Project: Skirt Extension

The skirt I decided to re-vamp

Bet you all own at least one, that skirt you love to wear but it's now really a tad too short! - well I have this fabulous denim mini skirt that just fits like a glove and I adore wearing it BUT I'm getting a tad too old to wear my skirt this short now!

I didn't want to throw it out or give it away so I tucked it away in a drawer - like you do lol A few days ago I was having a browse through some crochet sites for inspiration and saw a photo of a skirt that had been adjusted to be longer with some crochet panels - cue flashing light bulb moment! lol

I ran upstairs and pulled out my skirt, went through my wool drawer until I found a shade and texture of wool I thought suited this skirt and tackled adding a hem! Here are step by step photo's and instructions .... just in case you would like to breathe new life into some of your skirts too ;)

Skirt Extension Hem Pattern

Materials used:
1 x Denim skirt
3 x 50g balls of Debbie Bliss Prima
3mm Crochet hook
1 x Sharp darning needle

NB: Please note I use american terms when I crochet (yeah I know I'm british but the american terms just make more sense to me!)

Terms Use
ST - Stitch
Ch - Chain
sc - Single Stitch
sl st - Slip Stitch
dc - Double Crochet
sk - Skip Stitch
Shell st - Shell stitch
sp - space

Step One:
Taking your skirt Blanket stitch around the hem as neatly as you can, trying to space the stitches evenly apart, don't worry if you have to tie in extra lengths of wool these will be hidden under the first row of stitches

Row 1

Ch 1, sc in each stitch, sl st in first st, Ch 3, Turn

Row 2

Place dc in 3rd dc of previous row. Ch 1, dc in same st. *Skip 2 dc, V-st (dc, ch 1, dc) in next dc. Repeat from * to last 3 sts. V-st , sk 1 dc, dc in last dc. Ch 3, turn.

Row 3
 Shell st in each V-st across (2dc Ch1, 2dc). Dc into ch sp of previous row. Ch 3, turn.

 Repeat Row 3 until you have desired length, tie off.

I decided to add a matching belt to mine, you can find thousands of patterns for belts online - and here is my finished skirt, now all I need is the sunshine so I have an excuse to wear her out :)

Would love to see your hems if you decide to do this, don't forget to send me some photos :)

What a difference a day makes....

“May the sun bring you new energy by day, may the moon softly restore 
you by night, may the rain wash away your worries, may the breeze blow 
new strength into your being, may you walk gently through the world and 
know it's beauty all the days of your life.”

Good morning fellow incarnate* souls, (bet some of you just googled incarnate didn't you, if you can't be bothered the meaning is at the end of the blog lol)
Well, what can I say, what a difference a day makes! I feel amazingly well this morning, my glands have all gone down and are only a little swollen, I don't ache all over and I am feel very upbeat and positive.

I decided yesterday that it doesn't matter what name the doctor gives to this illness, it's been decided it's an autoimmune disease so I now have a name for it in a way!
By having a name for what is wrong I can now concentrate on healing it, so whilst I do not have a definite diagnoses I do know that it's my immune system that is playing up and I can now fix it!
I have been saying since the outset of this illness journey that if I get the name of the illness I can heal it, just a matter of trail and error with herbs and natural foods now.
So yesterday, armed with the knowledge it's an immune dis-ease I went googling and dragged my herbal healing books out, decided that I needed to 1. balance the immune system, 2. take down the inflammation, 3. sort the upper abdomen and 4. balance the bacteria, for this I would need certain herbs/foods.

so I am taking probiotics to balance the bacteria, raspberry tea to sort the upper abdomen, echinacea to balance the immune system (many people think echinacea boosts the immune system, what it actually does is balance it so it works properly) and finally honey to stop inflammation and kill any bacteria or viruses that should not be there.
So I swigged back a yakult as I can not stand the taste of yogurt (just one of those things) and proceeded to check my teas in the cupboard, there I had raspberry tea, echinacea tea and a lovely new jar of honey .... it wasn't until the second cup of the day that my glands went right down, I would say to 3/4 of the size they were!
 Last night I did a full lymph gland draining massage (peed like a biatch afterwards!) followed by some simple stretching exercises to straighten the spine up, then went on a meditative walk to just chill and relax in a lovely field of flowers whilst laying under a big old oak tree, and today I've woken with just a minor soreness in my throat, slight gland swelling and .... wait for it ..... no pain what-so-ever! So one is hoping this natural way is working, will give it a week or so to see and let you know how I get on as I go - healing is all trial and error, what works for one person may not work for another, but I am confident that mother nature has grown us a cure for every human ailment, we just have to find the one(s) that work for us.

