Test Results

I finally remembered to call the Practice Nurse at our clinic to get the results of the boys blood tests. It only too me over a week to remember to get Brodie's results o_O
There is only a one hour window each day to make calls to the nurse to get results and I would often remember an hour or two too late.

Brodie's results for his tegretol level were fine & in the therapeutic range. So that is ALL good. He's still had the facial pain but only once since his medication was increased. Well only one that I know of at any rate.

Angus's results were good. Liver function, blood sugar levels, haemoglobin were all within normal ranges. He did however have high cholesterol (5.7) and for a child his age it should be 4.5 or less. It surprised me really. I never expected any of the results to come back as anything other than normal.

For now I have Angus using the same cholesterol lowing margarine that Mark is using. I don't know if I can rethink how I cook things. I don't fry food in fat. I use cooking spray or olive oil and dry fry. I have a health grill that allows the fat in foods to drain away. I don't know how I am going to change what I already do to make our diet better.

Do you have any ideas? I'm at a bit of a loss.

Day 20 - 30 Day Meme

Day 20 – The meaning behind your blog name.

image courtesy of stock.xchg

I chose the name Blooming Lovely for two reasons.

Firstly because I absolutely love flowers. I love their colours, their fragrance and the HUGE variety that is out there. Spring is my favourite time of year! All the blossoms on the trees are SO pretty! And it IS spring right now!

Secondly, I also chose the name because it's a bit of a play on words. I used to say, "That's blooming lovely!' It was laced with sarcasm at times. You know those times when you get so frustrated that you want to say something horrid but you don't. I guess you could say its the closest way of getting me to cuss without using any swear words.

Husband Down

On the PA system: 'Clean up on aisle 25, we have a husband down.'

A husband and wife are shopping in their local supermarket.
The husband picks up a case of beer and puts it in their cart.

'What do you think you're doing?' asks the wife.

'They're on sale, only $20 for 24 cans he replies.
'Put them back, we can't afford them', demands the wife, and so they carry on shopping.

A few aisles further on along the woman picks up a $40 jar of face cream and puts it in the basket.
What do you think you're doing?' asks the husband.

'It’s my face cream. It makes me look beautiful,' replies the wife.
Her husband retorts: 'So does 24 cans of beer and it's half the price.'

This was from an email sent to me by my friend Julz. Thanks for the laugh :)

Day 19 - 30 Day Meme

Day 19 – Another picture of yourself.

I had forgotten that I had this photo of me. It was taken on my mobile last year. My skin was a bit on the red side that day due to the psoriasis on my face ... so I tinted my photo purple (it matches the blog better this way).

Another Santa

Here's my latest finished project. I can't believe that it only took me a week to complete. This Santa looks much nicer than the one I finished the other week. Oh well I guess practise makes perfect.

Day 18 - 30 Day Meme

Day 18 – Something you crave a lot.

Apart from peace & quiet from the boys & their fighting? I have been craving coleslaw lately. I'm too lazy to make it all the time so I buy it from the deli section in the supermarket.

Day 17 - 30 Day Meme

Day 17 – A photo of you and your family.

Its an old photo but its the only one I have with the four of us together. I'm way too camera shy to have a new one taken.

taken in 2006 when my boys were small & extremely cute!

Meet Me On Monday 16th Edition

hosted by Java @ Never Growing Old

Questions:

1. How many TV’s do you have in your home?

2. What is on your bedside table?

3. How many pair of shoes do you own?

4. Can you change a flat tire?

5. Do you like sweet treats or salty treats?

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1. How many TV’s do you have in your home?
We have four TV's (bedrooms, lounge room & the shed) plus I can use my computer as a TV.

2. What is on your bedside table?
Dust & lots of it! Well apart from that I have clock radio, half a dozen novels, my night time meds, a lamp, a box of tissues and one of my tube of ointment for my psoriasis.

3. How many pair of shoes do you own?
I'm not a real girly girl when it comes to shoes. I have about 5 pair not including my slippers.

4. Can you change a flat tire?

Yes I can change a tyre (my Dad taught me how to do that years ago) but No I've never really had to. Knock on wood, so far I have always had a strapping young man help me out with a flat.

5. Do you like sweet treats or salty treats?

I kind of like both but it really depends on my mood.

Ideal Husbands

While creating Husbands, God promised Women that good and ideal Husbands would be found in all corners of the world.

And then God made the earth round.

Blood Tests

Both boys have had blood tests this past week.
Brodie had one done on Monday checking his tegretol levels. Last time they were within the normal therapeutic levels but he as still getting those horrible facial spasms.

Angus had his done on Friday to check for various levels of things like glucose, iron, cholesterol and liver function. Angus's blood pressure was up the other week when I took him to see the doctor for his sore throat. I thought it might have been because he was in pain but Dr. F wanted me to bring him back to see how his BP was. Thankfully it was good this time.

High BP is one thing that runs in the family. Sadly we have three generations our my immediate family that have it. My Dad, me, Brodie and even one of my nieces. Mark does too. So its something that we have checked regularly. When Angus's reading was much higher than expected I wasn't terribly concerned but as it runs in the family its not something we can ignore.

