• I updated my Wishlist. Now when you click on the tab up there that says Wishlist, it will take you to my personal save-up-list. Of course, every time I think I’m finished I think of five other thing to put on it, so right now there are only the absolute essentials.
• The pictures in the WiP section of the sidebar are now linked to their respective pages – so when you click e.g. on the Dragon pic, it will take you to the Dragon Luck WiP page.
• Trolly didn’t put the contents of his newest box on his blog. NOOOOOOOOOO! *giggle*
• I have coffee, and tonight there’ll be Robin Hood – Prince of Thieves on the tv. That’s doubtlessly a ploy along the lines of “Harrharr, we’ll just be showing crappy old movies so everyone will watch the hockey!” Not working, guys. Especially if you’re giving me Alan Rickman, who will be talking, which is better than coffee. And chocolate. And a lot of other things. A LOT. Rawr.
• I’m half done with the Quaker Sampler. It’s such fun to work with overdyed threads. Click the thumbnail to get to the WiP page with more pictures.

• I made a Finish a month or so ago that I forgot to announce. It’s an adorable PINN pattern. I just found a companion piece called Mermaid Heaven, and I think I will remake them both on Polstitches fabric. Click the pic to go to the page.

Nurses here study for four years. They’re generally very well educated and do an amazing job. They’re also mainly female, and have two employers to choose from – in other words, they’re screwed. I’m all for them getting more money.

The only “but” there is that I wish they wouldn’t have to strike for it. It should just be bloody obvious to people that you should pay them according to the quality of their work, which they’re not right now. So they’re striking.

The thing is of course, that without them, nothing works. So even though the doctors, secretaries, assistant nurses and so on are working, the units in which the nurses are striking are still closing down.

In our hospitals it’s basically surgery, medicine and the ER. Of course they’re always taking real emergencies (meaning, if you have a heart attack, no one will send you home, but if you come in with a sore throat you’re out of luck) and the hospitals here and in Slightly-Bigger-Town are working together, so that the ER is open in one of the two.

Since I’m working in GP right now, for me this means that lots of the patients who would have gone to the ER during the night or weekend (the sore throat variety) will now be calling us in the morning instead.

The nurses’ union has asked for neutrality from the doctors’ union which has been granted. Meaning, we are not supposed to do any additional work that would normally done by nurses, so as not to dilute the effects of the strike.

Our nurses in GP won’t strike, and we have received a note that while we are to be neutral, our employer has the right to revoke free days and to prolong working hours. Which they promptly did, and I don’t especially like having ten minute appointments – mostly because I think my patients don’t really like having those, there’s not too much time to get any kind of talk, trust or relationship going. And of course they’re saying, this is neutrality because you’re not doing the nurses’ work, you’re doing the work the doctors in the ER would normally do! Which to me doesn’t really fly, and I feel like a strike breaker.

It makes me feel uneasy. There’s nothing I can do about it, really, and I can see on the other hand how it’s better the patient get a short appointment than not getting any, but – well, it’s making me uneasy. I remember when I was five, six years old and my grandfather was the president of Germany’s textile union, and how I would walk with him on the May 1st demonstrations, being proud of my red carnation broche. I have been thinking a lot about him these last days. He was an interesting man, managing to combine his work with being a conservative Christian (and voting as one). It has always fascinated me, even though I see myself neither as socialistic or conservative.

All that’s just to say, hey, work’s been a bit strange.

Friday our Diabetes nurse (who is awesome by the way, and one of the prime examples why they should really get 15% more pay – she knows more about diabetes than any doctor I know) took my bloodpressure. And, yikes. My mom has high bloodpressure, and I know that she found out when she was my age. I have been taking it just to see because of that in the past, but then I remembered I hadn’t checked in a long time.

Anyway, she was alarmed enough to give me the 24 hours – erm, thingo? You know, you fix the cuff on your arm and have a cable around your shoulder, and a little box on a belt that you’re carrying for 24 hours. It checks every 30 minutes, and every hour at night.

Yes, that does mean I didn’t sleep tonight, because every hour the damn thing made BZZZZZZZZZZZZ and blew up until I thought my arm would fall off. ARGH.

And just in case I will deny it later, if I’m lying over 140/90 average, I shall do the exercise thing till the end of the year to see if it makes a difference. Because I would so love to not have meds for the rest of my life. At least not yet

On the light side, I’ve been stitching and I’ve finished the Hinzeit Doctor block today, YAY! I’m so very proud of it. While I was working at it I had to keep thinking about how I’m so glad I made it through med school, and thankful that my parents put me through it. I’m happy that I have a job that lets me feel that I sometimes make a difference. It’s the best feeling I know. And while I know that there should be other things in my life that make me happier than my job – well, maybe sometime there will be, but right now I’m just glad I’ve got that. It’s a great thing to have. I feel like I’m doing a good thing, and like I’m doing something I’m good at.

