10-28

Yesterday just didn't quite work out as planned.  I was planning on 5 lovely lessons and a beautiful afternoon of movies or reading.  Instead, I had 3 lessons (my 2 that are moving next week haven't shown up in 2 weeks and I have called to find out why) and went to the emergency room.  I was in so much pain that I just couldn't take it anymore.  Turns out it was a good thing that I did go because I have an infection under my skin, which explains the horrible pain.

The antibiotic made me a bit sleepy this afternoon so I had to take a wee nap.  Surprisingly, I only slept for about an hour instead of 3 to 4 hours like usual.  Law and Order SVU is having a marathon on right now.  Most of the episodes I have seen before, but they are always good.  I am glad that it is still on with new episodes each week.  Mom and I used to watch it all the time together.  It was just one of the shows we watched together.

Aggie has finished her dress that we were working on last week.  I can't wait to see the picture of her in it.  I am going to be starting the ornaments for my students this week.  I need to get a new dressmakers pencils since the ones I have are unable to sharpen anymore.  I am not going to wait until December like I usually do or at least, that is the plan.  I have some really cute music Christmas material for the ornaments.  I am going to make some for my littlest cousins too.

There are 2 Christmas parties this year.  Kayla is having one and so is Danielle.  Danielle's party is also a 1st birthday for Miles.  I looked at some toys for him this afternoon.  It is hard to believe that he is 1 already.  He is so cute.  He likes me to hold him or at least he doesn't cry when I hold him.  His sister, Elizabeth, turned 4 in September.  She liked what I got her for her birthday too.  I am not sure about what to get Miles.  He is as cute as his sister.

This week is Halloween.  I am not planning to pass out candy this year unless it is warm out and I can sit outside to pass it out, otherwise, it is just to long to stand and too cold to sit outside.  I am planning to get some candy to give to the students who are having their lessons on Wednesday and for the Hubel kids.  I think that they will like that.  They do so much for me that it is nice to do something for them for a change.  I really like the family a lot.  Halloween is not my favorite holiday.  It was Mom's thing.  She used to decorate the front window and the dining room every year.  She really got into it.  Mom would be so excited about holidays that it made us excited too.  I remember how she would ask us if we wanted to go to the store with her.  I mean, we always said yes since you never knew when you would get a treat.  Looking back, I know that we would have had to go with her since she wouldn't leave small children home alone, but it made it seem like we had a choice of going or not.  That was just mom.  Christmas and Easter are my favorite holidays.  I love how people think of other people more at Christmas time.  I love Christmas Shopping too especially if it was for my mother.  I remember when I was about 25 or so, Mom needed a new winter coat.  I wanted to get her one, but she said it was too expensive for me to get it for her.  Well, she should have let me get it because by the time I bought everything that I got her, the coat would have been cheaper.  She was so fun to by stuff for.  Another time we went to a store for her to try on pants that she needed.  Mom tried on the pants and I wrote all the info down.  The next day, I went to purchase them.  By the time Christmas came she forgot that she tried them on.  I know she used to pretend when she knew what we were giving her, but this was a bit overboard until I realized she really DID forget what I got her.  The last thing that she actually bought me herself for Christmas is my Carebear.  It is a stuffed animal that I cherish.  She was so excited to give it to me that she put it on my pillow so when I woke up, I saw the bear right away.  Mom was standing at the door laughing.  That was Christmas 2008.  By the next year, she wasn't able to pick things out for me.  I think it was her last Christmas where she was more of herself instead of the Alzheimer's mom.  I am so glad that I have these memories of her because neither of my brothers have the daily memories that I have.  I am glad that I was with her everyday up to the end.

My head isn't so bad this evening.  I am thankful for that.  It is just the everyday headache, not a bad one right now.  I am hoping that this week will be good as far as the headaches go.  I didn't have as many bad ones as I have been having.

The Color of the Leaves 10-25

It is so beautiful here with the fall colors on the trees.  In my backyard I can see several of the trees my neighbors have and the are simply beautiful.  God's creation is so awesome.  My hedge is full of green, yellow, and red leaves.

I have a light load today.  I am not sure where my students are that are supposed to be having their lesson right now.  They are often late and sometimes miss for no apparent reason.  While I would rather teach the lessons, I do get paid whether or not they show.  They are 6 and 7 year olds now and are really cute.  I just wish they would actually practice.  I do the best that I can with what time I have with them, but they are talented and really could be doing so much more at this point.  Saturday, I have a new voice student.  She is 12.  I do not have any ink in my scanner/printer so I will have to loan her the books that she needs for the next 2 weeks.  She will be an every other week student.  I spoke to her dad yesterday and they seem to be very excited about lessons.  I have a binder ready for her and a note book, but since I can't copy anything for her here, I may be able to go to Kinko's and copy the music there.  I do have other things I need to copy too so that might be the best thing to do.

