December Recap

Happy Wednesday. I was hoping to post this sooner but things continue to be hard with my mom now. I hope your Christmas and New Years Eve was good. I am happy the holidays are over and we are back to some normalcy. January is always kind of a blah month but at least the weather has been pretty good here Sunny and in the high 40's and 50's. Hope it sticks around for awhile.

Hello December

I learned how to do this piece from Irina Trzaskos Skillshare Class Watercolor Winter Wreaths. I did mine digitally on my Ipad Pro.

December started off with taking mom to the orthopedist for her broken elbow. He said it was already healing but wanted her to wear a brace to protect it but it was huge and cumbersome and very difficult to get on an off. She also would never be able to do it on her own with her memory issues. I asked them if they had anything smaller and easier to use but they said no. They got it on her and she wore it out of there but when I got her home she made me take it off and refused to wear it again. I was not going to fight her on it because it was not good.  I just prayed she would be careful with the elbow but that didn't happen. She ended up hitting her arm on the sink the next morning it didn't seem to be a big problem though. About a week later it filled up with fluid on the other side. I sent a photo to the ortho doc and he thought is was bursitis and could drain it but not for a week. She already had an eye doctor appointment that day but I made the appointment anyways. We ended up canceling it and going to the eye doctor because it was better by then and she didn't want to go back to him. Turns out the eye doctor was another fiasco. I took her to my sisters eye doctor instead of her regular one because she has a problem with her retina and this guy could check that too. The other doctor use to send her out to someone else for that so I thought I was saving myself an extra appointment but it didn't go well. This guy was able to look at her retina and said he didn't really see a problem with it instead he was all ready to do cataract surgery. I was not expecting that. The other guy never said she needed that done. I think he was just money hungry and put a stop to it. That is the last thing she needs right now with everything else going on. They also charged a copay to see him and she said she had never paid that with the other doctor, They also wanted her to come back for another test on a different day saying Medicare would not pay for it during that appointment I told them to call and schedule that but I have not plans to do so.  She did need a new prescription for glasses though so we will try that first and then get a second opinion if needed. On top of that that building was not handicap accessible it had no elevator. I have no idea how that is even possible.  The next day she called me saying there was a problem with her tooth and she needed to go to the dentist. At first they didn't have any appointments but then called and said they did so I ended up taking her there. Turns out she has a broken tooth and needs to have it removed but they only have one guy there that takes out teeth so we had to wait until the middle of Jan. We put her back on antibiotics in the meantime. On Christmas Eve she said her hand was starting to swell up so I ended up calling Dispatch Health They were going to come over on Christmas Day but when I saw it it didn't look that bad and more like an arthritis flare. The swelling went down overnight so she told them not to come. We made it through Christmas but New Years Day her hand swelled up again. More about what happened after that next month.
In the meantime I was still looking for the helpers. I lettered this phrase from Mr Rogers on my Ipad.

I had a few sessions with the grief counselor from the Hospice. I didn't get anything out of them though. They ended up being a big waste of time because I did all the talking and all she did was just validate that everything that happened was so wrong which I already knew. The therapist also brought me a resource guide for more support but it was dated 2015 and when I went to call some of the places they no longer existed which just made me more upset. On top of that I got a sympathy card in the mail from them 5 weeks after he passed. I don't know why they even bothered at that point all it did was just bring back all the bad memories again. I ended up putting a post out in my Neighborhood group called Nextdoor offering to start a support group for others that are going through care giving or grief and I got 3 people to come. It was nice to talk to others that could really relate in person. I am hoping next month more people will attend.
Sales in our Etsy shop were terrible. December is usually one of our busiest months with our Winter Onederland theme. Not only is my Etsy shop my main source of income it is also a form of therapy for me so not having much work to do and not much money coming in to pay bills just made things even harder. I did get this appreciation photo from a buyer of her dog Izzy wearing one of my girl dog hats. Isn't she a cutie?  She reminds me of my Lily a little.

I made the piece below to welcome in Winter even thought I hate the cold and snow. Sometimes I can still see the beauty in it though. I learned how to create this piece in Zanenna Nabell's Skillshare class Delicate Winter Landscapes With Watercolors.  I did mine digitally on my Ipad Pro in Procreate.

Hanukkah started a few days before Christmas this year so we were able to celebrate them both together on Christmas. We had our traditional Chicken Soup and Chili Dinner. I made these 2 pieces in honor of the holidays.

I used One of On The Marks Designs New Folksy Florals Christmas Template for the tree. Inspiration for Happy Hanukkah came from Pinterest.
Overall 2019 was a really bad year. First with Lily then with my parents. The only good thing was Zoey in between but everything was so hard.

The one thing that help get me through it was my art though. These were my most liked pieces from Instagram. Many of them are my favorites too.

That's all for now. Hoping 2020 will be a much better year. Will be back next month with more to share then.