Stitch It!! Podcast

I got to pick up Bob yesterday. The vet had called in the morning and said she was amazed at his recovery, and she had no doubts about sending him home. So saturday afternoon I went to pick him up. after hugging about every vet person i ran into, and hugging his vet about 10 times and crying a little at how thankful i am (she was hugging me and crying too), i got to see bob.

he has a cone on his head and his rear end looks absolutely horrible, but other then that? he’s actually acting like nothing is wrong! they showed me how to clean him up since he’ll be in a cone for 2 weeks until the stitches come out. on the way home, he peed all over himself, so the first half hour home was spent with me crying (i felt SO bad) and trying to clean all the pee off of his fur.  after we got through that, and i called the vet a couple times to double check things, we were fine. he’s been using his litter box and peeing (a LOT more then he had been!), he’s eating like a champ, and he’s purring and snuggly. he looks so pathetic with his cone on, and he smells horrible (i’m going to clean him up some more today), but besides that? he’s acting totally fine!!!

we were concerned about little man’s response to bob wearing a cone. when he first saw bob, he walked up to him, gently pet him, said “Bob!” and then left him alone. good good little man!!!

we had set up a “recovery room” for bob to stay in for the first few nights in our laundry room. litterbox, food, and a snuggly bed all in one place. i got him set up in there, and stacked two baby gates in the door, and went to bed. ry got home from his show at 3am, and bob met him at the door. he had scaled the gate with his cone on and everything.  so ry just left the gates down and let him out around the house. he figured he was acting fine, and it’s better to just let him out then have him scaling a gate over and over.

this morning, he’s acting even better! he met me at the stairs when i came down and led me to the kitchen for his breakfast. he gobbled that down, went downstairs, used the litter box, and then came upstairs and rolled around on the floor begging for some snuggles.

Hello, Ladies!!!  MeOWWW!!!!!

mmmmmm…..breakfast….

thank you all so much for the warm wishes. i think our sweet little bob is being a super trooper, and will heal up just fine. i think he’s just super excited that he can PEEE instead of dribble. hahaha

Nurse, it’s time for my sponge bath!!!

The vet called.
surgery went okay, but not as well as they’d hoped. bob had a LOT of scar tissue in his urethra. he said normally a cat has 2 inches of urethra. of his 2 inches, bob’s had 1.25 inches worth of scarring in there. they were all very surprised that bob did as well as he had with this kind of damage/blockage. no idea how he was managing to pee at all.
because of the scar tissue the doctor had to cut up higher then normal to get to the good section of his urethra. and his concern is, they have to open up the tube tack that down to form a good drain, because bob’s drain is going to be made up of all this scar tissue, the concern is that he won’t heal properly, as scar tissue doesn’t heal well. so fingers crossed. we’re still not out of the woods yet.
ry is rather upset, and is planning on writing a letter to the emergency vet who did a lot of this damage. i’m trying to calm him down, because it doesn’t change what we’re dealing with. he’s just frustrated because if she hadn’t gone to town poking him for 2 hours, we wouldn’t be in this situation. or wouldn’t be as bad of a situation.

staying positive,
bob is a trooper, and has a house full of people that love him lots, and a vet staff that thinks he’s a great cat and give him lots of lovin, so hopefully he’ll surprise everybody once again and heal up just fine!
i’ll update all of you tomorrow once i get his update.

thank you for all of the well wishes.

It’s been a long long day, and it’s only 12.

Well, this morning, bob wasn’t peeing very well. he had started squatting around the house and was yelping in pain again. he was eating his breakfast, so that was good, but i wanted to get him to the vet ASAP before he completely blocked again.

The vet checked him and found he was blocked again, he was very tender, and wasn’t peeing. they gave him a sedative and tried to pass a catheter, and after 3 vets tried, they still couldn’t get it through. they believe that bob has mass amounts of scar tissue in his urethra from having the ER vet attempt to pass a catheter for 2 hours. it made sense. bob still hasn’t been able to pee big puddles since that whole thing happened. he would just get little bits out each time.

