Tuesday, August 22, 2023

Life Happens

Love Beads Mini Quilt #34/52

Sometimes life seems to "come at us" at warp speed.  This is the situation this week... and it is only Tuesday.

Saturday morning I was happily typing away here on my blog, and planning for upcoming social media posts.  Next thing I know I was writing the Sew & Tell party story for the week. Not all that unusual, except that I typically do that on Sunday.

Saturday afternoon was spent in the ER with my Mom having "muscle cramps" in her chest... insisting that she was NOT having a heart attack... yet, she had been turned away at the walk-in clinic because of said muscle cramps. She is nearly 83 years young and has struggled with severe seasonal allergies and asthma most of her life.  She has had stress tests done with inconclusive results in the past and she will have tests done again.  She has never had an issue with high blood pressure, yet her pressure was sky-high... alarm setting off high in the ER.  They gave her something for pain and it began to drop, but still considered too high. Lab results did not indicate heart attack or stroke, or clots...  I'm not sure why they let her leave without BP meds...

Sunday was hijacked by an impromptu, but much needed visit to our youngest daughter and her husband.  We needed to spend some time, see them face-to-face, and have a sort of "welfare check" since there was some unexpected news from her doctors' appointment on Friday.  Nothing life threatening, but we certainly wanted to see her rather than talk with her on the phone.  It was fortuitous that the Sew & Tell party was ready to go! She was in a much better frame of mind on Sunday than she was on Friday... and we felt better for her.  (Parenting is sooooooo hard!  And it never stops... even after they are adults and on their own.)

To top off Mom's ER follow-up visit this morning, (yes BP was high, but not alarm bell like) she shows a rash to the doctor and finds out she has Shingles. **UGH**

Blood pressure medication was prescribed as was the antiviral for the shingles virus.  She has an appointment for a laser treatment on Thursday morning.  The laser treatments, in addition to the Rx, were so effective for me last year when I had the virus. She is awaiting a call to schedule a lung function test and follow that up with an appointment with a cardiologist. **sigh** (no wonder I am tired...)

Also this morning (Tuesday), to top off aaaaaaallllllllll of that, my personal Facebook account was stolen and ultimately, disabled... which means that I am locked out, not only of my account, but also my business page, Melva Loves Scraps and my husband's.  I don't really have the time, nor energy, right now to deal with it so we are running away from "adulting" to go camping and soak in time with God and His beautiful creation.  

In all honesty, I'm not sure I will even try to recover it (them).  Instagram is still secure so, for now, that will be more of a home for MLS in the social world, for now.
I am considering alternatives... such as more frequent, but shorter stories here on the blog.  What would you suggest?

With a more cheerful update... I had a "goodie box" arrive yesterday from a friend.  She has recently been assisting her Mom get through a hip replacement surgery and move into an assisted living facility.  In doing so, she had a moving sale.  She sent a few items my direction.  One is this sweet carousel horse quilt.  It is machine appliquéd and pieced, but hand quilted.  


I love the border and the rounded corners.  The bottom two horses are worn with most of the embroidery non-existent and one saddle has a tear in it.

I have a plan to fix this sweet quilt... 


I will remove the two damaged horses and move the border up.  I think it will look fabulous.  

Dave is encouraging me to remove the center horse and replace it with the quilted setting square below it. 

If this were a restoration of sorts for a paying customer, I would go that extra step and use that center horse to replace the lower right horse that with the blue mane that has some saddle embroidery worn away.

But since it is just a sweet quilt that my friend couldn't part with, it would be just for fun and experience.

Since we are running away... I may do that.  But for now... I'll be packing up clothes and food for our run away from the world. 

If you have tips or suggestions on regaining access to my fb account, let me know... 

Do you follow just blogs?  How do you follow me?  Or do you do more on other platforms?  

If you want to chime in on how far you would take the repairs... let me know that as well.

What do you know of Patreon?  General content shared on the blog for free and sew alongs & such with a "subscription"? Fill me in!

If you made it this far... Thanks for the listening ear!  BTW, Love Beads, mini-quilt challenge #33/52 was subliminally created from my surrounding circumstances.  LOL!  I didn't even realize... 

