When the stroke strikes........

Yesterday I visited a close uncle (my mum's cousin) at Subang Jaya Medical Center (SJMC) who suffered a stroke on Wednesday. When he was first admitted, he lost all abilities to control his voluntary actions, like the movement of his arms, legs, eyes, and even the control of his bladder.

When I saw him yesterday, he was already to move all his limbs and he was alert. We were told that the immediate action by family members to bring him into hospital prevented the brain from further damage due to the lack of oxygen brought about by the stroke. However, it would probably take him a year to fully recover, and he would have to undergo physio-therapies and other forms of therapies to get his movemnets back to normal. We thank God that there is still hope for him to fully recover.

He was warded at Cardiovascular Care Unit (CCU) and only two visitors were allowed each time. My mum went in first while I sat with my son at the lounge waiting for my hubby, who had gone to park the car, to join us. As soon as my hubby arrived, I went in. The minute my uncle saw me, he let out a sob (although there was a tube attached to his throat for breathing purposes). It was heart-breaking to see my uncle this way because my uncle is a big size man, and when he talks (when he was well), the room would be filled with his voice and laughter. He has always been a joyful man, but always a responsible and caring person , especially to those close to him.

When I went to further my studies in the United States, by coincidence, I got a place to study Architecture at the same university where he was doing his Masters. He took it upon himself to be responsible for my well-being throughout my stay there, so much so that many of our colleagues dare not date me for they `fear' him (LOL! *wink*) because they would have to go through an `interview' with him first, only then can they take me out. Hmm.....no wonder I had no boyfriends during those days! LOL!

I remember one time when I sprained my ankle, but didn't know, (I thought that the swelling was due to my falling and it was just a mild bruise) while learning to play tennis (now you know why I do not know how to play tennis? LOL!), he came looking for me when my room-mate told him that I have missed classes for two days because I was unable to walk. He scolded me for not telling him about the fall, but I did not want to trouble him. Further more, I thought that the swelling was nothing serious and it would go down in a couple of days. He took me to the hospital and practically had to carry me down the 3 flight of stairs from my apartment to get to his car.

Having an uncle studying at the same university sure does have its advantages.....and disadvantages! LOL!

I do pray that my uncle will recover quickly and fully from the stroke. To see him immobile would be something hard to accept for someone who has been active all his life, but, only God knows what lies in the future for him...and us.

GET WELL, Ayah Li. We love you!

The cards are back!

It's been a long time, a very long time since I did any cards. What inspired me to start making cards again was a result of my son wanting to pay a visit to Papier, The Curve at Mutiara Damansara.

I was on leave on Wednesday and took my son to join my hubby, who was working, for lunch at the Curve. I never intended to drop by Papier because I know that if I do, I will tend to spend unnecessarily.

But, after lunch, my son insisted that we drop by there because he simply loves to play with the dinosaur toys there (like as if there aren't enough dino toys already at home! LOL!). It was a mistake. A BIG MISTAKE! LOL! Spent I did, not a little, but a lot and my purse is currently suffering a shock from the amount spent! LOL!

I bought a set of clear alphabet stamps and acrylic block to go with it, which, mind you, cost a bomb, ColorBox stamp pads, 3 card magazines and 3 12"x12" scrapbook papers. The cost? My purse is crying in pain! LOL!

I went home and did up 2 cards. On Thursday nite I made 2 more cards, and today, I made another one. I am on a roll! LOL!

Some progress and other things

With my cough improving a bit, yesterday I managed to put in some stitches on my Star Project. Even though I felt like I spent close to four hours on it (with many breaks in between), I felt that I made little progress. It seems to take me ages to see any progress. Maybe because the piece is a big one.

I feel like giving up on it, but, yet, I want to see it done. Maybe if I have a friend stitching along with me it might help me progress more? *wink*

BTW, while I was doing some light spring cleaning, I came across this piece I bought when I visited Graz some 3 years ago. I bought this piece at a small shop that sells only finished pieces, and no charts. I would have certainly bought some charts had they sold any.

Don't you think this is such a lovely piece?

On another note, I thought I would put up photos of the small things I sent to my partner for the VSE which was recently completed.

Thank you to all members who had participated in the Valentine Stash Exchange.

The 100 day cough?

I have been sick, very sick in fact, in the last week or so. I had a bad cough and cold that does not seem to want to go away despite taking two different types of antibiotics and a quite a few cough and cold medicines. There are times when the coughing fit gets so bad that I feel like swallowing a whole bottle of the cough medicine! LOL!

The cough gets so bad especially during the night that it has affected my sleep so much that I get up feeling like a zombie in the morning, but yet, I still have to go the work because I have lined up so many meetings for the week and postphoning some of them would make me go off schedule on so many of my projects. Added to that, I had a meeting Kuching on Monday, 12 February, which I had to fly there on Sunday because the meeting was early in the morning. Came back to a full day meeting on Tuesday and flew to Penang on Wednesday. All that travelling just did not do well for my flu and made it worst. I was at my worst on Thursday morning when I had to drive to Putrajaya for a meeting, and almsot fell asleep at the wheel due to the lack of sleep and fatigue.

