Free, At Last and Pictures

As some of you know, I've been wearing a halter heart monitor for the last 3 weeks. Now I must tell you that a "halter heart monitor" sounds much sexier than it really is. Imagine having 3 electrodes stuck to you, each with its own wire being fed into a sensor that connects to a black lanyard which hangs around your neck. As if that isn't sexy enough for you, you must keep the cell phone monitor within 10 feet of the sensor at all times and respond to its multitude of beeping which indicates that 1) you have somehow disconnected one or all of the electrodes, 2) you are out of range of the cell phone and a signal cannot be found, 3) the battery of the sensor or cell phone is low, 4) you're having an "episode" and you must respond to a questionnaire within 60 seconds, 5) you are back in range of the cell phone and 6) there were a couple of beeps that I'm just not sure what they meant.

Anyway, the monitor finally came off today. The doctor told me that they have recorded enough data, even though I didn't have one of my "major episodes" which was the reason for wearing the darn thing anyway! All that remains to remind me of the monitor are the red, swollen sore spots where the electrodes stuck to my skin. It sure will be nice to sleep tonight and not feel as if I'm being strangled.

All joking aside, I'm amazed at technology! I was pretty shocked when I got my first phone call from the monitoring company at 2:12AM the first night I wore the thing wanting to know how I felt because I was having an episode. I didn't even feel it! Amazing!!!

Backing up a little here, yesterday was a mixture of busy work and relaxation. I made all of the cookie dough for my orders and my nephew's graduation party, and I made a breakfast casserole and put it in the freezer for this coming weekend's festivities at my sister's house. I worked outside a little bit, but not as much as I had wanted. All of the mulch that we had is spread and I'll get more on my way home from work Wednesday, if it's not raining. I watched the Indians' baseball game and was going to go to turn it off when they were down 10-0, but I decided to stick with it while I was doing some hand sewing. Boy was I glad I did! The Indians scored 7 in the bottom of the 9th and won the game. That was fun to watch.

In regards to quilting, I have finally finished my pink and brown blocks and will post pictures tomorrow or Thursday. I worked on the guild retreat quilt and should be able to finish that soon. I also spent a little bit of time getting everything ready to finish up the raffle quilt. I probably won't have time to work on that until Thursday because I work from 5:30AM - 2:00PM and then have errands after that.

As promised, I finally have some pictures to add. I have to warn you, it's a good thing I can sew because I sure would starve it I had to earn my living by taking pictures. Hey, maybe I could market that as a weight loss product - take crappy pictures, try to sell them and buy your meals with the money you get! I've got to get busy on my new business plan. :-)

Anyway, here are two of the hanging baskets we bought Saturday. I love all of the color and different flowers. Do you see the sprayer in the second picture? That was filled with vinegar and dish soap and used as a "green" weed killer for the new garden area. Within 2 hours the grass had started to die and I was ready to start spading the area. Can you see the brown grass in the last picture? (I feel like an elementary teacher. Do you see Spot run?)

This last picture is of the area that has become the dumping spot for plants over the last couple of years. If I didn't know where something was going, I planted it here for "a couple of days." Well, a couple of days has turned into a couple of years, but it's finally getting done. I have some iris and lilies that I need to get out of there, but that will have to wait until they are done blooming, and I want to transplant a few more of the black eyed susans. After that, this area will be a clean slate!
Well, I'm excited. Three posts in four days is pretty good for me. I'll try to keep it up, but I certainly won't make any promises. I do have some guild work that I should have done before I blogged, but this was going to be more fun. I guess that I'll have to do that when I get home tomorrow before I do anything else!