Sentimental blah-blah aside, here you go:

This is it without all the charms attached, because they will be hiding a big part of the caducei:

And this is it with the charms:

And two close ups that show the charms better. They’re adorable, I will definitely do more Hinzeit designs in the future.

This design does mean a lot to me, and I definitely want to buy a frame for it. I don’t know if I should get the frame that’s meant for it and shown in the picture (see in the last post or on Webshots) because I used such different colours, and I would love to have something in another colour. Right now I don’t have the money anyway, but it’s definitely something I want to save for.

See, there’s this liqueur I really like, called Ramazzotti. Italien spicy stuff, and of course I’ve never been able to get it here in Sweden. In our family, it’s lovingly called Rambazamba.

This week I got a letter from home which is always good, and in this was this. And at first I thought, oh yay, quadratisch praktisch gut and all that (which is the commercial slogan of Ritter Sport in Germany) and since it was red and I know my chocolate I thought it was marcipan (see?). Only when I looked again a few minutes later, I saw this:

And I went all OH MY GOD IT’S RAMBAZAMBA CHOCOLATE!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes, in bold and capslock.

I also had to immediately make a pic to send it to Bouncy Haired Girl to go OMFG IT’S RAMB – you get the idea.

I’m so amazed that I haven’t even tried to taste it yet. Because look! Rambazamba chocolate! Letters from home make me happy.

(By the way, trivia for the day – my favourite’s nougat. Guess what colour that one has? Yah, I know, I’m so predictable.)

Anyway.

Doing a bit better today, I decided to stay home from work yesterday. Did a fair bit of stitching on Dragon Luck, which I will update when the next row is done. I also finally did the beading on Heart Beaded Biscornu. I don’t know – it looks alright, but I just don’t know how to bead really. If that makes any sense. This was the first time I’d done it. It’s okay for something pretty lying in a basket, but it doesn’t feel stable at all. Guess I will gave to find someone to tell me about proper technique. Yes, that’s a hint, ladies!

There are a few other new pics in the album where you can see it from other perspectives, too.

But really, I was all excited because I have never done anything but cards or pictures. Why? Because I’m scared of all finishes. I can’t sew, I never learnt, I can’t knit or crochet or anything, and I’m hopelessly intimidated by all this pretty stuff that waits to get messed up by me.

The thing is that I’ve been wanting to make biscornus and needlerolls about since I saw Rene’s famous basket for the first time. It’s a basket full of prettiness, and I want one! So obviously I had no choice but to try.

I ordered some beautiful fabrics from Polstitches for the L&L SAL later this spring (it is absolutely gorgeous, I can’t wait to start!) and while I was at it, I ordered their Heart Beaded Biscornu.

I adore Dragon Floss, it was a joy to work with. Also, I was a bit scared of the Kreinik, because I have lately worked with DMC Metallics and found them dreadful. Very pretty looking, but awful to work with – and I got a bit afraid that I would mess up my Celtic Spring later, what with all the metallic in the dress.

The biscornu uses Kreinik too, and I was so happy to find that it works much better for me than the DMC. Is that a common thing or did I do something wrong with the DMC? I used Thread Heaven on both of them and I stitch with gold plated needles, and I found the Kreinik so much smoother and easier to work with.

Anyway, the stitching went easy enough:

I started with the frame.

 

Then I added the borders of small hearts and after that the big hearts and the petals in the middle:

   

Then there came the sparkly stuff:

 

 

After that was done (it was so much fun and looked so pretty!) I did the underside:

 

 

To add to the Things I Had Never Done Before This: Algerian Eyelets! Wanna see my first golden very blurry one? Course you do.

 

And after hours of sewing and swearing (more swearing than sewing probably) and going into the fabric store saying, “Hi, I’m looking for the bu – WHOA!” (cue Eva finding a Wall of Buttons) and telling the shoplady “I need stuff to put in my biscornu!” while bouncing up and down, and shoplady going something like “Allllllll right, you very crazy woman, take your filling and buttons and get out of here while I smile and nod at you benignly” and stuffing stuff into my biscornu and sewing it shut and sewing the buttons on and going “Meh!” and opening one side again and putting in three times as much stuffing -

WHOA, look, a BISCORNU! *points proudly*

 

 

I haven’t done all the beading yet (have to ask the smart ILCS ladies about it cause it’s just another Thing I’ve Never Done Before But Will To Have Pretty Things To Put In A Basket Or Somewhere) but I’m so thrilled with it! It’s sitting right here next to me and I still don’t quite get I’ve made something this pretty.

And yes, I’m not normally nuts, I just didn’t get much sleep tonight. Really. *shifty eyes* Going to bed now  

I will update more about what’s going on with me soon, but before that, here’s my first finish for 2008. I would have finished it last month, but I had to frog a section and run out of one colour, and the LNS was closed until Thursday. Comments welcome

Click the thumbnail to see a bigger pic.