I forgot to get the results for Brodie's test during the week. I feel awful that I forgot but if there was something not quite right I would get a phone call or a letter from the clinic. Angus's results should be in either on Tuesday or Wednesday. I just hope that I don't forget to phone for the results. I am sure if there's anything wrong the clinic will let me know about it. LIke they did when my glucose levels were a bit high. I'm crossing my fingers that there is nothing to worry about.

Day 16 - 30 Day Meme

Day 16 – Your celebrity crush.

Do I have to choose only one????!!!! Oh boy there are way TOO many to choose from! I've had a crush on RDA & Patrick for years! I mean look at them! They are gorgeous!

Richard Dean Anderson

Patrick Swayze

Michael Shanks

Scott Bakula

Day 15 - 30 Day Meme

Day 15 – Something you don’t leave the house without.

My handbag is about the only thing I don't leave home without. I forget my phone, my sunglasses, my kids (just kidding) but I never forget to take my bag.

One More Day To Go

It's definitely been a killer not having a decent internet connection until after 11pm each night. I've stayed offline as much as possible so that Brodie has the most access at the moment. He becomes extremely unbearable at times when he isn't able to 'talk' with his friends on facebook. Its just easier to let him have his computer time than to cause any problems by saying get OFF the computer!
Thank goodness I only have to wait another 24 hours before everything resets for another month.

I have been making good use of my time away from the computer by watching some shows I had recorded and doing some more knitting. I'm about half way through making another Santa. Not too sure what I will do with this one yet, perhaps post it to my Spirit Sister. I was thinking about all the people who have seen my photos of the other Santa & Mrs Claus that I shared on facebook. A few of them wanted to buy one but I have no idea how much to charge for them if I do sell them. To be honest I would just be happy with the cost of the wool & the filling. I'll have to think about it because I'm not sure if I want to commit to making a lot of them as there have been about 6 requests so far which is an awful lot of knitting & sewing. I don't know. What do you think?

Day 14 - 30 Day Meme

Day 14 – A TV show you’re currently addicted to.

Here's three of the shows I love watching at the moment. There are more I could list but these would definitely have to be my current favourites.

Food Safari

Heston's Feasts

Packed to the Rafters

Dial Up Speeds :(

I'm sending this post in via email as it is taking way too long for pages to load at the moment. We've now had our Internet connection throttled back to dial up speeds. Uploading things doesn't seem to be too limited so hopefully this will send quickly. At the moment the only time we have a faster connection is between 11pm and 7am when our off-peak time kicks in. With any luck I wont be too tired to post tonight.   Have a great day/night everyone & think of me with my super slow connection lol

Day 13 - 30 Day Meme

Day 13 – Your favourite musician and why?

I would have to say that it would be Jimmy Barnes. Mainly because he grew up in Elizabeth like I did and he's made it BIG!
They say Elizabeth is one of those tough areas to live in. With loads of unemployed and people on government benefits. I however, being born there & growing up there didn't think it was that bad.
I love how he adores his family too. Family is the most important thing in the whole world, well to me anyway.

** I started this post about an hour ago (before I sent my email) in the hope that the page would download for me & upload okay. It seems it has but I was unable to watch the video of Jimmy singing. I just hope I chose the right clip to share

Day 12 - 30 Day Meme

Day 12 – A photograph of the town you live in.

Here's a picture of our main street.
There's around 7,500 people living in town. It's lovely & quiet for the most part. Not a lot happens here and I love it that way.
Country towns ROCK!

Meet Mrs Claus

I started making Mrs. Claus the day after I finished sewing Santa. I just finished her this afternoon. I like her but I don't think she looks as good as her hubby!

Happy Birthday Sis!

It's my sisters birthday today. I don't know if I should put how old she is or not lol. Its not like she would read my blog or anything ... so ... nah I wont say .. at least not this time round. Cos I'm nice like that. Ha Ha!

Happy Birthday Vicki!

Just In Case I Disappear .. .. ..

Someone hacked into our wireless access on our home network :(

We have a rather generous download allowance of 50 gig per month for peak times and 50 gig for off-peak. I've been checking it regularly over the past few weeks because I knew that with the boys being on school holidays this week & next week we would use a fair chunk of it while they were home.
So last week when I noticed that we only had about 6 gig left I went into our ISP's shop & paid for an extra block of 10gig for our peak times. That was on Wednesday afternoon. I thought cool, that would give us 16 gig until our account resets on the 26th. That should be MORE than enough to cover us.

Oh boy was I WRONG about that! I checked our account on Wednesday night to make sure that the allowance had increased, which it had, but I was almost floored by what I saw. I can check out how much we've used because our ISP lists what we used each day. As I said I was almost floored. Somehow from 10am that morning until about 4pm that afternoon almost 6 gig was used! I don't know how that was possible because there was hardly anyone home during the day. In fact three out of the four of us weren't even home for the most part & Mark was asleep for part of the time and when he was awake he wasn't online.

Anyway, Mark phoned our ISP the next day & queried it. I was hoping it was an error on their end but it wasn't. Mark has now put extra security on the wireless access with a super-duper password that hopefully no one will be able to crack. Since he's done this our downloads have slowed dramatically. I guess that means this 'hacking' has been going on for a while now.