 I also made a very, very big decision yesterday, one I have been toying with for the past few years! I have decided to go back into doing psychic readings again. I am a very talented reader (not blowing my own trumpet, I'm stating a fact here) I shock myself with how accurate my readings are! 
My place on this planet is to help, heal and enhance others lives, so why not use the skill/talent/gift (whatever you want to call it) to help others, but due to financial constraints I will have to charge for my time so have listed two types of readings so far on my etsy site.

I am at the moment offering a budget reading for £2.50, this will comprise of answering one question Your question will be answered within 24 hours and sent to the you by email (it'll probably be answered within an hour if I am online when I receive the order), this is for those people who really need some advice and guidance in one area of their lives.

 https://www.etsy.com/listing/129754074/budget-tarot-reading-one-question-quick?ref=shop_home_active

The second is a full tarot reading, I use which ever layout feels best at that time so I do not offer a set layout, this reading will give you an in depth look at what is going on in your life at this time with advice and guidance on how to make things better. It will cost £20 as it takes me several hours to write up - I am sure you'll be very happy with what you receive.

 https://www.etsy.com/listing/129754921/full-tarot-reading?ref=shop_home_active

Over the next week or two I will add some more readings, obviously my ribbon readings, maybe angel auragraphs, spiritual paths, guide readings and anything my bossy spirit guides Nasadra & Letti tell me I am doing! (I drew my own guides a few years back and these are my main guides below, they are an awesome bunch)

I will have to start practising drawing again before I can offer this service again, it takes a lot of meditation and quiet time to get the link to stay strong enough to draw a guide, but it is easier than drawing spirits as their energies fluctuate so much more! plus I haven't drawn in about 3 or 4 years so I am very rusty, that will be readings to be added at a later date!


So as you can see I am back in positive fighting mode, I will beat this illness it will not dictate my life, and now I know I am fighting an autoimmune disorder I know how to start the healing.

Love & light


*Incarnate - having a bodily form

Life goes on ......

I'm over my grumpy mood from Monday - life goes on, what will be will be etc
In truth, I should be used to knock backs by now, after two and half years of no diagnoses why on earth do I expect one now! lol 
At least these days (now I don't take any medications) I am a good 60% healthier than I was, and I know what I need to do to keep my body working well enough to get through a day! ok that does involve taking quite a lot of pain medications some days, but I now recognise the signs of a flare up and am pretty good at calming it down enough to cope, so screw it I can get through this, whats another year or two eh!
At the moment all my glands have swollen, hubby was rather shocked when I pointed them all out and he could feel them under my skin, they are under my jaw, behind my ears, back of my neck, down the sides of my throat, around my collarbone, under my arms, a couple just above my breasts and several just above my elbow, I gave up checking after that lol


So today has been quite eventful! I finished a fabulous ladies hat I have been making, it's in real Irish aran wool and has two detachable flowers so you can wear it in different ways - basically it's 9 hats in one if you count the combinations - may even make a third flower and put it on a brooch pin like the others that way the owner will have even more choices and combinations to make - I have to do a proper photo session but here's some quick snaps I took earlier...

 

I have been applying for jobs since before my operation, I actually am not sure if I can hold down a full time job but needs must when poverty is knocking at the door! basically if I don't go back to work we will end up probably homeless! so ill or not I will have to go back to work! I've applied for about 60 jobs, had several 'no thanks' emails, a couple of 'sorry not this time, but we'll put you on file' and a lot of companies who can't even bother to send an email to say anything! but this morning I applied for a very well paid admin job in a town about 8 miles away that takes around 30 mins to drive too, and the agency dealing with the job phoned me *shocked* they asked if I could start work immediately and did I have my own transport, once I'd answered the recruiter said we've now emailed you onto the company in question as you have been shortlisted - I know that there were 27 applicants (said so on the job site) so fingers crossed, we could really do with the extra cash.

