(6 miles)

Hard to believe it has been nearly a month since I added to my Threads. Oh well, We have yet to settle on a date fro Brandy's surgery. I often wonder what the doctor does when it is someone that they care about who needs attention .

Quilt Market was not what folks expected, that is for sure. The assumption is that shop owners are trying to save some $ by having the distributors come to them rather than spend the money on travel and hotels. I can certainly understand that but it is not good for the rest of us who spent large $$ getting to the show and setting up a booth. Oh well, such is life. My favorite part of the whole thing is seeing other people's creativity, getting to meet the designers and creators of so many awesome things, just talking to everyone. We all know how much I hate to talk, heh heh.

Quilt Festival was another thing altogether. It was great. My daughter calls these "Ego Trips," and I concur. How could it not make your day when so many different folks come to your booth and say, "I love your booth, your products, your sense of color and design, etc,??" I am definitely not immune to any of that. I love it. Probably the best was the owner of one of the booths that specializes in African materials who saw me walking around (spending while my son watched the booth, hee hee) and motioned for me to come to his booth. He said, in the most wonderful accent, "I just love your booth. It is the best booth in the show, I want to live in your booth. I want the rug you have on the floor. " He was just a doll. I offered to make a rug for him out of his fabrics and you would have thought I was giving him the moon.

Speaking of my "walking around," just going to the bathroom ends up costing me big bucks. It got to the point that whenever I told my son I had to go to the bathroom, he would reach into the cash drawer and hand me $100 bucks because no matter what aisle I took, I saw something I "needed" to use in my designs....now if I can just live long enough to try all of them out, gulp.

Finally, we have photos of our daughter's wrecked car. I am posting them and repeating, "We are lucky; we are blessed."

(11 miles, sort of...)

Today I wussed out. I got to the 10+ portion of the walk and called my husband for some water. (Bless his heart, he loves to bring me things as I walk.) He drove to meet me and the Car called out loudly to me, screaming, "Get in. Do not get out. Go home." I listened.

(15 miles)

I am definitely old. I mean, whew, poooped. I even took a two hour nap after the walk, today. Jeez, what a geezer.

I have been a busy little girl. Not only am I using up a large portion of my days walking, but I have been working on mini quilts for months, preparing for several quilt/art shows that run almost back-to-back. Since Thursday I have been involved with the Jonesboro Heritage Quilt Festival. These small festivals are often my favorites because everyone is so helpful and and pleasant. Also, this time I ad an entire room to display and decorate. What fun. Too bad I am still too dumb to remember to take pictures!

Perhaps this weekend when I do the Red River Festival I can get my head on straight. In the meantime, I am spending my "spare" time trying my best to get the rug completed for a canvas company who wanted me to test their cloth. Of this I will definitely take photos since it will probably be the last time I get to see it. What a ton of work to "give" away and not even know if they will like the end result.....

Still nothing new to report on Brandy's condition. We are apparently going to have to go to New Orleans to see a doctor. Fingers crossed, prayers said.....

Here is the story: I should just say, "Ditto," to my last blog. Talk about things changing with one phone call. We are reeling in a state of....what, shock?, disbelief? relief? A couple of days after the car accident where the emergency room doctors did every test they could think of to check for injuries, we received another call. This call was from one of the doctors who treated Brandy after the accident. He called to say that the complete results of the tests were in and it was discovered that Brandy has over 90% blockage in one of her arteries. This is totally unrelated to her accident. It apparently has been going on for quite some time and was never discovered even with all the tests for her liver surgery, her hysterectomy, her....whatever. Left untreated, as it has been, it is a death sentence. The reason I mentioned "relief" earlier is that we still have time to do something about this because it was discovered at all. I repeat, miracles do happen--who would have thought that a car accident could save a life??? Now, we have to get her to a vascular surgeon. The problem now is no one will treat her because she was not working long enough at her new job for her new insurance to kick in. What has happened to the doctors who are in it for the humanity aspect? not just for the money?

(10 miles)

Cannot even talk. Too worried to write. Perhaps tomorrow.

(14 miles)

Just proud to say I made it. I am pooped.

(5 miles)

Whew. Lives can change with the speed of only one phone call. Around 5:00 yesterday evening we received a call letting us know that our daughter, Brandy, had been in a car accident and was in the emergency room in Minden. Yet, again, she proves that miracles happen and some folks are granted 9 lives. She is down several of those, definitely one was added to the "used" column after this incident. The doctor kept running tests, an MRI, CAT scans, X-Rays, etc. She had seen a photo of the car and just simply could not believe that anyone could have survived the impact let alone have survived it without major problems. The car Brandy was driving was rear-ended by a truck to the extent that the rear of her car was forced into the front of the car with part of it wrapping around the driver's side of the vehicle. She had on a seat belt and was still thrown into the passenger side of the car, tennis shoes torn off her feet. She was knocked out for several minutes and came to only to see the driver of the other car lighting up a cigarette. She screamed at him to put the cigarette out because there could be gas fumes. It seems pretty obvious that this guy was not running on all cylinders! She is lucky, we are lucky. Brandy received only soreness and bruises. More evidence, Miracles do happen. Whew.......

(4 miles)

I am a good girl. Today it was misty and I still did my walk. O.K., so I did it out of guilt
because I did not walk the nine mile one on Sunday. I just could not handle two days
of guilt. Should I mention that I was also trying to undo the damage of my dinner from
the night before???

Last night for my birthday dinner, my husband had plans to take me to some fancy
restaurant. I changed those plans. I asked for a hamburger with bleu cheese. He
had to call all over town to find someone who made those. Success was ours. We
had a huge hamburger loaded with cheese on a jalapeno bun and it was joined by
some wonderful sweet potato chips. Of course, I burped all night long from
indigestion but that is why God gave us Alka Seltzer ! Bring on the bread pudding.....


Oh, here is the picture of the winner of the Quilt Raffle. TADA.