13th.

Blood work is done but no results given yet. She had a bone scan done on Thursday night, it was the only time they could fit her in.

She has another scan she has to get done some time in the next week or so which involves injecting dye, waiting 3 or 4 hours and then the scan. Not sure what that one is called. All those names are getting rather confusing for me to keep straight.

At least she's not sounding like she just finished a 10 km run anymore. But her voice has dropped an octave. I guess the mass is pressing against her vocal chords or nearby and affecting the register.

I'm on repeat 10 of 14 for her Adamas Shawl. I bought some green fabric beads and hope I can figure out where to add them on the last chart. If anyone's done this shawl before with beads, I would certainly appreciate some help here. I'm still very much a novice at adding beads to knitting.

I'm also toying with the idea of outlining some of the hearts with different color yarns in duplicate stitch just to add a visual break to the sea of royal blue. My circular needle is getting very heavy and the number of stitches on it is making it more and more difficult to move stitches around. I just hope I can fit these last 4 repeats so I can close with the last chart.

Another idea I've been toying with is adding an angel charm when I do the final castoff row where each heart ends.

Taking a picture at this stage wouldn't show much since it's sitting in a pile. I can't spread it out, my circular needle is too short for that to happen.