The vet gave me a choice….either bob needed to have a perineal urethrostomy (where they basically change him from a boy cat to a girl cat) or his blockage would cause his bladder to burst/kidneys to fail. The estimate for the surgery was $1700..i don’t have that kind of money…and if i did, it’d be in savings to help cover mortgage payments so we could keep our house. the choice didn’t really feel like it was mine to make. i was going to have to let bob go before his pain got too bad.

i explained i was unemployed, and told them i couldn’t afford it. i called, consulted and cried with ryan. we just couldn’t afford it. a few minutes later, the vet came back in, she said that since i was unemployed, if they got proof, they could apply for a grant for $500 to help pay for the surgery. that helped, but it still was going to be rough.
then vet started tearing up and she said because everyone in the vet’s office loves bob so much, and he’s such a great cat, and we’ve done so much for him already, that if i have that documentation for them, they would accept the $500 grant money as payment, and the surgeon would do the surgery for free, and they would write off all of bob’s aftercare.
what? they were willing to do bob’s surgery free of charge, just because he was the greatest cat in the entire world.

i went from crying tears of sadness to tears of overwhelming joy! i’ve never ever had anyone do anything like that for me before. i honestly still don’t know how i’m going to repay these people.

my bob is going to be okay!

they brought bob in to visit me for a while before they took him back to his cage. he’ll be having his surgery this afternoon.

please, keep him in your thoughts!

I just thought I would take a moment and share our progress on the charity blankets.   First off, i want to say thank you again to all that volunteer. if you are interested in volunteering for the next round, you can contact me through ravelry or post your interest in the charity group threads. I’ll probably organize another sign up once these blankets are finished.

but for now, LOOKIE LOOKIE!!!!!!

I’m missing pictures of a couple blankets, but aren’t they all just scrumptious?!?!?!?! i’m so excited to see how they turn out! every section is a new adventure!!!!

Episode 21: “Meet Tonya!”

Today we meet Tonya!!! The microphone is a little poppy, and you hear me moving it back and forth. sorry about that!
she mentions She Knits patterns, Gossamer Shawl, Central Park Hoodie, and Running Moon Farm Fiber Retreat

On/Off the Needles:
-The Fawkes Socks are finished!!! they are blocking and will be off in the mail ASAP!

-007 Monkee is on the back burner
-Barn Raising Quilt is being knit for the little man

-Wisdom Sock Yarns Los Angeles
-Newfound love for DPNs
-Two-toned Shrug is nearing completion!!!
-My love for the Double Point WIP tubes

Spinning:
-Maryland Sheep and Wool love! My fleece is on the way!!!
-My very own fiber fest! new jumbo/plying flyer for my wheel and a niddy noddy.
-Niddy noddy’s explained

-Nikol from Yarn School’s etsy story Artclub. AMAZING monthly batt club!!!
-Beaverslide.com great organic wool roving and yarns at reasonable prices! yeah!
-Sock yarn has been completed!


-Salad Spinner!!!!!
-Spinning semi felted merino

Contest & Babble:
-Thank you for all of the great contest entries!!!!
-Pre-emptive worrying! see? not perfect!

Favorite Thing:
Probiotics. Ry’s story and his success.
here’s some i found online:
Bio K
Xymogen Lacidolfil
Renew Life
otherwise, you can buy them at Trader Joes or you can eat lots of yogurt with live cultures. Like Activia

Thanks again to Erin for making our new Stitch It Podcast button! Adopt it and let it live happily for ever more on your blog!

<——————— lookie! lookie!

Thanks to Erin, we now have a stitch it podcast button!

Look how cute it is! don’t you just want to take it home with you?!?!   i think it’s just neato!

