Birthday Boys

It was a big day on my family yesterday as my DS and my Dad both had birthdays - only 64 years between them!



Have I told you recently how wonderful my DS is? I had the most enormous hug from him first thing, before he'd even opened any presents, just out of sheer happiness. And he was so delightful to watch opening his presents!

I think he likes this present!

I received another big thank you hug after the presents were open.

We all had our normal days at school and work and in the evening went out to Pizza Hut for a special birthday meal.

In all, it helped make up for a hectic few weeks at work and the fact that I had to work last Sunday!

The big party for DS's friends is on this coming weekend when we'll be going swimming!

Lost the plot

I feel like I've lost the plot a bit over the last week or two. I just don't seem to be able to settle down to doing and enjoying anything particularly well at the moment. As a result, very little has been achieved.

On Friday, in attempt to find something vaguely interesting to do, I dug out my knitting needles and began my first attempt at knitting one of these.

Originally uploaded to Flickr by monkee maker

I've got a back, a front and two arms so far. If you haven't seen it before, take a look at monkee maker's blog. It always makes me smile!

Also on the knitting front, I've discovered these!

Originally uploaded to Flickr by KnitYoga

The pattern for these gnomes originally came with an issue of Simply Knitting, I think in 2005, and I'm seriously having to restrain myself from spending a ridiculous amount of money on ebay to get hold of the pattern! But they are very cute!

I have done a little stitching over the last couple of weeks, but nothing I'm ready to share yet. I'm working to get Donna's RR finished and I've also made a (very) small start to my Paradigm Lost for the Snowbird SAL. But then the lethargy set in!

Maybe I'll have some photos of my own to post next time!

Oh, and there are still PIFs available if anyone's interested. See this post.

Disappointed

When I became pregnant, I promised myself that this blog wouldn't turn into a baby blog. This blog is about my stitching and I really want it to stay that way. So if you're not interested in the baby/pregnancy stuff, feel free to ignore this post.

I had an appointment this morning at the Hypertension Clinic at my local hospital and while things are still fresh in my mind, I wanted to post my thoughts. Maybe one day they'll be helpful to someone else.

Just to start by saying that in my previous pregnancy, I had problems with high blood pressure from about 3 months and by about 4 months was on tablets for it. I had various things done/to do such as 24 hour blood pressure monitoring and self monitoring of blood pressure. Then at 34 weeks, along with the high blood pressure, I had severe pre-eclampsia (HELLP syndrome) which resulted in my having a caesarian section.

Today was my first appointment at the Hypertension Clinic which I also attended last time. I have generally found the people there much more informative and helpful than the community midwife and it was the same again today.

I was, however, very disappointed that my blood pressure is again high and until 11am tomorrow I'm having it monitored for 24 hours. That means I have a cuff around my upper arm connected to a small machine on a belt around my waist. Every half hour during the day, the machine inflates the cuff and measures my blood pressure. I'm allowed to take it off to change clothes or for a bath or shower, but I need to wear it all the time, even when I go to bed tonight. The consultant I saw today (who I'm sure I saw last time) has also said that he wants me to go on to self monitoring when I get to 24 weeks.

This is all relatively straight forward. There is nothing difficult or intrusive in either the 24 hour monitoring or the self monitoring, although I know my arm will be suffering by 11am tomorrow from squeezing of the the constant inflation/deflation.

But I am very disappointed that my blood pressure is high again so soon. I'd hoped this time I would be able to have a more 'normal' pregnancy and get to experience everything without worrying about the blood pressure and potential implications. I had my urine tested today and it showed a small amount of protein too which worries me.

The consultant also spoke to me about the possibility of having another caesarian. If my blood pressure doesn't become a significant problem and I go to full term there is every chance I'll be able to have a natural delivery. However, as soon as anything goes wrong and the doctors need to intervene, than I'll be having a caesarian.

However, with my blood pressure up again, it does increase the possibility that intervention may be required.

Overall, it was a positive, informative appointment with midwives and doctors who were interested in what is going on, in how I feel about it all, and what I want to do. But I'm very disappointed that the blood pressure and potential problems have raised their head again so soon.

I go back again in 3 weeks.

My first PIF!

I'm feeling very brave for having signed up for my first PIF (pay it forward) on Deb's blog. So now it's my turn.

I will send a stitchy gift to 3 lovely people who sign up for my PIF by leaving a comment on this post. In return, you should also offer a PIF yourself.

I'm really looking forward to doing this. I don't think I'll be sending out any PIFs before Christmas, but I'll start planning and try to get them done before baby comes along in April!

In other stitchy news, I picked up MTM again a couple of weeks ago and am now nearly finished part 2. I'm very pleased and I've really enjoyed stitching on it. Here's how things stood last Sunday morning - I've finished the outer gold box now, so only the backstitching and beads to go!


My chart for Paradigm Lost has now arrived for the Snowbird's SAL. And I finally ordered my fabric and floss for it. I can't believe how long it took me to decide what floss to use! First, I found a lovely varigated green Anchor thread that I thought would be perfect, but then discovered that it looks like this is an old colour as I can't get enough of the floss for the design! So I had to start looking again.

I've finally settled on a DMC varigated floss in shades of light blue, lilac and grey, fading to white. And I'm stitching on Antique White jobelan. I'm really looking forward to getting started and seeing how the design looks in these colours. All other versions of this design I've seen use darker, stronger colours and I'm really excited to see how it looks in the paler, more delicate colours.

Thanks to everyone who commented on my finished Starflake - I'm glad you all like it as much as I do! And thanks to Anita for pointing out that I neglected to name the designer. For anyone else who's interested, Starflake is designed by Patricia Ann Designs. The grey and pink colour scheme is an alternative colour scheme included with the chart although it is illustrated in the blue/white colours. I just thought the blue/white combination looked too cold.

Now a huge thank you to everyone who congratulated me on my pregnancy! I feel great now that I've told everybody amd am managing to stop going around all the time desperately trying to hold my stomach in! LOL I've been browsing around the web looking into Natal Hypnotherapy which looks interesting. I've also found a lot of info on VBAC which threw me a bit as I'd never considered that there might be an issue with my having had a caesarean last time. And why does everything I read assume that having a caesarean is a bad experience? When I look at my beautiful, healthy, happy son, how could it possibly be anything other than positive?

The secret's out

In the last week, I've told my son, my parents, friends, neighbours, work, so I think it's about time I told the rest of the world.
I'm pregnant. 17 weeks. Baby is due on the 11th April.

My DH is pleased, but we were both a bit taken aback that it happened so quickly. DS is pleased, but more excited about his 7th birthday at the end of this month. And he's worried that the baby will eat his lego and break up his models. But there's plenty of time for him to get excited before April and I'm looking forward to sharing with him what's happening. He's started coming up to me and patting my stomach gently saying 'Hello baby' which is really sweet of him. I rather think the rest of my family is in shock!

So far I've had a lot more symptoms than when I was pregnant last time including the morning sickness, changing food tastes, unsettled stomach, bad skin and particularly the tiredness I was expecting. As long as the sky high blood pressure and pre-eclampsia don't return, I'm not going to worry.

I am disappointed that I don't seem to have a more helpful midwife than I had last time. Is it really too much to ask that a midwife take an interest in me as a person and not just in what's happening to my body? And am I really supposed to know everything and what questions I might want to ask when? I just wouldn't mind a bit of proactive advice at times.