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Paper Symphony is giving away some nice Buzz & Bloom stuff on their website. I love Buzz & Bloom!! See it here

Well Scott's been home for a week now. There have been good times & not so good. He is still having difficulty getting comfortable for sleeping (I have been taking his sleeping pills!!) He did make it out to sit on the sideline for Daniel's hockey on Saturday, which was nice for Daniel. (of'course they won!) I went back to work on Monday, so poor Scott is home alone without transport bored out of his tree & it's still awhile before he can drive again. We are all much happier now that Daddy is home with us. The kids seem to be completely unaffected by it all.

Oh & Daniel came 13th in his school cross-country. He was very excited & disappointed. He bet the kids he wanted to beat, but missed out on going to inter-school competition by 1 place!

He's coming home!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

He has been up & down alot in the last few days, even developing a new pain & irregular heart beat, but he has been cleared to come home lunchtime today!!!!!!!!!!! Now my hard work starts. I have missed him so much I have been neglecting myself & the kids to spend time with him in the hospital. Will keep you posted, right now I have to clean the house & then go to pick him up.

On another topic this is my week 2 entry for the latest Crafty Tart competition. I had to go & take special photos around the house for it, but I am happy with the result. I kept the white background (been a loooooooooooonnnnnnnnnnnnngggg time since I did a white page!), but my photos are colour. I love the way the colours pop out at you. I kept the journalling like the add & also put my title in the same sort of place. So basically i had used it as a sketch for my LO. It is so simple yet so effective. They are currently up to week 4, but I have not even had the chance to think about scrapbooking lately.

Happy Anniversary?

Right now where was I up to?

Saturday. We picked Scott up from Middlemore & he came to watch Daniel's hockey game (they won again!) Then we went to the beach for lunch & some sun. Scott was tired by the time we got him back to the hospital.

Sunday The kids went to their friends houses to play, mum picked them up at 4. I spent the day keeping Scott company in hospital. It is so nice that the kids are happy at mums & I don't have to worry about them.

Monday Scott was supposed to be moved to Auckland Hospital at 10am so I went to work. At 12:30 he was still waiting!!! My boss tried to cheer me up by taking me to one of the building site I had drawn (I don't get to see many finished houses), that was cool. I went straight from work to Auckland hospital to see Scott (yes he finally got transferred). Unfortunately I missed seeing the surgeon. Scott was very upset when I got there & the nurses were worried about him. I could just see them postponing his surgery cos they were concerned about his mental state, so I had to find out what the problem was. It turned out that no-one has ever told us the results of the various tests they have been doing over the last few months, but the surgeon knew. Apparently his aorta was dilated meaning all the research Scott had been doing on mechanical valves was a waste of time cos his condition was now different to what we thought it was. So I told this to the nurse who explained the differences to us in lay mans terms. apparently the surgery is the same, so are the risks, it is just a valve with aortic extension the put in rather than just a valve. So we felt much better after that. They scheduled his surgery for 7:30 am on the Tuesday. But when they kicked me out at 9:30pm it still wasn't definite cos he needed a CT scan to measure the dilation before the surgery & he still hadn't had that. He did get the CT during the night. Oh & it was our wedding anniversary & he had to take his ring off.

Tuesday I went to work to keep my mind off things. They told us surgery was gonna be 4 hours, but it was 8. Apparently it is a bit complicated removing the homograph valve then putting in a new mechanical one. Scott parents & I finally got to see him about 6pm. When I first walked into ICU I was so relieved to see him still alive, we were both so scared, but the longer we were there the more obvious it was that something was wrong. He was still bleeding & they had tried all sorts of clotting agents so they decided to take him back into surgery to see if they could find the problem. It was so scary watching them all run around him not really having any idea what was going on & feeling so helpless. The surgeon sent us home saying he would ring & he did, they fixed it. Mum came home with me to help me put the kids to bed. Then she gave me a sleeping tablet after we got the call from the surgeon.

Wednesday. Mum came over to help get kids off to school, I was still half asleep with my sleeping tablet. Then she took me to hospital to see Scott, I didn't trust myself to drive. Wow! Scott was sitting up & off the ventilator. He was drugged to the eyeballs & kept coming & going from consciousness. He kept asking what day it was. I didn't tell him about the complications from night before, figured he didn't need to know that right now, he just needed to get better. the staff at the hospital were amazing! I was so shattered that I went home after lunch & his dad went to visit him. I picked up the kids from school like a normal day, Nicola & I watched Spongebob while Daniel played on the computer. Mum & dad brought us dinner.

