And I am back

Hi everyone.

Gosh, looking through your blog posts, you have all been so busy.
Will I ever catch up with my reading?

Well, I'll try.

My surgery went well...kind off.  Instead of an hour in recovery I was in for four hours.  As I was waking up there was a slight booboo with the morphine which stopped me breathing and then it stopped working completely so I was in a lot of  pain.  I'm good now though. Everything is healing nicely and it is quite nice to know I am well and truly menopaused now (again).  I have to say it is a bit of an anticlimax.  I feel no different.  I had some great news though. The next surgery I was meant to be having has now been cancelled.  My surgeon seems to think the risks don't justify the surgery so that's perfect where I'm concerned.  Six surgeries in three years are more than my fair share I feel!

So that is just wonderful.

I don't like to wish my time away but I will be well and truly pleased when 2014 is no more.  I wrote that on my fb page yesterday, thinking life can only get better...and then I had a call from my son who had come off his motorbike.  Thankfully he had taken my advice that 'it's better to be ten minutes late than dead' and he was only going 10 mph, but his bike slipped on black sheet ice and he then fell again when he was trying to pick his bike up.  He is ok, and not hurt and for that I am greatful, but honestly.  How much more can life chuck at you?  They say you are never given more than you can handle: I'm saying that's not true and right now, I have had enough.

But I 'm going to continue to be optimistic and look to 2015 as being a good year: a year with lots of new releases, growth of my business, a healthy and easy birth of my new grandchild who we now know is going to be a little girl!  I'm so excited.  This Christmas just doesn't feel Christmassy and I think it is because I'm the only one who believes in Santa.  It will be great when I have a grandchild to watch the muppet Christmas Carol with, and make Christmas cookies with!  Yay!

And talking about business .....

Ok Ok.....hang on, I am doing my best Holmsey!! Good grief. Sorry everyone. I'm trying to type and a very impatient hare keeps butting my arm. I think he is a little excited and why not?

 Please welcome a very special, very grown up, very Fergus-free 2015 SAL. The Year of the Hare. This is January all stitched up. Every three months will complete that stitchy finish. January, February and March will form the first one. Stitch size of all three stitched together 211 x 120. The first part will be on sale later today.  www.stitchersanon.com   https://www.etsy.com/shop/StitchersAnon 

Of course we have no nice sunlight so the photo was a bugger to get.  Stitched on white evenweave, with DMC threads and whole stitches only.  I'm so proud of this one.  I actually sketched and shaded February's Holmsey in the hospital. Well, you can't sleep; no had told me how to switch the light off in my cubicle, and there were moans and groans and nurses walking around everywhere so I figured I may as well make the most of the pain relief and sketch.  And it worked!  I'm so pleased with how he has come out.

Oh and I forgot!

Cross Stitch Crazy magazine featured my story....and hubby and I had a sit down and worked it out.  Over the last three years I have raised 4000 euros for cancer charities: Cancer Care West, The Irish Cancer Society, The Breast Cancer Research charity and Stephen Sutton's Fund Raising page.

I think I deserve a bit of a rest now, though I will still donate from my sales of charts.  I do believe we need to change this mindset we seem to have and we should stop worrying about 'what is in it for me' and start thinking a bit more about services we can offer to help make the world a better place.  When I go, I want to go knowing that somewhere along the line I helped make someone's life a little better, a little easier.  Sometimes just being nice and offering a smile is enough.  There is far to much 'me me me' in the world at the moment.  

Which brings me to my final point.  I am on a very limited income.  I guess that is the posh term for 'broke'.  

Please, please do not send me xmas cards or pressies. Wonderful though they are, I really cannot do the same back.  Instead, what I do each year is I buy a Christmas gift off Oxfam for all my internet friends.  Last year I think it was legal advice and education for a women's group in India who were having their land taken from them (don't quote me on that: sometimes I get up to three gifts for the different groups I'm in and you know what my memory is like).  I have a home, heating, full freezers, access to medical help and everyone will have something under the tree to unwrap.  We are extremely privaledged.  I would rather spend my card money on something which can make a difference in someone's life.  So I hope you understand.  I'll post here when I've decided what to buy.  So many needy people in the world!

Right must get back to work....I am putting all my charts into paper formats because of the new VAT MOSS scheme....frazzle frazzle lol.

Have a peaceful and happy weekend xxxxxx