Little man is doing much better today. air conditioning appears to be helping. i just hope the pollen settles down soon so we can enjoy our summer! if that poor kid got both of our allergies, we’re going to be in trouble. i’m a spring/fall allergy kinda girl. ry is a all summer long grass allergy kinda guy. let’s hope that’s not the case!

anyway, he was very excited about going out to play with his little friends at daycare. i’m going to get the house cleaned up, shower, and see about getting some much needed laundry done. found out i have some training/system testing tomorrow morning, so little man will be at daycare tomorrow and friday as well. i should find out later this week or the beginning of next week about the new job. the company is still getting on it’s feet, but once doors open, i hope to be busy and making money. everybody keep those fingers crossed for me, because we need this to happen. otherwise, we go down that sell-the-house-quickly-and-hope-we-still-have-our-shirts-when-we’re-done-and-afford-a-decent-apartment kinda thing…..fun times!

for now, i’m hopeful!!   so fingers crossed!

today is a very low point for me….i turned on the air conditioner.

i hate air conditioners. while they do keep me cool during summer months, i hate the smell of stale air. i love a cool spring breeze. i love the smell of lilacs drifting in through my window.

but, poor little man appears to have allergies. he slept through saturday (i think he was awake a total of 6 hours), has rubbed his little eyes raw, has a runny nose, and keeps pulling out his hearing aids.  same with me. the pollen and mold counts are so high right now, i’m barely able to stay awake and my sinuses feel like sand paper are in there giving them a good rubdown.  i haven’t taken allergy meds in the past 4 years. i’ve had no need. but with such a wet winter, the mold and pollen count are insanely high! so i’m suffering.

i called his ped, and all they could suggest was eyedrops….mmmm…no thank you. they sting, and i don’t think they have ever made my eyes feel better. SO, we took a bath, changed all the bedding (in case it’s loaded with pollen/dust/mold),  and we closed the house up to help filter the air. it’s beautiful outside. sunny, warm with a cool breeze, and perfect for playing in the park or blowing bubbles on the patio….but not today. we need to get his poor little eyes/nose/ears back to normal before we go out and pummel them with more irritants. (mine too).

so, we’re sitting in our sterile environment today, watching toy story 2, eating gold fish crackers, and hopefully we’ll both get some relief!

i love how stuff transforms! first you start with some roving:

you spin up some yarn:

then you start knitting with it:

and every step of the way, you never know what you’re gonna get. and every step of the way, you’re pleasantly surprised with how awesome it is.

i’ll say it again:
I LOVE SPINNING!!!!!!!!!!

Are you bored? and don’t know what to do to have fun?

Why not build yourself a tent out of baby gates next to the stairs!!!!

Tons of fun!!!! Everybody likes to be sort of invisible and drive toy cars around!!!

Another happy customer!

Episode 20: “Life is like a Box of Chocolates…”

The Garden this week has been tucked in to keep it from harm during the cold!

Interview will be next week. please let me know if you’re interested in being interviewed!!!

On/Off the Needles:
-Sock is nearly done
-Shrug (started, frogged, and started again)
-Monkee status
-Charity blankets
-BarnRaising Quilt from Knitalong: Celebrating the Tradition of Knitting Together for my little man!!!
-Check out Casey at Knitting at Night Podcast it’s awesome!!
-Craft Zine has lots of cool patterns and whatnot. i’m going to sew some reversible wrap skirts!

Babble:
-My Harp Story: Prism 36 by Blevins Harps
-Monkey wears shoes
-Little man says/signs his name
-Little man’s new school

Spinning:
-LOTS of new spinners!!! Lots of wheel questions! I LOVE IT!!!!
-Oiling the wheel, what a difference!!!
-Sock yarn almost done. I’ll share photo’s soon
-Finished my yarn from Butterflygirl designs.

-Fleece has been ordered (well, stephanie knows i want some!) and i’ve been studying.
-Yarnspinner’s podcast has lots of great information
-WSKAL (Wash, Spin, Knit a Long)
-Felted roving….grrrrr

Contest:
Listen to the podcast on how to enter, but this is your prize:

160+ yards, Beaded Worsted weight, 10 wraps per inch, columbia top handspun yarn in “Midnight Dream”

Favorite Thing:
Rodrigo y Gabriela
and as promised, here is the AMAZING YouTube video of their performance on David Letterman:

Holy crap, I just watched it again, and it’s AMAZING……