I could really do with going to the dentist to fix 3 broken teeth (I have about 8 to 10 fillings a year because of the dry mouth problems!) but it's going to cost a minimum of £208 - lets hope I get the job ... it would change our lives, I have always been the main earner between hubby and me so we miss my wages, be nice to be able to afford things not only like the dentist, being able to pay for my prescriptions and not having to shop and cook for 4 adults on £120 a month, but if I get this job we'll be able to have the odd meal out, decorate the house and maybe even get a holiday - we can but hope.

So all in all it's been a good day, at least I have hope that the future will get better :)

No closer to an answer!

Date illness first flared August 2010

I was going to write up my blog yesterday, but I was somewhere between frustrated, stunned and upset and it wouldn't have made good reading as I would have just been ranting, and no one wants to hear ranting do they!
I went and saw my doctor yesterday, told him what the anesthetist had suggested about me having Sjogren's syndrome, he agreed I probably had it in my eyes but nowhere else!
He then went on to say he actually thinks I have something called CREST syndrome (Limited scleroderma) but lets not send me to get tested, oh no, that would be way to easy, no lets have triple antibiotic therapy again!!! 

I am sick of antibiotics, I hate the triple therapy it's causes so many more problems than it solves! this will now be about the 6th or 7th triple therapy antibiotics course in 18 months, surely he can figure out they are only calming the situation for a week or two not curing it! 
The course calms the pains down for about 2 weeks and then the pains come back, the glands swell again, I get sicker, other symptoms return...... blah blah blah 
I wish I was someone with a big fat bank balance, I bet if I went private I would already be diagnosed properly!. 

I googled crest yesterday, after figuring out I had to use the word symptoms after it I stopped getting toothpaste pages and found loads of sites about it, I can honestly say hand on heart that I can understand where the doctor is coming from on this but I personally think he is barking up the wrong tree with this one, as the only thing that could possibly be related is my abdominal pains, I have absolutely none of the other signs or symptoms! but at least he has decided it's an autoimmune disease (we sort of gathered this ages ago didn't we!)

So we are no further forward really are we! so much for his promise a few weeks back to send me to rheumatology or endocrinology for testing eh - no wonder what doctors do is called 'practice' grrr!
So as you can see I am still rather grumpy over yesterdays events, but hey I guess in today's oversubscribes national health service us plebs best get used to having to wait, wait, and wait some more until one day someone decides to send us to the right specialist and we get a confirmed diagnoses or die waiting!

I am now at the 'I give up' stage, I've had enough of being poked, prodded, tested and generally being treated like a joke! I am tempted not to take the antibiotics, not to go back to the doctor and just let whatever my body is doing carry on and see what happens, maybe it'll give up and get better of it's own accord, maybe it'll worsen, I really don't care anymore! 
I just don't have any faith in our medical services to figure it out, I don't have the money to go private, I don't have the money to try alternative natural medicines, I don't have the money to buy the medications I am prescribed by my doctor anyway -  so there is no point going to the doctor is there!

Time to just sit back and let whatever this is take it's course and do whatever it has to do, because I am no closer to an answer now than I was 2 years and 7 months ago!

The road less travelled....

It’s okay to fall apart for a little while. You don’t always have to pretend to be strong, and there is no need to constantly prove that everything is going well. You shouldn’t be concerned with what other people are thinking either – cry if you need to – it’s healthy to shed your tears. The sooner you do, the sooner you will be able to smile again.

That poster above is part of a design for my psychic reading, for those who have known me for a long time you'll know that before I became a crochet artist, a graphics designer, in fact before I became anything else I was a psychic reader and taught others how to develop their own psychic and mediumship skill. 
Recently an awful lot of my old clients have been asking for readings from me, but several years ago I decided to step back from doing readings, it was so emotionally draining and I was having too many problems of my own to be dealing with other peoples on top! 

