Thursday, November 15, 2007

Doctors consider small changes to be stable

"Fighting " 12x16 painting by my blind 4 year old Jimmy


Jimmy is doing pretty good right now, We are just waiting for his next MRI the second week of December to see if whatever it is in his head is growing or not. If they grow then they are tumors if they don't grow then they are just scar tissue.

Doctors are interesting people, they consider a change of 20% or less to be "stable" so you could actually have a slow growing tumor be "stable" and think it is not growing when it is actually growing, just very slowly. That is why we always insist that the radiologist check his MRIs against several scans that we have done in the past, not just the most recent scans. Well it seems to be the same with Opthamologists. Jimmy went to Dr. Hoffman last week and we were told yet again that there was no change in his vision. When I asked specifically what his vision was he told us that he still can't see out of his right eye and his left eve is 20/125 with peripheral vision loss and limited color perception. his vision used to be 20/200 I asked him why he considered this no change. He said last time his vision was 20/150 and 20/125 is not really much different. Jimmy's vision has been slowly improving over the past 2 years but not enough to be considered a change when tested every 3 months. The good news is that his vision is slowly improving when we were told that it would probably never get any better. I'm rooting for those optic nerves to grow!

Monday, November 12, 2007

You can have anything you want

Sailing 5"X7" watercolor

My husband took me to San Francisco a couple of months ago to visit some of his relatives. While we were there some of his cousins took us sailing on the bay. It was the highlight of the trip! It was so relaxing. I really needed the break. While we were sailing I took t little picture of a sailboat. I painted it last night.

While we were in San Francisco my husband, took me into a jewelery store and said "what do you want? I'll buy you anything you want." (he was either feeling really rich or he knows me too well) I looked around for a few minutes and told him I did not want anything. It's not that I don't like jewelery, I love it! I just at that I really didn't want anything more. I have all the important stuff in life and I am quite content with what I have. Sometimes possessions can seem like a burden. The gift he gave me is: now I have a real cool story I can brag about to my friends about what a cool husband I have.

Now if he had offered me art supplies.....

Friday, November 9, 2007

Work in progress - kitchen tile mural


Here is the beginning sketch for a tile mural to go above a kitchen sink, The client I am doing this for wanted a window over her sink that she could look out of, since that was not possible I am doing a tile mural of a window for the backsplash above her kitchen sink. Her kitchen is all done in fall colors, so I have tried to incorporate them as much as possible. I added a little finch on the windowsill looking out just for interest. and the mountains are the ones she would have seen from the neighborhood she grew up in. this mural will be very large - 35 tiles! It will take a long time to paint because of its size and how many times I will have to fire it in the kiln. as a result this will be a long drawn out work in progress. but I'll post more images of this project as it comes along.

Tuesday, November 6, 2007

November

Autumn Reflections 3.5"x2.5" Card

I can't believe it is November already! This time of year always makes me feel so melancholy. Fall is kind of a sad season smoshed in there between my beloved summer and wonderful winter. The leaves are falling from the trees that always makes me think of endings and goodbyes, the birds have flown away, and it is beginning to feel a little chilly, I even have to start wearing shoes again. On the bright side Christmas is around the corner! I usually try to hold back on the Christmas music & decorations until after Thanksgiving but I think I'll give in to my Christmas lust and play a few carols today, and while I'm at it I'll wish for a little snow.