Piece Out,

Melva

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15 comments:

  1. I hope your Mom is doing better and is not in a lot of pain with the shingles. High BP - so hard to pinpoint the cause, they usually just want to prescribe medication to lower it. I know what you mean about parenting, it never stops with our daughter. ;) I am happy for you to be getting away from adulting on your trip! Ugh on the FB page takeover, I've only had that happen to me on Instagram. Honestly, I've been thinking more and more about NOT blogging and only posting on IG. I spend many mornings catching up with my favorite blogs, and although I love reading them, it certainly is time consuming, as is writing my not-so-frequent posts. I wish I had some advice for you. That little quilt is so sweet - good luck with it! Enjoy that trip. :)

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  2. I hope your mom and daughter will soon feel better and that things will return to normal. What a lovely little mini you shared this week! Thanks for sharing it on my weekly show and tell, Wednesday Wait Loss.

    https://www.inquiringquilter.com/questions/2023/08/23/wednesday-wait-loss-342

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  3. I read Quilter Blogs quite routinely, but don't do any social media. I figure I spend enough time in front of a screen. I have subscribed to Patreon because I like the author and her videos and get her emails regularly. I have also used "followit" to receive blog posts from other quilters. That's enough for me.

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  4. I hope your camping trip brings the calm you need. Shingles can be painful I hear, I hope your mom gets the relief and I hope her BP gets normal. I tend to read blogs more than any other social media.

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  5. I'm so sorry that your mom is going through so much, and then your daughter, too. Frustrating and stressful for us as daughters and mothers - I'm there, too. I hope you enjoy your camping escape! That is a sweet little quilt and so kind of you to fix it for your friend.

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  6. I much prefer reading blogs, and don’t use either Facebook or Instagram. My DIL’s FB account was stolen and she never got it back. My daughter’s Instagram account, used for her photography hobby, was unexpectedly locked (not stolen) and it took a couple of months to get it back. Meta doesn’t really care. The people posting are just the product they sell to their advertiser customers

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  7. I am so sorry to hear about your mom's health challenges. I sure wish her and your daughter the best. With such a busy week, you certainly deserve a nice relaxing camping trip. Although I do enjoy IG, I prefer to read blogs for various reasons and yours is a lovely one, Melva.

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  8. Have a nice camping trip. I'm sorry about your current difficulties. Hopefully you'll feel strong and ready to face it all after your trip.

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  9. Sorry to hear about your mom and your daughter's challenges. Life does have a way of interrupting us. I do insta/facebook but despise them both. My facebook accounts I try to keep separate, friends and family on one, and sewing on the other, but they comingle. Most annoying is that there are so many adds. I did change my instagram password when I read this and will do the others, so annoying. I know patreon as a way to support a blogger/creative...and then your subscription gets you things.

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  10. I do enjoy reading blogs but find it time consuming as is writing blog posts especially when few people actually comment but I continue to document my own mostly quilting journey. I do use both IG and FB but prefer IG.

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  11. What a week you've had. Hopefully a bit of time slowing down and unplugging will help. My main social media activity is reading blogs. I try to comment on all I read but don't always succeed mostly because I can't when I use Safari but I can with Chrome. (Go figure why that is the case...) I do not use IG at all. I look at Facebook about once a week. I find that people and things I am interested in don't often come up for me. So my thought is why bother. I have not heard of Patreon so I have no opinion on it.

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  12. Oh my goodness!! what a week you have had!!! I like the idea of running away from adulting haha!!
    Can you report your page stolen and prove who you are to get it back??
    your Mom and your daughter are lucky to have you tho - great that you can be there for them

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  13. Yikes, no wonder you are exhausted! I really don’t use Facebook anymore, and haven’t wandered into any of the other social media, just my blog and reading others. My business website is actually a blog with mostly pages, and it works well for me.

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  14. oh my, what a week... hope your mom and daughter are doing a bit better.. I got locked out of FB as well, lost my fb page and group, so I started again.. but then I hardly ever post, it's hard enough keeping up with blogging which is my first love... Such a gorgeous quilt - love the border! xx

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  15. Hi Melva, your Love Beads mini is so cute. Good luck with your mom and kids - yes, our mothering role is never finished. Good luck with your social media issues - I guess you need to figure out if Instagram can replace what you use Facebook for. Take care

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