I was one of those horrible little children who would say things and freak people out (yup I've always been a bit weird lol) My mum often recounts the story of when I had been playing in the garden and a neighbour popped round for a cup of tea, I came in through the back door from the garden and told her she was having a baby girl and she had to tell everyone because they were already guessing, she went white apparently, she hadn't even told her husband yet! 
When I was how I knew this, little 3 year old me just said, the lady in the garden told me - there was no one in the garden at that point, no one anyone else could see anyway.
I now know the lady from the garden is actually one of my guides and has been with me since I was born and will be with me until I pass to the other side, she choose to be my lifetime guide.
I often wonder who, in their ultimate wisdom, would give me a quietly spoken nun as a guide! But she is my inner strength, she helps me stay calm in a crises,  she is my comfort when I am scared, the voice that tells me 'no that is dangerous', she helped me become who I am today.

As I grew older I got scared of the fact I 'knew' things that I shouldn't! By the time I was a teenager I started to block out the things I could sense, see and feel, the unseen world was way to scary for my wee mortal self to cope with! Although admittedly I found it was easy to impress people with short palm readings still! 
By the time I'd moved to Germany (ex husband was in the army) I still dabbled a little and occasionally would read a book on the subject, I still could not sleep alone at night without the light on, I still jumped out of my skin every time a spirit shadow passed by, I still just 'knew' things about people, but I had learnt to play it all down and chalked it up to having an overactive imagination! But life was about to take a very unexpected turn that made me face my fears and the gift I was hiding.

On November 2nd 1989 I gave birth to a tiny little souls, he was 6 weeks early and very poorly, the placenta had been ripping away from the womb wall for about two weeks before and my little son Matthew had been getting cool blood, he was born with pneumonia and pleurisy. Having a baby in special care is bad enough but we were in Germany and my german was very limited, to get any information from the hospital meant taking translators with us!
Anyway to cut a long story short, Matthew came home when he was 9 weeks old and sadly passed away at 14 weeks old from SIDS (sudden infant death syndrome also known as cot/crib death)
Being a grieving mother I HAD to know he was ok, so a friend gave me the phone number of a medium in the UK called John, I phoned him but he had no appointments available, then he stopped talking for a few moments and said... phone me back in 20 minuets spirit is telling me I have to talk to you. 
He was pretty amazing, he gave me evidence that no one knew, told me things that only I knew, he told me who was looking after my little boy (my cousin, Kathleen, who had passed away at 16 from cancer) he passed the messages from spirit that helped me cope with my sons death. 
I was then given a book by Doris Stokes (voices in my ears), suddenly everything started making sense, the things I heard, sensed, felt, they were all part of a bigger unseen world which we are all part of!
I had started developing my reading skills before Matthew had passed away, mainly tarot, palm reading etc, but I started to rely more on my inner voice, those weird out of context thoughts and feelings, I started to notice that when certain spirits visited the whole room would smell of tobacco or lavender etc I was becoming more comfortable with my gifts, but still wouldn't sleep alone without a light on!

Once we'd moved back to the UK, I started attending the odd spiritual church service, more evidence came my way from the spirit world, more hints (some of them not subtle at all!) came to tell me that I was meant to be helping others by using these gifts I had. 
It wasn't until after my first marriage had ended that I really started getting into the spirit reading side of things, I was by that stage on the internet and had found loads of people were just like me! (yeah crazy nut jobs that talk to thin air) I eventually found a chat room based site online that held classes, this place was amazing to someone like me, it was somewhere I could be free to be myself, free to practise my psychic readings at any time day or night, somewhere that actually helped us use our gifts in safe environment, I learnt lots there. Alas the site owners got a little above themselves and let their egos run the show, it all came about money!
Don't get me wrong I am quite happy for any psychic or medium to make a living from using their skills, when it boils down to it we all need to eat and pay bills etc, but sometimes the human side takes over and readers start overcharging. Yes by all means charge for your time and effort, but don't rip off people who are in desperate need of help!