Just so you know, if I disappear before our account resets on Sunday, its because we are on dial-up speeds and I'm having problems waiting for pages to load.

Day 11 - 30 Day Meme

Day 11 – What’s in your make-up bag?

I was going to say that I only have dust in my make-up bag considering I hardly ever wear any but I thought I would take a photo of what was in it & share it.



As you can see its a bit of a mixed bag.

Day 10 - 30 Day Meme

Day 10 – A photo of our favourite place to eat.


There's no place like home!

Meet Me On Monday 15th Edition

hosted by never growing old

Questions:

1. What is your favorite all time movie?
2. How often do you go over the speed limit?
3. What really gives you the creeps?
4. What is your favorite snack?
5. Would you rather be a dog named Killer or a cat named Fluffy?

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1. What is your favorite all time movie?
Gosh there are too many to choose from. If I only had to choose one it would probably be The Stand. It's based on the Stephen King book. I see it as a classic good versus evil type movie. The book was scarier though but then again the usually are.

2. How often do you go over the speed limit?
I always go my best to do the speed limit & I am ever so thankful that Mark put cruise control in our car. I am also grateful that our speedo shows us travelling faster than we really are. We're actually going 5-10 kmph slower. I'd much prefer to be going slower & have people pass us. At least we'll still get to where we want to go.


3. What really gives you the creeps?
I don't know about things giving me the creeps but there are a few things that gross me out. Is that the same thing? Things like people sticking their fingers up their nose or sniffing like crazy instead of blowing their nose. They definitely make me sick.


4. What is your favorite snack?


5. Would you rather be a dog named Killer or a cat named Fluffy?
I'm definitely a cat person. Just as long as I was a spoilt rotten princess of a cat I would be happy! After all they sleep all day, well it seems that way with my two.

Any Tips On Keeping Foghorns Quiet?

Does anyone have any tips on how to keep extra LOUD voices quiet? Brodie has such a loud voice. Its almost like he is constantly yelling. I know he isn't but it certainly seems that way. I am tired of telling him to lower his voice. I feel like I am a broken record. You would think that a kid that is 17 would KNOW how to have a quieter inside voice by now!?!?!?!?! I am beginning to wonder if he will ever stop speaking so loudly.

Day 9 - 30 Day Meme

Day 9 – A photo of the item you last purchased.

We bought a cast iron Dutch Oven while we were out yesterday. I cannot believe how heavy it is. Yes I know cast iron is heavy but this is much heavier than the cast iron camp oven we bought last year. At least this one is much prettier to look at! You just have to LOVE that colour!
You might be able to see how much it cost, well the price tag is on the product label but don't worry we didn't pay anywhere near that much for it. We paid less than a quarter of that price. I think we got an absolute bargain! Now all I need to do is work out what to cook for dinner tonight to christen it.

Day 8 - 30 Day Meme

Day 8 – A song to match your mood.

School Interviews

We had parent/teacher/student interviews at Angus's school this morning. I saw all of his teachers. They all pretty much said the same thing: Angus is a great kid but he needs to focus more in class & listen to the teacher when they are talking.

I also learnt that Angus has been busted watching movies on his laptop or playing games during lesson time when he's meant to be working. I told he may have to leave his memory stick at home if this sort of thing continues .. either that or he be taken out of the laptop class altogether! I know he would hate that.

All in all though I think he was pleasantly surprised. The teachers spoke of many positives with only a few areas of concern. Angus is awfully unorganised but I think we can work on that for next term with colour coded folders for each subject with notebooks in each of them just in case he needs something to write on other than his laptop. Hopefully this will help.

Right now all he wants to do is veg out a bit & play games. His school holidays have just started. Two weeks off or so he thinks - I KNOW he has work to do over the holidays that needs completing! I'll at least give him the weekend off before he needs to start 'catching' up or trying to get ahead.

Day 7 - 30 Day Meme

Day 7 – Your dream wedding.

It would have to be on a beach on a beautiful tropical island where we can drink from coconut shells with pretty umbrellas in them. I have no idea where the tropical island be but I wouldn't really care as long as the weather was nice. Maybe Hawaii. I've always wanted to go there.

Day 6 - 30 Day Meme

Day 6 – A photo of an animal you’d love to keep as a pet.

I have always wanted a lilac point Balinese cat.
The colour looks so pretty. They just look so elegant & graceful.



Or I would love a Ragdoll.
They are just so placid and let you do just about anything to them. So to have one that looks like this picture would be great!

I would have to say that these cats are definitely on my wish list for pets and would be spoilt rotten just like the cats we have now.

Tik Tok - Star Trek

I just had to share this. I like the song & I like Star Trek.

Day 5 - 30 Day Meme

Day 5 – A photo of yourself two years ago.

That was hard going to find a picture of me from two years ago. It seems that I was extremely camera shy in 2008. The only picture I could find was from January 2007. Gosh my hair was super-shiny that day!
So here I am with my baby girl Saqqara. Sadly she is no longer with us. I miss my baby girl *sniff*