Not a good weekend

The title says it all. Late last week, my sister's soon to be FIL was rushed to hospital very seriously ill. He had major surgery which he wasn't expected to survive but he did. He is however still seriously ill. This coming Saturday, my sister was due to get married and today she and her fiance had to make the sad decision to call off the ceremony. The wedding was to be in my hometown and the groom's father is in hospital several hours drive away. Everyone is understandably upset and its particularly difficult when its supposed to be a very happy family time.

Happy dancing

The only advantage of having enforced time off is that I'm getting more stitching and knitting done. I'm going to be off for at least another week and then I was supposed to be on holiday anyway so its going to be mid June before I'm back at work.

I finished Mirabilia's Miss Valentine at the weekend. I'm not really a girly girl but I love the pink of this design. The mill hill beads were a tight squeeze on the fabric though.



I've got Halloween fairy in progress too and I'm hoping to get it finished this week too.

Knitting wise, there are more socks in progress. I started a pair of Pomatomus socks earlier in the month and now the first sock is done. They are in Shepherd sock in the shade Tahoe. I bought the yarn from Hazy last year and as soon as I saw the Pomatomus pattern, I knew that I wanted to use this yarn to make them. The second sock is in the works.

Monochromatic exchange

Its been a good mail day today. On top of the new issues of Knitting and Knit1 which arrived fro Get knitted, I also got my Monochromatic exchange from Simone today.

Its a lovely cushion and its finished very neatly



She also sent some fabrics and threads along with the exchange



This afternoon, I stitched the last of the beads and crystals on my sister's wedding dress so that means the dresses are done. Tomorrow is the Hen night; its fairly low key as per her request and thankfully she has booked a table somewhere as standing up isn't something I'm good at just now. Thanks to everyone for your good wishes re my foot. I think its getting better as its not so swollen and not as sore.

Doctors Orders

The alternative title to this post should really be How to drive Paula slowly insane. For the past month or so I've been having pain in one of my heels which I ignored as sore feet can be a bit of an occupational hazard as a nurse. That was a very stupid thing to do as it got a lot worse about 10 days ago and my foot decided to balloon up. One trip to the doctor later and I've been told I've got Plantar fascitis, which is an inflammation of ligament in the sole of the foot and its blooming sore. So I'm under orders not to go to work until next Tuesday at least and I've got to see my GP then. I've been referred for physiotherapy also. Meantime, I'm spending a lot of time sitting down and taking painkillers. I've never been off sick for this long before and whilst extra stitching time is good, the not going to work/not being able to go anywhere is not a good thing. Especially when my sister is getting married in just over 2 weeks and there are things to do and things to buy. Internet shopping is my friend just now.
Anyway enough of the pity party as I'm otherwise healthy and happy and other people have many more problems than me. Also I've got lots of hobbies that involve sitting down lol.

There's been some knitting progress

A ballband discloth



A finished pair of rainbow socks



And a Pomatomus sock in progress



I received a lovely exchange from Lina



And I sent an exchange to Linda



I did some simple finishing



And I stitched another Essy's friends piece and finished it off.




I've been stitching on Mirbilia's Miss Valentine today and I'm hoping to finish it this week too. Other than that I've been wandering around the internet reading lots of blogs and I finally got round to using Google reader to keep track of the blogs I read. I'm a complete convert to it. The remainder of my time has been spent applying beads to 4 bridesmaids dresses and one wedding dress. No pictures of them just yet but there will be after the wedding.