Thanks for wondering how I'm doing.
Physically, my back is still not healed and I quickly go from mobile to almost immobile throughout the day. I'm trying to avoid meds as much as possible (thanks for the reminder, though) and only use them when really necessary. I'm trying to do several rounds of physio stretches a day.
Also physically, something is up with my crotch and I'm trying to figure out what. It feels like I've ridden 20 miles on a bicycle, sore and stinging a bit. I can't even remember clearly when it started but I have a list of possible causes (as it also feels like a reaction to soap.) I have to do some research on that.
Mentally, I'm doing OK but definitely on the edge of depression. I'm short-tempered, weepy, and sleepy a lot of the time (but failing to get to bed when I should.) I'm doing my light therapy every day. Most of all, I'm trying to stay off my computer as much as possible, hence I haven't been here much.
I'm still making progress, just with heavy effort:
* Christmas is put away (although I'm stilling finding missed items!)
* the sleepover with dgs7 went well, he and I went shopping for dgd's birthday presents so I had an expert consultant
* dgd(now)5's birthday has come and gone (although her friend party is on the weekend in a major snowstorm)
* I'm keeping up with the housework
* We completed the big project of emptying the spare bedroom, building the new bed (after 44 years I finally bought a head/foot board for our queen sized bed), setting up the bunk bed cots in a semi-permanent state and carrying the old box spring downstairs to the garbage room (thank heavens we own "forearm forklifts" that I got from an "As Seen On TV" show - they really work well for items like that that just can't be put on a dolly, even if we had one large enough, because it wouldn't have fit through the elevator door if it was on anything at all.)
The top bunk bed can be left assembled but half dropped to make a 'couch' (see a photo here and you'll see why I put that word in quotes:
https://discobedshop.ca/collections/por ... organizers) so we left it that way and made the bottom bunk up for dgs2.75 to use as his bed here now. It is only a few inches off the ground and I have a pool noodle made into the bed to help stop him from rolling out of bed and foam mats to put out when he's here. I have two noodles so can use the second on the top bunk when dgs7 is here. I didn't leave it as a bunk bed because dgs2.75 is a climber and a fall from the top bunk onto my hardwood over concrete floor would likely cause an injury.
As all projects are never straight forward, I had a sewing project to remake the bed skirts (plural because the bed is 18" off the ground and my skirt was only for 12") because they now needed splitting at the corners to go around the bed post. So that made for a stressful day, I was overtired, very sore, having trouble concentrating due to pain and confusion with things piled all over the living room and our bedroom, and with a time deadline to get the beds made up so I could get the bedding piled on my bed off it so I could go to sleep.
That was Tuesday. I also managed an errand at the other building, a walk, and a phone meeting that day, plus a ton of email.
Yesterday, the ironing board and sewing machine were still set up so I spent a good chunk of the day mending with the machine and ironing and working on a sewing project to come up with a warmer option for my hands while walking.
On my Tuesday walk I learned the mittens I had were only a little better than my assorted gloves for keeping my fingers from freezing after about 20 minutes. These are single layer wool mitts my mom knitted for me as a teen. My Nordic walking poles have awkward hand straps that don't easily open wide enough to get my hand through if wearing any hand covering. I had been hoping it would be easier with my thin mittens. It was but they weren't warm enough (and it was just below freezing on Tuesday, not really cold.) With mitts, I could pull fingers off the hand grip to warm them up a bit but it wasn't ideal. So when I got home I dug through my scraps drawer and found some old fleece sheet material and lined the back of the inside of the mitts with a layer of that.
On my walk yesterday, it worked really well. It was just above freezing but windier than the day before and my hands, including my unprotected thumb, were actually hot. When I turned so that the wind was from the side and hitting the front of the mitts, it was blessed relief to have them cooled down a bit! I'm guessing the thumbs didn't get cold because the rest of my fingers were still warm so there was warm blood to heat them.
So I'm rather proud of myself about that idea. I'm still wondering what to do about thumbs in colder weather. Before I had these Nordic poles I would just use my mittens that are wool felt on the palms and fur on the back of the hand. Those work really well for keeping the wind off my hands and keep them warm. (That's where I got the idea of adding a layer just to the back of the wool mitts.) But these won't fit in my new poles. So I guess in extreme cold I'll just use my old poles.
On Tuesday while I was working on the spare bedroom I was adding stuff to my A-river cart. After Christmas I bought a plant soil meter which registers moisture and light and there is not enough light for my plants. Pierre, the ficus tree, is struggling so I have bought plant lights for him. And a waterproof mattress cover for the bunk, and an extra sheet (I only have one set of single sheets) and some sheet straps since there is no mattress to wrap the bottom sheet around. Those things will arrive over the next few days.
Another thing I bought after Christmas was a fancy oven/meat thermometer. That confirmed the old toast oven wasn't working properly so I have a new, much smaller one, and have a much better way to know when food is cooked. It also measures the temperature of oil so the schnitzels I made last night for dinner turned out amazingly (up until now we had the oil temp too low so they were soggier that what we get when we go to restaurants.) I can't believe how simple it is to make schnitzel. This holiday season I also learned how simple it is to make sausage rolls. So I'm learning how to cook more things these days. We received a gift box of spice mixtures complete with recipes and so we'll try and use those through the year and learn even more.
So, that's what has happened with me over the past week. I haven't cuop on posts but will try to.
I was going to pull up a SHE memory that I have saved but have discovered not all files were moved over to my new computer so that set of files isn't there. Sigh....