I moved to a wonderful site, run by the two must lovable people, in place of membership fee's for having classes, here everyone was welcome to classes for free. I became the psychic class teacher, it was great fun, I do have a rather wicked sense of humour so classes often ended up being a few hours of laughter and silliness! Teaching is a great way to develop your own gifts, you have to constantly research subjects, reading techniques and tools for the classes, you learn more teaching than you do being in the class! The site eventually due to financial constraints closed down, my teaching days had ended. (The easiest way to remove fear is to gather knowledge on a subject)
I was reading online by this stage but I was ill and getting sicker every day, the strain of being constantly ill, having several operations, lack of money at home and then whilst reading feeling other peoples emotional, spiritual and physical pain made me too depressed to work any more, so I stepped back from using my gifts, using them only now and again to help friends. 

I now feel it's time to return (upstairs having been nagging me for the past few years to start again!), I have been playing on a great spiritual site Medium Mystics, (it's free to join and the classes are free too) many of the people I used to teach are there plus a heap of friends new and old, I have done a couple of readings and found I haven't lost any of my skills, I am now far more emotionally balanced and even though I am still not well, I can cope better now and much better at blocking the emotions that used to engulf me when I read!.

Now all I have to do is decide on what types of readings I will be offering and what cost I will put on these services - I absolutely hate doing the write ups for anything, I can write the most descriptive flowery prose & verses but get me to write up an advert and I am stumped, I am just no good at singing about my own skills! - maybe I need some classes on this...anyone know where I can get some classes on how to write adverts?

Like stained-glass window, I am the multi-coloured glass which light filters through, allowing the beauty of the spirit world to touch others lives.
My job is not to solve anything, it is to filter the light into many colours giving others permission to shine.
Angelwithin 2013

Nothing binds you except your thoughts.......

It's been a few days since I blogged, nothing much has really happened, I am having a rather boring life!
My life used to be so busy, I was either out working, shopping, visiting people or out get rather drunk with the girls! These days it tends to be rather repetitive but in many ways it's lovely as I have plenty of time to do things, just wish I had the energy I had back then and then maybe I'd get all those jobs around the house done that I want to do! I have plans to redecorate the whole house but with the state of my health over the past couple of years if I do start a project you can guarantee things flare up and then the project gets left half done for months on end!
Hubby is no DIY person, I got him to hang wallpaper once, well I say got him to do it, I started and he took over! (like men do!) 
Well.................it's still up but the pattern is lopsided, the seams show and generally if I get the chance the whole lot is coming down! He's just as bad at painting, he insists on using a roller (for speed) but everything gets splattered with paint, even after I have covered it all in dust sheets!  I now know that when I want to decorate he has to be at work so I can get on with it and know that there will not be paint splatter and if there is wallpaper it's hung with at least the seams not showing and the pattern in line! men huh! lol
I did decorate my main living room about a year and half ago, took me nearly 6 months to complete, but I did it lol It's now the only room that doesn't need a revamp ... although *starts plotting a new look* lol

My pains under the ribs are back with vengeance, good job I have a doctor's appointment for Monday! I have noticed though that the cod liver oil does indeed take down inflammation and my neck now looks somewhat normal again, which is great as I really hated how thick set and lumpy it was looking! The little pastilles I got for mouth dryness are amazing, not woken up with my tongue wielded to the roof of my mouth once since I started taking them, and the artificial tears have stopped me rubbing the life out of my eyes, I now don't look like some sort of alien with red eyes all the time lol 
See all I needed to know was the name of what I had and I can control it, I am extremely lucky it's taken me two and half years to get this far, most people take on average 4.7 years before they get diagnosed! Good job I had a very alert anesthetist at my operation who read all my notes and said, if they are read as a whole it's obvious (mind you I had told a friend about 6 months ago that I thought it was Sjogren's)

When I get to the doctors on Monday I have to tell him about the Sjogren's (Sjögren’s is a chronic autoimmune disease in which people’s white blood cells attack their moisture-producing glands. Although the hallmark symptoms are dry eyes and dry mouth, Sjögren’s may also cause dysfunction of other organs such as the kidneys, gastrointestinal system, blood vessels, lungs, liver, pancreas, and the central nervous system. Patients may also experience extreme fatigue and joint pain and have a higher risk of developing lymphoma.) and persuade him to send me to rheumatology to find out if I have Sjogren's primary or secondary, if it's primary then we know it's causing everything, if it's secondary it means another autoimmune disease is working in conjunction with the Sjogren's!
You can learn more about Sjogren's syndrome by clicking on the image link below

http://www.sjogrens.org/home/about-sjogrens-syndrome/symptoms

The water works are still giving me a few annoyances, nothing compared to how it was like before, it's so much better not leaking, but now I have to spend anywhere up to 15 mins voiding as the urine flow is unbelievably slow sometimes - but hey it's a small price to pay for what it's fixed. 

