🚂 To Ohio And A ✈️ To Hawaii

 Hi friends! We have so many things going on in our family life here. I will share the exciting news with you in just a moment. First let me share the latest finish I have.

💖Nothing Is Impossible💖by My Big Toe Designs. This pattern is found in the 2015 JCS Christmas Ornaments issue. This is the yearly ornament I stitched for and will gift to Jacob and Kristen this year. 💞 I stitched this two over two with the called for DMC on 32ct cream linen. That beaded edge. 🙃😕Not my best by a long shot, but it is done. I have so many ornaments to make up in a pile in front of me, and, well, thanks be to God, Jacob and Kristen are not judgmental of my work, they just love it. I am happy with the beaded hanger. 😉 The backing fabric is dark red.

❤️🤎❤️🤎❤️🤎❤️🤎❤️🤎❤️

SO Brian and I  are taking the Amtrak train to visit Jacob and Kristin in Cleveland Ohio. We are going to my in-laws for Thanksgiving in town here on Thursday for an early lunch and then Madeleine is driving us straight over to the train station. We have a short layover in Chicago and then we will travel overnight. We are going to have Thanksgiving together on Friday. We will go to The Crafty Ewe cross stitch shop in Cleveland over the weekend. 😁 We are also going to the Cleveland Museum of Art. I am not sure what else our son has planned for us.

Our one and only daughter, Madeleine, who is now 26 years old, has been working for The National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition as an archivist and she loves the work. What Madeleine has decided to do is get her Master of Library and Information Science. Are you ready for it? AT  University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa!! Yes, Hawaii! The reason she chose this program is that they have a few courses that focus on East Asia and this very much interests her. Also, IT IS HAWAII. She is very adventurous. She will work part time for the school while she is there. She is interviewing next week for a Korean professor. As long as Madeleine works 20 hours a week, her tuition is covered and a bit of the rent money. She has found a studio apartment that has 12 units. All women and a few families live there. It has a security gate and has a mini garden patch of her own in back. She will take the bus to school. 

Would you pray for this young lady of ours? What I have not shared with you is that Madeleine has been dealing with a swollen leg and foot for one year now. Last Christmas Eve she twisted her ankle. The next morning she woke to a swollen ankle. It kept swelling. And going up her leg. She went to the doctor. They did x-rays and ultrasounds and CT scans. A very educated doctor at the medical college in Milwaukee told her she has May-Thurner Syndrome. He told her she needed surgery to relieve the swelling. She had the surgery. They put a stent in her artery, up by her pelvis. This was months ago, before she went away for work to Denver and San Francisco. When she came back she went to see the doctor again for a check up. He was stunned to see that the swelling in her leg was not gone. He thought it would be better or gone. She broke down sobbing. He sent her to another vein specialist who admitted she had them stumped. Madeleine has been wearing compression stockings for months now. This new doctor said she had to wear thigh high stockings. She wore those, but then the fluid just pooled up in her thigh. She told him that and asked if she could wear compression stockings/pantyhose. Yes he said. 

I meanwhile have been going to a physical therapist for my shoulder. I mentioned all of this to her. She asked if the doctor did not mention that she not go to a lymphedema physical therapist? I said, No. I got right on that though. Madeleine asked her doctor for a referral and he gave it to her. She is going to one now and her leg is improving every week. She has to do so many exercises every single day. 😔 Actually the therapist told her today that she has to come to realize that this is a life condition and she has to do these exercises every day of her life for the rest of her life.

What THIS Mom did was look for answers. I thought of something. I asked Madeleine something last week. I said, "Madeleine, did you get your third COVID shot right before your ankle swelled?" She said, "I got the shot at the beginning of November." She twisted it December 24th. 

Now this may be my longest post ever, but if you care to, this is what I found, and I believe this explains what happened to Madeleine. Check this out: Lymphedema If you take anything away from this article it is: Physicians should consider secondary lymphedema among the complications of the COVID‐19 vaccine. Prolonged inflammation in lymphedema patients might compromise lymphatic function and increase edema.

One thing I have desired of the Lord,

That will I seek:

That I may dwell in the house of the Lord

All the days of my life,

To behold the [a]beauty of the Lord,

And to inquire in His temple. Psalm  27:4

Thank you for stopping by today my friends. I realize I gave you a lot of information today. I truly appreciate your friendship. I hope my American friends have a Blessed Thanksgiving.

Stitching and praying,

Vickie