After the meeting, I drove to the clinic, but a journey which would usually take only 40 minutes took me close to 1 1/2 hours to get there because I practically went round Putrajaya twice. Must be because I was too sick, I simply could not find my way out of Putrajaya to get back to Subang Jaya to go to the clinic! LOL!

The doctor insisted that I take the medical leave and go home and sleep so that the medication can take effect better. I was still contemplating of going back to the office in the afternoon because I had a meeting to chair and another one on Friday morning. But, I relented when I realised that I wouldn't be able to chair the meeting anyway with the bad cough. After making some calls to have the meetings postphoned, I took my medication and went to bed.

It has been 2 days since I finished the last dose of medicine, but the cough and cold is still there though not as bad. I am able to get up and prepare some simple meals for the family. Before this, my hubby has had to buy all meals since I was simply not up to doing anything. The coughing fit has left me weak most days.

It gets so irritating at times when the coughing fit kicks in, and my sleep is still interupted by the coughing fit that kicks in a couple of time each night, but my mood has imprived. I am not as easily irritated, but I am just frustrated why the cough and cold would not go away despite all the medication that I took. Some call it the 100 day cough. Gosh! Is that how long I still have to suffer? *sigh*

NNC's inaugural meet-up!

Yup! We had fun!

Our first inaugural meet-up for the group was held on 10th February, 2007 at Seri Melaka, Amcorp Mall, Petaling Jaya, Selangor.

I was late getting there for I made the mistake of taking the LRT (Light Rail Transit) instead of driving there because I thought that going by LRT would get me there quicker considering that it was Saturday when most roads leading to town would be jammed up. I also wanted to avoid the jam coming back because I had a dinner to attend the same day.

It is one of those days when you just miscalculate your timing. When I got there, most of the members were already there - Angie, Faizon, June, Janet, BJ, Emily and Diyana. Rose arrived slightly later since she also took the LRT. Soon after, Shanny arrived with her mum, followed by Jo and later Wendy. I think Wendy surprised everyone with her presence because I never told anyone that she was coming, but we were having a guess the mystery member game where Emily said that she was bringing along a member, but she was not telling who is is, and Wendy wasn't the mystery member! LOL!

Much later, Azie arrived with Linda with all her wares of cross stitch things to sell and we were like going goo goo ga ga over them! LOL!

Thanks, Emily, for injecting some fun into the meet when days before the meet-up, we were like listing down almost every member of the group, and mind you, we don't have that many members, and yet we did not get it right! LOL! Well, I almost did! I had already guessed it was Janet, by said that she was from Kedah, when she is actually from Ipoh! Duh! Emily said that we were 99.9% wrong! LOL!

Anyway, we had fun getting to know everyone with the little time that we had. Three hours was still not enough time when we have so much to talk about and show off what we have done and been doing! There was so much that we wanted to learn from one another, but time was simply not with us. I also had to leave early to get ready for my dinner, so that made time flew even faster.

I had fun, and I am almost certain many had fun too. I must thank Emily for making the booking for the place and for treating us the `sago pudding'. I thank June for her lovely rose pins, Rose for her lovely pincushion, and Shanny for her lovely heart shape hanging ornament.

I thank each and every member that made it to the meet up and made it a great one! Hopefully we will have many more great meet-ups in the future too!

Out of this world.....

and into space! LOL!

When I bought my latest issue of Cross Stitcher last month (issue 182), my son saw a chart of a space man. He asked that I stitch it for him. In fact, my son has always been asking me to stitch something for him each time I bring home the latest issue of any cross stitch magazine, but I kept putting it off. Even his birth sampler I have yet to start on it and he is going to be seven this year! LOL! Poor him! I have stitched so many name plates and birth samplers for my nieces and nephews, and I have yet to stitch either one of them for him. So, so, sooo terible of me! *shaking my head*

Anyway, since this is a small piece, I thought I'd stitch this piece for him. I thought it would be a real quick one. It did, only, I did not have the flurescent and glow-in-the dark floss called for in the chart. I have smsed Wendy and she said she will get it more me since she is the distributor for DMC threads. So, until the threads arrive safely in my hands, this is as far as I got.

A little something different compared to what I have been stitching lately, which is mostly very sweet and matured designs. It's a nice break, and I hope to get it done real soon and have it framed up to put it up in his room.

An envelope of goodies!

The envelope looked very deceiving. It was the usual brown envelope you buy at the stores. You could never tell from the envelope that it contained so many lovely goodies. When I ripped open the envie (notice that I said `ripped'? Goes to show how excited I was to receive the envelope! LOL!), out came packets and packets of goodies! There were punched images, stamped images, embellishments, the list is almost endless!

