A Quick Glimpse

Oh my, it has been a very long week (two really with Sammy being sick before). As I mentioned last Sunday, Nov.1 John went out of town, Tommy came down with something and I was supposed to meet Linda, the Curator of STM Gallery to hang my show. "When it rains" as they say. Well, mom and dad took Sammy for the day and because I didn't know what Tommy was sick with and I was hesitant to leave him with anyone, but my dear sweet sister volunteered to sit with him so I could get out for a bit to work on the show. She had report cards to do and she said she would do them at my house while Tommy rested. She teaches Grade One and she said he couldn't possibly have anything different than the germs she is exposed to everyday! Probably true. And she said she wasn't planning on licking him! Ha... I love her sense of humour! Since then however, I have been hunkered down with my little sickie and, for the most part, quite house bound with my parents chauffeuring Sammy to and from school for me. After four days of unrelenting fever and other symptoms I took Tommy to the doctor yesterday morning. We had to sit in a cordoned off section of the waiting room with face masks on the entire time. If we took them off we would have been asked to leave. We were there for 2 hours and when we got into the examination room we had to keep our masks on. Thank goodness the doctor didn't take too long to come in.... I really was tired on smelling my own breath and never wanted a mint so badly in my life! Oh yeah, and I felt bad for Tommy, too! The doctor's body language was quite interesting... he stayed against the wall from the time he came in and had his face mask pulled right up to his lower eyelashes. He broke free from his grip on the wall long enough to check Tommy's lungs, which thankfully, were clear and that is what I needed to know to ease my mind- at least a little. I can't blame the doctor for being cautious... in fact I admire those in his profession a great deal... they really put themselves in the line of fire, so to speak, to take care of all of us. Although he didn't send anything off to the lab to confirm his diagnosis, we are pretty sure it is the dreaded H1N1. That is simply the only flu they are seeing right now. Nobody else in our family has come down with any symptoms and although I have tried to be vigilant with hand washing and cleaning, really it is hard to live in a house with 3 other people and not share germs at all. And seriously.... the recommendation to stay away from those with flu symptoms is just not realistic or doable for a mother with an ill child. Ridiculous. But maybe Sammy did have the flu for those fevery three days before he got strep and Scarlet Fever and maybe I had it back in September when I was sick for that stretch of time.

John got home from Toronto just after midnight on Tuesday, so when he got home from the office on Wednesday I went out to meet Linda and pick up the wine for the reception on Sunday. Then I went to see the show myself for the first time. So here are some pictures. It is a public gallery on the second floor of St.Thomas More College on the U of S campus. It is in a hallway and therefore was difficult to get decent pictures, but hopefully you get the idea. I am really happy with the flow of the work through the space and I think Linda did a fantastic job making sense of the variety of sizes and subjects. It is all related to the boreal forest, but there are skies, forest scenes, abstract reflections, and rivers. I think she really tied it all together well.

I am so looking forward to November 8 and hope to see lots of friends, family and artists... and maybe meet some new art lovers! