The Lost Week

when I last posted here I was working on projects, entering things in shows and getting ready to go any have what was supposed to be a relatively easy procedure to have a polyp removed that was discovered in my colonoscopy

uh, not so much

the polyp turned out to be twice as big originally thought, and while it seemed that every thing was fine, at 1:30 the next morning I was back in surgery having part of the colon removed because the bowel had perforated (and when they do that surgery in the middle of the night, you get a nice 8 inch incision full of staples as a "souvenir", and they don't mess around with taking "just a snip" off the edges)

and just to add insult to that injury, the antibiotic that took care of making sure I didn't develop peritonitis left me open to another nasty infection -- c. diff

so in the end, what was supposed to be an over night stay ended up being a whole week in the hospital and I'll have a lot longer recovery period

my home coming was made quite festive by the roses on the table and the amazing batch of chicken and dumplings that was the evening meal on Sunday

one thing that the longer recovery period means, however is that I will not be able to do the Artist in Residence program at Caribou Ranch this summer

I'm pretty bummed about that

the up side of the reason I can't go this year, is that I have been invited to do it next year without reapplying

cool!

before all the "excitement" I had started doing the quilting on this piece

I decided to start at the horizon line and have done most of the stitching in the green area

I still have not figured out exactly how I will make the reflection look more "reflection-like", but I have a bit of time to think about it as it will be a few days (probably not until next week sometime) before I can get back to my studio to work on it

I had also started working on the fence for the garden piece, which was rolling right along

I'm hoping to get back to this one by the end of this week since it is hand work that I'll be able to work on as soon as I can tolerate having the box it's in rest in my lap

the last couple of days in the hospital, I felt well enough to be watching the view from my 5th floor room and snapped a few pictures of sunrise and hot air balloons

I may be able to use these for some art pieces in the future -- sunrise photos are always useful for picking off parts of for landscapes

while I was away,  I was notified that these two pieces that I had entered in shows did not get accepted

bummer

which means I'll be watching for other shows to enter them in

this piece, however, was accepted and will be part of a show titled "Gone to the Dogs" in the Niza Knoll gallery in Denver.

whoop!!

very cool news indeed

and while I've been out of commission, Mr Benson has been hanging out at my daughter's house

one evening she sent me this cute "get well card" from him

I'm hoping to have him back at home tomorrow afternoon -- I think by then I will be able to manage taking care of him, and it will give me a reason to walk slowly to the mail box so he can check all of his "p-mail" messages

and for the next week or so, the focus is to heal and get stronger

onward!