But, the best of the lot is a red and white crocheted doily, painstakingly crocheted by Usha! It's really lovely! Thanks, Usha, for all the goodies, and the time and effort you took to crochet the doily. Valentine's Day has started already for me! LOL! Shall I tell my hubby that I got a valentine present already from someone else? LOL! *wink*

The goodies I got are actually the Valentine Stash Exchange (VSE), one of the many activities organised at NNC. You are assigned a partner to whom you send some valentine goodies. You can send anything, but part of it must be craft related, and in the colours of love. You, in return, will receive some goodies, but you do not know who your partner is until the day you receive the goodies.

Sounds fun? It is, especially when the innocent looking envelope lands in your hands!

Time to grab the towel!

First, I have to thank BJ for taking her time to do up the tutorial for making up the towel topper. It looked easy enough. Shouldn't be much of a problem for me who have dabbled with the sewing machine since my craddle days, right? WRONG! LOL!

It started easy enough, until I got to the part where I put the back and the front together, with the binding already in place. I think I missed a step in BJ's instruction. Trust me for not printing a copy of the tutorial and hoping to rely on memory to get me through the steps. Have I forgotten that I am not as young as I thought I am or want to believe? LOL!

Anyway, when I turned over my towel topper to the front, I could not figure out how to seal the ends of the binding tape. I sewed it to the back but, somehow, it just did not look right. It looked even worse when fully completed with the towel in place. It looked bulky and awful to me. I just did not like the way it turned out. Not any fault of BJ, of course. She did a swell job of doing up the tutorial. It was just the way I did it up, or my sewing.

After much contemplation, I decided to turn this interchangeable towel topper into a fixed towel topper. By doing this, one thing for sure, I could hide the flawed binding tape permanently into the topper. The second thing is, the topper does not look bulky like when the interchangeable towel is folded into it. Just the way I prefer it!

So, teacher BJ, how does it look? Sorry I did not follow your intructions to the T, but instead, used the intructions and made some slight changes to get it to the way I like it to be. Hope you don't mind.

I still learnt something new from BJ's tutorial. Before this, I have never used binding tape the way she showed me how. I gave a go at making an interchangeable topper, but just did not like the bulky part. I think it's the towel I used. Yeah, right! Blame it on the towel! LOL!

Crazy for pincushions?

Yesterday, while at Bangsar Village to send my son for his art class, there was a charity drive in aid of the flood victims that lost almost everything during the flood that kept most of the southern part of Malaysia in waters for almost 3 weeks.

There were lots of lovely things sold. Besides the books, colour pencils, crayons and other school things which you can either buy and keep which, 100% of the sale will go to buying school things for the kids, or, you can donate back the school things you bought to be given to the school kids.

Apart from that, there were quite a number of stalls selling crafts and handmade items like beaded necklaces, bracelets, earring, bags, cards, cushion covers, placemats and many more handmade household items. I can't say how much of the sale for these items will go to the flood victims, but, I hope more then 50% will, if not more or all of it. It is, afterall, a charity drive officiated by Datuk Seri Sharizat Abdul Jalil, Women, Family and Community Development Minister.

I bought a couple of things, which, among others is this cute little turtle pincushion! Isn't it so adorable? I just had to buy it! Yeah, like as if I don't have enough pincushions already! LOL! And, guess what? I also dropped by QG to pick up some interfacing for my towel topper, and, hee hee, as I was paying for the interfacing, I saw this cute little crazy patch pincushion! Heheh..what else! I bought that one too! Goodness! I don't believe I just bought two things without giving much thought to it! LOL!

As if that was not enough, last night, I finally made up my 4-patch pincushion! LOL! This is my first 4-patch pincushion, and definitely not going to be my last! It was difficult at first trying to figure out how to do it, but, once you get the concept, it was a breeze! *wink* I love the way the green matched the pink fabric, like as if it was meant to be! *wink*


The only thing about the pincushion which I wasn't fully satisfied is that I did not pad it more, because I thought it might make it bulge too much. But, now, when completed, it felt too soft, like a squashed up pillow after being used for a long time. Get the picture?

Anyway, just to `show' you that I DON'T actually need anymore pincushions, here are my collection thus far. Some made by me, some given to me by some lovely stitching friends. Will this make me stop buying or making more pincushions in the future? I think you can guess what the answer will be, right? LOL! *wink*

Isn't this loaf of bread a beauty?

LOL! I can't believe that I just called a loaf of bread a beauty! I must be going nuts! LOL! But, I just love the way this bread turned out! *grin*

Yum! It was a delicious breakfast I had this morning! All because of something so simple as a freshly baked homemade whole meal bread! Yup! Baked my own bread last night using my bread machine which was almost becoming a white elephant in the last one year for being under utilised!

With just butter and a spread of fresh strawberry jam bought in Cameron Highlands recently all completes the meal. Yum! I must thank my mum for giving me the bread machine for a birthday present some 4 years ago. Thanks, Mum!