holding on

One of the good things that came from our time living in Ticine was a man named Fulvio. He was a massage therapist who dealt with all kinds of techniques and methods including  cranial sacral therapy. He showed me just how much I hold inside of me and how little I let go. It occurred to me last night that part of the reason I am feeling so ill right now is that this past month has been one hell of an emotional whollop and I don't deal well with that at all.

I hold on to sorrow the way a miser holds onto money. I store it somewhere around my solar plexus and I don't let it go. No wonder I hurt there so much. Fulvio would take one look at me and then he would tap that part of my body and say "Big block" and then he would work on the "big block" until I was crying hysterically to cleanse it all. I do not know how to do this myself.

As I have written about earlier my endo has come back with a vengeance meaning some pretty unpleasant and invasive testing coming up , there were two deaths in my family and I had someone I thought was a friend accuse me of hate crimes against men for saying if men experienced endo there would be more done about it. This is a lot of emotion for 1 month, really. I need to find a way to get rid of it without making myself so ill because right now I am not doing so well and I am heading back down into that panic attack dark place.

I think it was a big step just figuring out that I suck at letting go. That I store every hurt, every insult, every bit of abuse and all this terrible sorrow and I don't let it go almost as if I somehow think I deserve to be in pain, damaged.

I need to relearn how to breathe, Marcus kept saying that to me last night you need to breathe. I hold my breath a lot, I clench my abs and I hold my breath - how crazy is that? So I will have to start doing yoga again. I cry when I do yoga which makes me feel sort of stupid but since I am home alone it's not like the world is watching and it cleanses me.

This is me learning to breathe and trying to let go.

Last Sunday in February

It's been a hell of a month. 2 members of my extended family died and it made me realise just how very far away I am from my family in Canada. I have had a huge endo flare up that's given me a really bad bout of IBS, massive amounts of hairloss, bloating and weight gain, incredible pain and discomfort ( not to mention constipation) I had my annual OBGYN appointment and everything looked okay but given the pain I have and the problems that have been ongoing I now have to have a colonoscopy (ugh) after which I am certain will be another lap surgery. I am happy to see Feb go though March is shaping up to also not be a fun month.

It's been a good month for art but bad on equipment. I have produced a bunch of nice scrolls but broke my burnisher which somehow managed to leap off my table ( flat with a cloth on it) and break clean off. I wanted a new one any way but this was a tad annoying. I will have to get my butt in gear to photograph all the new pieces. I have a bunch of blanks I don't really know what to do with yet but something will come up I am sure.

We were gone this past week to stay with a friend near Frankfurt. Marcus has work related stuff to do and it was an excuse to see our friend C who just bought an apartment ( lovely)  It was great to see him and his new place. I spent a lot of time just hanging out browsing the web and relaxing which was nice. The only down side was an online discussion that turned into a bizarre fight over my feelings about endometriosis. I really don't mind civil discussions but using sarcasm and abusive language to get one's point across does not really count for a civil discussion and I decided that I have had enough abusive people in my life I don't need more. Unfriend is useful in these situations.

Yesterday was a good day at home after a long drive on Friday. We went shopping in Hamburg which was okay though I must admit as I get older I find crowds hard and harder to deal with especially as people don't seem to see me and insist on walking right into me. We buzzed Lush for the shampoo that Marcus uses and Saturn for DVDs and music. Then we went and had a quickie lunch fro the fab Indian place in the Europa passage and after that drove out of the city to Boesner the art supply shop I spend far too much money at. I replaced my burnisher and bought a 2nd one of a different size, some new blue ink, some new paint brushes and some watercolour paper. All in all I was very restrained.

We did some Lidl shopping on the way home and then settled in to watch animated stuff . Ratatouille and Shrek3 then topped it off with The Duchess ( excellent film).

Today I have not big plans but I will probably settle in to do some artwork. The sun is shining and it's beautiful out though a little frosty and hazy.  I am going off the hormone treatment today so I am pretty sure next week will be a lot of fun wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. 

in the meantime be excellent to each other and hang in there spring is coming!
 

Monday.

The geese are back...this means spring is coming! Oh happy day! As you have no doubt read it's been a pretty crap start to the year as a whole..oh well been and gone looking forwards not backwards.

I did get some fab news that my BFF Andrea got published. Her knitting design will be in the up and coming knit magazine Interweave Knits. check it out here:

Interweaveknits

It's the really pretty pink crop jacket. I am über jazzed for her.

Meanwhile back at the Haus-am-See lots of medieval stuff was done. I'm in the zone which is both good and bad. Good that I am doing art stuff bad I forsake all else when doing art work. So housework tends to fall by the wayside- though not today.

It also means I buy books- lots of cool scribally delicious books. Bad for the bank account but  lucky for me I was given a couple of most awesome amazon gift certificates so I could have some shopping fun. On the list were two model book facsimiles. Happy happy happy.