Anyhow, I am now going to go have a couple of hours extra sleep, had to get up earlier than normal to take my daughter to the dentist to have a tooth pulled (it was either this one or the wisdom tooth and this one's root was not half as deep) you never know I may go crazy and blog again later (that sounds more like a threat than anything lol)

Love & Light 

Learning to dance in the rain....

Hello again, sorry I've been absent for a few days, hubby had 3 days off in a row and hey what can I say we both just love spending time together!
When he is on shift (normally they do 2 days, 2 nights, 4 days off) we only see each other for about 3 hours on those days, so when he is on his days off we tend to just chill out together and forget the world, even after all this time! (our 10th wedding anniversary is at the end of the month).

Crochet

I haven't spent every single moment chilling obviously, just not had time to sit and blog. I have however been working hard updating my etsy shop, I now have 100 listings! I did have 103 but I've sold a few items *grins*

I've been busy finishing off things I started to make ages ago, I quite often put down a piece I am working on when an order comes in for something to be made, customers come first. The half made items end up in a box under my desk so I am slowly taking them out and finishing them one by one, here are a few I've finished this week.

I absolutely love how well this teddy came out, it's the first one I've ever tried to make, next on my list is a blue one and then who knows lol

This little newborn penguin hat is soooooo warm and snuggly, looks much cuter in real life, the photo just doesn't do it justice sadly

And some cute hats - well you didn't think just because winter is fading and spring is on her way that I would stop making hats did you?! lol

There are also some lovely headbands up and several tooth fairy pillows, I have also re-listed all my stock that I have currently.
I have two contracts on at the moment, will show you the photos when they are completed, one is for a duo shade of pink set for a little girl who is due in a few months, the set consists of hat, mittens, booties and cardigan, all decorated with lace, ribbons and pearly buttons - looking so cute so far if I must say so myself.
The other is for a fair skinned, blonde haired version of my topsy turvy doll, (pictured below) I have just picked up the skin toned wool today so she'll be being brought to life over the next week.
 

o as you can see I've not been sitting around doing nothing, I'm always busy even when watching the TV!

My mother, bless her, brought me a pasta machine, I feel bad letting her spend her pension on me but I was brought up to always say thank you, because if someone wants to buy you a gift, you should be grateful as that person wanted to make you happy and remind you that you are loved. 
So I gratefully took the machine, and tomorrow I get to play with it for the first time, I have been googling lots of pasta recipes but have opted for a firm family favourite, my home made lasagne, but this time is the very first time I will make it with fresh home made pasta sheets!  I can guarantee it will not be the last pasta recipe this week though LOL

If you'd like my lasagne recipe just right click on the image below and go to 'save as', 

Health matters

All is pretty much quiet on the health front, I get the occasional stabbing pains, my glands are inflamed again, I am pretty sure my blood is acidic again! Because I now know the name for what I have I can purchase the correct things to help make me feel more normal, I have some lovely natural saliva stimulant pastilles to calm the mouth dryness, some soothing artificial tears for my eyes and some cod liver oil capsules as they will help apparently (not seen any difference yet but there's time yet lol) ......other than that I'm in great shape.

I have now lost 32lbs since this all started, that's 2 stone 2lbs or 14.5kg, I am now 4 (could be 5) dress sizes smaller than I was.... I am now more or less the same weight I was when I got married! maybe I'll squeeze into my wedding dress on my anniversary for kicks lol It's not a diet I would recommend though ladies, it sucks the life out of you!
Strangely since finding out that it looks 99% sure I have Sjogrens I am so much happier, I'm so relieve for my monsters to have a name! I am researching how to manage some of the symptoms better and I really feel positive that although this is for life, and that I'll never be cured, at least I can start to understand how to keep it under control and at last get my life back! - hope that make sense!

well that's your lot for tonight - hope life is smiling on you
love & blessings