Emily will be getting her new books tomorrow.  She is very excited about this as am I.  She is a lovely young lady who is in 4th grade.  She likes her school and she seems to get along with all of my students.  Then again, I think that all of them get along well together when we have recitals so that is good.  I don't expect them all to become best friends, but I do expect that they are nice to each other.  My teenage students are very nice to the little ones.  I have had where the teenage students were mean to the little ones, fortunately, that is not happening right now.  I am glad about that.

My head is the normal, everyday headache today.  Yesterday was much better for it, but since it isn't super bad, that is okay.

My students arrived late today so they only had about 20 minutes each.  I don't have anymore students for the evening.  I have to go and pick up some books for Emily tomorrow so that is where I am heading out too shortly.

wow!

I have 100 followers now.  That totally surprises me!  I am one grateful fibro girl!!!  Thanks for reading!

Midweek already 10-24

I can't believe it is Wednesday already.  Wow, did I sleep through Monday and Tuesday?  It sure feels like I have.  I went to see an associate of my Primary Doctor this morning for the pelvic type pain.  I sure hope what he gave me works otherwise I will have to go again and well, that does add up and since I already owe my doctor so much money, I need to not have to go.  I also realized that I totally forgot to bring the filled out form for my doctor to sign.  *sigh* Fibro fog at work.

I don't have a whole lot of lessons for the next few days.  My busiest day is now Monday instead of Thursday.  I don't mind because it is the nature of the business that I am in.  I am thankful for the few hours I work a week.  Without them, I would be losing my mind and that would not be a pretty sight.

This week we don't have choir practice since there is an event at church that will take place in any of the rooms we can practice in so no practice tomorrow evening.  I think I will cut out the ornaments that I am making for my students for Christmas.  I am also making some for the little ones in the family.  I love the fabric that I have for them.  It has music all over it in a Christmas theme.  It should be really cute for the ornaments.

I tried to take a nap this afternoon since I was a bit tired, but I only slept for about 1 hour or so.  I am not sure but I have a feeling that after my last lesson, I will be heading up to bed.  I am a bit tired no, but I have a lesson in about 20 or so minutes and that will perk me up.

The new headache medicine seems to helping a bit.  Today, until I thought about it, I didn't have a headache.  Naturally after I announce the good news about it, my head starts to ache a bit.  However, it is Wednesday and the last bad headache I had was Saturday night so there is some improvement.  I will see what the rest of the week turns out like.

A Fall Day 10-23

Tonight is NCIS and NCIS Los Angeles.  I simply love those shows a lot.  I have missed the last 2 weeks because of things I needed to get done.  Tonight, there shouldn't be any reason for me not to see the shows.

It is a quiet type day in the house.  I have only 3 lessons today and 1 is already done so just 2 more and then I am done for the night.

I have some paperwork that I need to take care of tonight.  I have run out of ink again, so I have to go and buy some so I can copy the paperwork and mail it in.  Tomorrow, I am getting up early (like 8:30 am) so I can go to the Social Security Office for my statement of income that I also need to put in.  I sometimes think paperwork will be the death of us all.  I only have a smidge left to do so that is good.

I woke up at about 4 am this morning and I was wide awake ready to take on the world.  I just wish I had my get up and go later in the day.  By the time I get up late in the morning, my get up and go has got up and gone.  I was tired again by 5 am so I went back to bed until about 12 noon, which is my normal time to get up.  I think, for me, one of the biggest obstacles in my life is the extreme fatigue that I have.  Yes, I have pain everywhere but that just makes me even more exhausted than I already am.  For me, I am so used to the pain that some days I don't really feel the full brunt of it unless I bump something or think about it.  I know it is there, but when I am distracted, it isn't always so bad.  Now that is not to say that I never have extreme pain, I am just saying I am used to the everyday pain.  When most people ask me how I am, I always answer fine, because to me it is normal to be in pain and so tired.  When my best friend asks me how I am, I will give her the lowdown about it because that is what she wants to know.  She doesn't want the standard answer.  I also think one of the worst things for me besides the exhaustion are the headaches I get.  I have had a headache since about March of 2003 so I have had a headache for about 9 years.  I don't remember what it was like not to have one.  I am hopeful that the new neurologist will find something to break the cycle of headaches.

For some reason, I am having pelvic pain again today.  It started yesterday.  If I still have it tomorrow, I will go see the doctor tomorrow.  It isn't super bad like it was a couple of years ago, just a little bit bad.  however, I will NOT wait as long as I did back then to see a doctor.  I just won't.