February hell

For the second time this month I woke up to a facebook msg that a member of my family had died. This time it was my mum's older brother, my Uncle Peter who was a very cool person. After a 9 hour wait at an ER a week or so ago they discovered he had been having a heart attack for 2 days so they rushed him off to another hospital where he ended up have quadruple bypass surgery. This resulted with him ending up with 20% normal heart function. After a couple of tense days in the ICU he didn't survive. I don't know any details. I just woke up and read he had died. I am sad, though even more sad for my mum. I feel very far away from her and my family and there's not much I can do about it.  It has not been a happy month so far.

On Tuesday I went to see my obgyn for my yearly alien probe ( as one of my friends likes to call it) and discussed in my usual strung out nervous way how I had not been doing so well lately which led to the discussion about further treatments and procedures. The end result is something I have known was coming for a while now but dreaded and she has been nudging for. So in March I go for a colonoscopy. And I am not looking forward to that at all.I also go off the hormone treatment so I'm guessing March is going to suck the big one and being around me will not be a lot of fun.

The last week has been very pain filled and while I suspect and hope thy won't find much in the actual bowels I do expect this will lead to another lap surgery to dig out the rest of the endometriosis and get rid of any adhesions. I am currently in a lot of pain in a very specific spot, it's not getting better. This is the problem with endo, it is insidious. It's like a cancer without actually being called cancer. Abnormal growths outside of where they are supposed to be.

So this means that we are not going to Crown Tourney. I just don't want to risk big travels and staying over night in strange places when my body is in turmoil. I have pain I can handle at home but traveling throws it into chaos and makes it all ten times worse. At the moment I can live with the someone just shoved a dull spear through the lower left half of my back through my abdomen but driving for 6+ hours in a car will not make that any better. At home I can dose up on painkillers, retreat to the couch with a heating pad and doze my way through the misery. Plus given the change in hormone balance that will be happening I will probably be an utter bitch to be around and I don't really want to subject anyone to that.

So I'm sad and feel very defeated. Not much else to say. I get through some of this by hiding in my studio creating arty things. Concentrating on the art makes me forget that I hurt through and through but it doesn't make the sorrow go away.

little things

The B is part of a backlog scroll I'm working on. I decided to try tooling the gold which is no easy feat given the kind of gesso I use. Still it looks okay.  Currently I started painting the acanthus leaves that make up the main body of the illumination. Will show it when it's done.

Yesterday was not a banner day. I had my annual obgyn intrusional, nothing new or unexpected there. I used to be terrified of the once a year pap smear and exam now it's just an add on to the rest of the routine I go through on a fairly regular basis. Since the discovery of endometriosis I'm at my obgyn fairly regularly. From the very first visit she has suggested a colonoscopy which I've avoided due to an unrealistic amount of fear and loathing but now, backed against a wall, in March I will have the procedure done. I have pain with no apparent cause and enough issues with all things guts and bowel that this is necessary. But I'm scared to death.

So yesterday was a crap day. I was wound up, with a pulse of up over 100 but great BP go figure, the doc's assistant was like "Wow, you're a little stressed ". NO shit. And that stress didn't go away. The news about my uncle is not good and we had a frigging snow storm yesterday.

I also go off my hormone tablets in March so March is getting all set to be a banner month in the worst possible way. Now... I have to get ready for work. Gets me out of the house and lets my husband have a day home alone ( eep)

Getting older sucks.

me at 45

My birthday. Just out of bed, still sleepy but somehow documenting this seems right. In 5 years I'll be 50 which is a little daunting.  Not sure how I feel about it all, but the physical side of getting older sucks. The brain side still thinks it's 32 and that's a good thing.

bob

Given all the sad news that's been flying around lately I thought I do a cute and fuzzy post. So this is Bob. Bob was my mum's cat ( He's since passed on this mortal coil and gone parrot chasing in another dimension). Bob was a feisty old bastard with a personality to match the size of Canada. He was making up for lack of a tail big time. He was a cool cat tho. So here's a really nice picture of Bob and his standard wtf do you want face..

family

me and my fabulous sister on Christmas ever in Newfoundland.

So we got bad news yesterday. It's been that kind of start to the new year. My Great Aunt Chris died last week and yesterday I learned that my favourite uncle was discovered to have been having a heart attack for the past 2 days after a 9 hour wait at the ER. He was rushed via helicopter to another hospital for emergency cardiac surgery. The only news since has not been positive. I feel very far away from my family and all I can do is hope for a good outcome but mentally prepare for the worst. When I moved to Germany to be with the love of my life I left the rest of my life and family behind. It happens, my mum did the exact same thing but it doesn't make times like this easy.

All in all January and Feb(so far) have been pretty crappy. My endo issues have attacked with a vengeance so I've spent most of this past month and half not feeling 100%. I am hoping that the up and coming obgyn visit will see some sort of forward movement. The hormone therapy stops my period ( mostly) but now the rest of the symptoms are back. It's painful and tiring, though honestly it's mostly just exhausting. It's difficult to have a chronic illness that does a variety of weird things to one's body, harder when no one understands it including the world of doctors and disheartening when it attacks a person in places it's not polite to talk about it.

