OWW!!!

Last spring, I began experiencing a numbness and tingling in my left hand - the thumb, pointer finger and social finger, to be precise. When I say numbness and tingling, I want you to imagine the worst and most awful time your foot ever went to sleep, and then multiply it by about 50. It always happened in the middle of the night...I would wake up and half my hand would have no feeling! It would take 20+ minutes of me sitting on the toilet shaking

and rubbing my hand to get the blood back into it. Once the circulation came back and my fingers turned from white to red and blotchy, the tingling would turn into stinging burning pain. At that point, I would be wide awake, and I would go back and try to get back to sleep.

This happened at least 3 nights a week, until I finally saw a surgeon and scheduled a surgery to have my carpal tunnel release surgery done at the end of February. I wore the wrap for 10 days after, and could not get the area wet. Then, once the stitches were removed, I could get it wet in the shower, but was not allowed to soak it (poor Larry has been washing the dishes for the past month!)

But, here it is, two months later. Just as my doctor said, the worst of the pain is on the pinky finger side of the lower palm. But I am following the nurse's suggestion, and rubbing vitamin E oil into and all around the scar. Every day I see an improvement. And every night, I sleep the night through!

De-Pilling Cashmere

For many decades, I had a little battery operated, hand held, lint remover. It used so much battery life and took forever to de-pill an entire sweater, that I used it quite sparingly, and never for more than one sweater. Finding an over-sized, electrical model on Amazon was a game changer!

Last fall, I washed all my cashmere sweaters. I wear them all winter long, and it is inevitable for them to get fuzzies under the armpits and along the sitting area. Before storing them away for the warm weather, I decided to give them a thorough once over with the lint remover.

The best place to do this is on a good ole-fashioned ironing board. It has a nice padded and flat surface and you can stretch the sweater out and move it around to reach all the corners.

Looking at these two photos, you can see how much of a difference shaving this particular sweater made. I had to clean out the waste receptacle twice on each sweater! And here is a helpful hint: if you need to clean out the "blade" compartment, UNPLUG the shaver, and use a toothpick. You do not want to bend the very fragile aluminum blades and wiring that comprise the shaver!

It took a couple of hours, but my reward was a lovely stack of like-new cashmere sweaters! All sitting in my closet, ready for next autumn!

Downsizing "Ideas"

For more years than I care to admit, I have collected subscription magazines on my two favorite ideas: Cross Stitching and Scrapbooking. Last year, after cleaning out my pantry and library, I realized that 1) - I could really use the shelf space that 20 years of magazines take up, and 2) - Getting rid of some things that I thought I would, and even should, keep together, is quite liberating.

This I discovered, when I was given a large bag of needlepoint magazines that had already been taken apart to some degree, and that I had no emotional attachment to.

As I happily tore out page after page of patterns...but only the patterns that I wanted, It occurred to me that I could do the same with my magazines. The sky would not fall...

And so, for the past few months, I have been dismantling. So. Many. Magazines. I gave a lot of the cross stitch magazines to my sister, who tore out her own selection of patterns. And I gave all the partial scrap-book magazines to Goodwill. Someone else can find their own favorite ideas.

Then, I organized my ideas into categories, put them into transparent sleeves, and filed them in lovely, heavy duty binders that I covered with pretty papers with added titles for easy reference. Now, I have two feet of shelf space taken up by reference binders, instead of twelve or fifteen feet of magazines! And my house is at least 75 pounds lighter!