My student should be here soon.  He is a piano player.  He is doing pretty well.

Monday 10-22

I had several lessons this afternoon and evening.  It was a nice lesson day.  My two littlest ones will be switching to Mondays instead of Wednesday.  It seems to work better for them so it works for me.  I like being able to be flexible for the parents, not only does it helps them but it helps me if I need to change a lesson for some reason.

It was such a nice, low key weekend with Kathy.  I thought it was cute that Kathy's girls wanted to come with her.  I am just glad that I didn't flare and we had fun.

I have to do some paperwork this week that I keep forgetting to do.  I FINALLY wrote it down so I will do it tomorrow.  I need to get this done as soon as possible.  Wow, my spelling is not so hot tonight.  So far I have forgotten how to spell about 3 or 4 words.

I am really getting tired tonight so I will be heading to bed early.

Lovely weekend

Oh my, it was such a lovely couple of days with Kathy here.  She arrived Saturday morning.  While I taught my few lessons, she ran over to the Disney Store in the mall.  There is not a Disney Store in her area so when she comes here, she always goes to see what is new and with Christmas coming, it is good to start ahead when you have 4 children like she does.  When I was finished, we went out to lunch/dinner at a restaurant that I had gift certificates for.  We both really enjoyed the food there.  I have a little bit left for another visit so that is good.  Kathy and I are both HUGE MacGyver fans so I had a disc of movies that were done after the series was over.  I had not seen either one of them and neither had Kathy so that is what we did, we watched 2 MacGyver movies and boy were they good not to mention how we were remembering our college days when we were totally enthralled with Richard Dean Anderson.  *Ah*, it was such fun.  We chatted some more before we headed for bed.  Mom's old room is one of the guest rooms so that was where she slept.  I got up after she did, but that is nothing unusual as I tend to sleep in more than most people I know.  I got up at 10 and after getting ready for the day, we went to Chipotle's for lunch.  Kathy had never been there and apparently there is one on the opposite side of town from her so she was in for a treat.  She loved it as much as I do.  If I wasn't so full from lunch, I would want more, thankfully, I am full and not going to eat anymore.  After lunch, Kathy had to leave to go home.  She was planning to stop at her parents' house since she would pretty much go right past there on her way home.  Her dad had surgery last week and is doing fine, but she wanted to visit them anyway.  Her parents are really two of the nicest people ever.  I spend the 3 major holidays with them.  I am very lucky about that too.  I have known them most of my life since Kathy and I have been friends since we were 3, but still, to be a part of their holidays, is very nice of them plus I get to see Kathy and the kids, which is definitely a plus.

One of the nicest things about this weekend was I didn't have a bad headache at all yesterday or today, just the usual dull headache.  It did hurt a bit more than usual when I went to bed, but when I woke up it wasn't too bad at all so I am one thankful Fibro girl.  It is also good that if I did, Kathy wouldn't be mad at me or anything and I knew she would be up for whatever I needed to do if it was bad but since it wasn't, that is great.

This afternoon, I have 2 lessons.  Both are piano lessons, although one is usually a voice lesson but he wants to learn a bit more about the piano.  It was strange yesterday that my two girls weren't here for their lessons.  They are moving in a few weeks so I am thinking that maybe they got caught up in it.  I did leave a message on their mom's cell phone, so I am hoping they will call and let me know what happened.  They have never just not shown up without a phone call before.  This is very weird.  The two girls are so sweet and cute as well as their little sister.  I am hoping that everything is okay with them.  I am planning on calling them again this evening to see if everything is all right.

October

I hate this month.  I have since 2010.  This week just upsets me beyond words at time.  2 years ago at this time I was watching my beautiful mother die.  It was the hardest thing because I couldn't fix her and I wanted her fixed.  I didn't want her to go.  I only wanted her to stay.  I would have done almost anything to keep her here with me.  I asked about what they could do and they said there wasn't anything that they could do.  I just miss her so much.  Add family issues to the incredible sadness at this time of year, I wonder how I can get up at all.  Some days, I just want to stay in my nice warm bed and not face the day.  It isn't as bad at times as it used to be, but some days it is really hard.  I just wish that I could sleep through all of October, maybe someday it won't be so bad.  Today is just a bad day.

the start of the new week 10-13

I missed church again this morning because of another bad headache.  Right now it isn't too bad, but the evening is still young.  I am watching a marathon of Law and Order, SVU.  I do like this show a lot.  I think I have seem most of the episodes except for the last season.  I could never remember when it was on.  It is on Wednesdays at 9 pm.  I will have to remember that.