However... never mind all that. It's been a pretty productive time as well. I found my way back to making scrolls. I love the art. It's precise and exacting and it takes my brain to a quiet place where pain and problems are forgotten. The break did me good. I came back to the craft with new eyes and rediscovered my love for it. Plus being in my studio, which is warm and comforting, is a sort of refuge from everything that's going on.

in a few days I turn 45. I am half way through my 40's. I think this is a good thing. It hasn't been a happy number so I think I will be glad to get through it. So I guess this was a non art related post but it's where my head is right now. Missing my family, sad by the losses that have swept through my friends' lives as well as my own and watching with bated breath as a turbulent world seems to shift again to something different and hopefully better.

so anyway now I wait for news and hope. There is always hope.

that month which should not be

Rhaps in Trenthorst

I hate February. I hate it for several reason but the biggest is the 14th.  Okay enough about that. It's been a sad beginning to the year. People have died, family, friends and known personalities. It's been emotional and a bit rough. I look forward to spring though not to the allergies that come with it.

I'm busy with art, making scrolls and contemplating a massive spring clean out. We have too much junk and it's weighing heavily. But gardening and roses and green...it's all coming and it will be wonderful.

repeats

So yeah...I'm doing this one again on request from the owner only this time it's on pergamenata and waterproof ink because he wants to take it into the field. Am I crazy or what?

exhausted but really happy.

So I have spent much of the past week on this monster. It is a style of illumination I have not tackled before so it was difficult to get right but I am quite happy with how it turned out. When it has been awarded I'll repost with the text.

Albion Scrolls

The Albion is probably the most prestigious award outside of peerages given in Drachenwald. It is given out once a reign by the king to someone who has performed exemplary service to the Kingdom.  As a scribe I have been lucky enough to do 4 of these scrolls and I thought I would share a little about each one.


The very first Albion scroll I ever did was for Cecilia Jonsdottir, who is a really lovely person. This was a woman I sort of knew but I wouldn't say that at that  point we were friends so I had to ask people about her and what she liked. In the end I went for simple rather than complicated because I wasn't quite at the skill stage for something really complex. But I also wanted pretty, I had heard that she didn't have many pretty scrolls so I wanted it to be something shiny and cool. The top miniature shows a representation of Cecilia  with baby dragons, at each corner is an image that represents the sacrifice Albion made ( there's a whole story about this which gets read out in court before the award is given out and it always makes people cry) Then the bottom miniature is of Cecilia and her two very good friends. The scroll was written in Swedish because Cecilia is Swedish.  It was one of my first tries at gold leaf and I was happy with how it turned out.

The next Albion I was asked to do was for Master Bertik. Bertrik is a good friend and so I kinda went all out. It was at this point I also thought the text for the Albion was sort of lacking in all the flash and bang it should have for such a big award so I decided to write the entire Albion story out onto his scroll.  The two miniatures on each corner show Albion as he was before he started giving parts of himself away and after it was all said and done. The middle one is of Bertrik and John. they are really close friends so I wanted them on the scroll. Given that this was a King only award I felt that Honor who was Queen at the time and also really close to Bertrik should be on the scroll someplace so she is on the bottom shown with Lucy.

The 3rd Albion I did was for someone called Kragen who I didn't know  and later I found out was someone no longer even living in the Kingdom ( this a  no no and was something that cause a bit of an issue but that's politics and I won't get into it) Because this one was being given out at Pennsic ( big war thingy in the US) It needed to travel well so the two bits are done on pergamenata and could be rolled. / folded. Again I wrote out the story and then I did a smaller separate scroll as the actual award piece. It took forever to write out and it was one of the first examples of my flourishing work ( here's a great example of what not to do) I was still working on the kinks and didn't quite get the pattern of it all still it turned out okay over all.  I never got any feedback about this, even though my contact info was on the back the guy never wrote to say if he liked the work or not which I thought and still think was pretty fucking lame.

The story

the scroll

The most recent foray into the world of Albion was for my most excellent partner in crime and friend Eleanora. I started it ages ago but never finished it then this week got off my lazy ass and completed the scroll. It shows Albion giving away his heart which is really what Ele does for this kingdom. I also decided enough with the writing out of the entire story and went with simple is more. I am happy with how it turned out in the end, especially as for a very long time it didn't look like it was going to be so nice.

I hope I get to do more Albion scrolls because they are a lot of fun. It's also a really nice award to watch being given out.

finally

So It only took me a couple of years to finish but now it's done. yay.

poodling along

I'm kind of at a loss for things to talk about at the moment mostly because my head is full of projects. We took a bit of a big break from the world it seems and now the world has flooded in with a vengeance. Not that I am complaining, I think it's good to be busy and creative but it's overwhelming.

There's lots going on in all directions. We are members in two busy costume clubs utterly unrelated to each other. ( one is medievalish and the other is totally Star wars related) and there are a lot of events coming up for both these hobbies. It's cool really.

I am also working to try and finally finish the DOTE blog / books. It's so close and yet it seems to fight me every word of the way. I'm sorry to those who are waiting that I am so slow... but I am working on it, promise!