Thursday Visiting hours are 11 till 1 so I went to work for a bit this morning, then went into the hospital. I can't believe how much better he looks, when I said that to him he gave me a filthy look & said he didn't believe me, I guess that was the lack of morphine talking! He is obviously uncomfortable, but in a ward bed & eating a little bit of food. He is still very sleepy. The kids have been asking to see him so I am gonna take them after hockey practice tonight, just for a few minutes.

It's been a long week.

Monday was normal.

Tuesday was Nicola's first class trip, so I got the day off work to go with her as they needed a 1:4 ratio. We walked to the local supermarket bakery. The most exciting part was getting an iceblock! Kids, hehe. Because I had taken the whole day off I decided to spend the afternoon putting my scrapbooking in chronological order. To do this I had to take apart about 6 albums & spend them over lounge floor. I was still doing this when the kids came home from school, & when Scott came home from work & when Scott told me he wanted me to take him to the hospital! Turns out he was having chest pains. So I phoned mum & she came & picked up the kids & I drove him as fast as I could to the Middlemore ED. I dropped him at entrance & went to find a park. He was already in a bed, hooked up to machines by the time I got there. He had blood tests & was on monitors & oxygen & we waited & waited. Scott was feeling heaps better on the oxygen, but they needed to admit him overnight cos they needed to do more tests in 8 hours to compare results. We were so bored waiting we started pretending we were extras on Shortland Street & were guessing which nurses were sleeping with which Doctors etc. Scott was so bored he even let a student Dr ask him questions, etc, apparently Scott is very exciting to student Drs. So eventually I left at 10ish cos I was so exhausted & I still needed to pick up the kids & go home to bed. As soon as I left the ED I started crying, it was so horrible to leave him there. I rang my girlfriend & she calmed me down enough to make it to mu parents. I lost control completely when I saw mum, but felt much better after a good cry. I took the kids home to bed & was asleep myself the moment my head hit the pillow.

Wednesday I sent the kids off to school & then went to the hospital. he had been moved into the short stay department awaiting a ward bed not long after I had left the night before. I seem to be jinxed, when ever I go to the toilet or go for a walk; a dr arrives, he gets moved or something. So they have decided to admit him now until his surgery.

Thursday I went to work, spoke to kids teachers so they know what is going on. i took kids to see him in the evening so they would know daddy is ok. They will not be able to visit him in hospital after his surgery. Nicola thought it was great fun. She made daddy bed go up & down, spoke to the nurses & other patients & weighed herself on the weighing chair (17.6kg) Daniel was reading the Top Gear mag I got for Scott, so he was fine too.

Friday. Scott rang this morning, he hadn't had a good night with his room-mate dying. So I took day off work again to spend some time with him. I was even there when cardiologist visited (woohoo). Hopefully he will be having surgery on Tuesday, so will be moving to Auckland hospital on Monday. My girlfriend picked the kids up from school this afternoon & I had a nap.

Tomorrow they are letting him out of hospital for a couple of hours to watch Daniels hockey game, which will be so nice cos it is the last one he will be able to attend. It is funny little things I am noticing while he isn't here. Like I had to do rubbish this morning & I don't know how to pay the bills, etc.

So that is my week & I am exhausted.

Kaiser's Scrap your Summer competition

There is a competition on the Kaiser blog to use your summer photos with either of their new summer paper collections, either 'Pina Colada' or 'Off Shore'. I used the 'Off Shore' collection & some dark blue rhinestones. I loved the way the orange brought out the colour in the kayak but still keeping a beach theme.

Crafty Tart's Innovation challenge 1

It's that time again! these challenges are a bit different so the easiest way is probably to check out the site your self here. This is my take on the challenge. I looked through some old photos of me growing up (as I like to for a change from always doing the kids). Anyway I found these photos with pink in them with my 'PERM!!!!" so I thought that I could put them with the beautiful glitz paper for a contrast to how I wish I looked. The flowers are cut from Bo-Bunny paper & layered with foam tape. I used the parenthesis in my title & sideways below the journalling. I just loved the contradictions on this page "Beautiful Disaster" hehehehe

I already have some ideas for this weeks challenge,yay! bring them on!

On another topic.....Daniels game of hockey was very tense today! They ended up with a draw (unbeaten record remains intact) but wow it was close; the score kept going from them, to a draw, to us, to a draw............ All the parents for our team went home with very sore thoats from shouting. But everyone had fun!

Oops, I forgot to put up the Sewing technique Challenge LO. I did the page on the right ages ago, but had no ideas for the facing page. It all came together rather well with that Basic Grey Marrakech paper (that I said I didn't like, but was given). I have actually used it heaps, the stickers are awesome. These are photos of me when I was little 4-5years. My grandparents when they came to visit from South Africa & my Auntie Elaine. As for the sewing...well only used to tied buttons into flowers centres & ribbon on, but hey.