Aggie's costume is almost finished.  I will have the bulk of it done by Friday.  Aggie is coming Friday morning so we can put the finishing touches on it.  She received the wig for her costume yesterday.  She looked good with it on.

Becca had her lesson today.  We have picked most of her music for competition.  She is doing the cutest Renaissance piece for classical.  It is from the time of Elizabeth 1.  It also was in the movie, "Vanity Fair".  I saw it years ago with my mother.  I remember being excited that the character sang that song.  Her Broadway and her Pop songs are all picked.  She is just having a bit of trouble with choosing her Inspirational song.  Becca is down to 2 choices for that category.  I also need to ask Natalie if she would like to sing a duet with Becca.  I am sure she will so it is just a matter of picking out a song.

Other than 1 lesson, it has been a very quiet day.  I am going to read some more and then head for bed.

Saturday 10/13

It is almost mid October, hard to believe.  I received some sad news this afternoon.  My lovely Wama and Deema will be moving so next week is their last week.  I will miss them so much as they are such lovely students and so talented.  They are such wonderful girls.  The whole family is wonderful.  I love their mother, she is such a lovely person.  I am hoping that someday I will be able to visit them in Dubai.  That is something I plan to save for because I would love to see them there and visit their country.  I just can't say enough of how wonderful the family is.  They came to get ice cream when I had my birthday and we celebrated Lulu's 5th birthday together a few weeks ago.  I plan to stay in touch with them through face book.  I am thankful for face book because of the message feature.  I can hear how they are doing.  I know that they miss their dad and they will be with him again shortly.  The girls plan to play piano when they move so that is really good.  I can't believe that next week will be their last lesson with me.

I can't wait until next weekend though because Kathy is coming to visit!!!!!!  It should be awesome.  We haven't been able to arrange a time to hang out just the two of us so this is long overdue.  With both our schedules, it just hasn't worked out.  Not only does she have her schedule, but her husband's and her children's schedules too while I only have my little schedule.  I am looking forward to have her here for the weekend.

Aggie and I were working on her costume for Halloween this afternoon.  I have measured the part that I need to redesign.  She is going to be Merida from the movie Brave.   So far, it is turning out pretty well.  I will make the adjustments tomorrow.  I am happy with how it is turning out.

Time to read a bit and then head for bed.

Thursday/Friday

Thursday:

It has been an okay day until about 5:30, then my headache got worse so I missed choir practice yet again this week.  I sure hope that by Sunday it will be better.  I am really tired of this too.  I do hope by tomorrow it will be back to the normal, everyday headache.

Lessons went well today.  I was a bit tired when I finished teaching, but that is mostly from the headache.  I was going to sew some of Aggie's dress tonight, but my head will not allow me to do that.

Friday:

My head is mostly back to the normal, everyday headache.  I did go to bed early last night because my head hurt so much.  Today, it seems it will be alright so that is a good thing.

I got the results of my blood tests back.  Apparently, my hemoglobin is very, very low.  Normal for me is around 12.5, normal for everyone else, is about 13.  Mine at this point is at 10.6, which means somewhere in the stomach or colon is bleeding so I have to do a test here at home and then send it away for the results.  this test tends to gross me out but I guess it has to be done and no more ignoring it, which I have been doing for, oh, about a year now.  Both Dr. G and Dr. T want this done so I will bite the bullet and do this during the weekend and hope I don't gross out from it.

Things have calmed down with the family now.  I still have to make some decisions that are hard, but I am weighing all my options.  I am much calmer and less upset than I was on Sunday when everything hit the fan and flung itself on me.  I don't do well in situations like that because of the fibro fog.  Once people starting going on and on harshly, I can't think.  When they talk to fast and so much, I just can't really follow them.  It takes time for me to process exactly what is being said and what I need to say.  Instead, I couldn't think properly or answer properly.  I do hope the next time I am discussing these details, they will slow down and let me think otherwise, I don't know what is really going on nor will I totally understand what is being said.  I am just glad this has smoothed out for now.

I have some lovely lessons today.  Acer, Calli, Emily, and Antoinette.  Antoinette is actually a make up lesson from Wednesday when she as unable to come.  The other three are their normally scheduled lessons.  Oh, I just remembered, I have to copy a CD for Allison.  I will be right back.  Okay, I am back.  Boy am I glad I went to get the CD because it reminded me about the other CDs I need to copy and burn.  Good thing I went up.  The group song for Christmas this year is called, "Oh What a Merry Christmas Day", it is from Mickey's Christmas Carol.  I know, it is so not a surprise that I picked a Disney Song for the group song.  It is very me.  We are starting to pick Christmas music now.  Some students have already picked theirs but others are thinking about it and I will be pulling a lot of it out in the next week or so.

Well, on to doing the work I need to do for students!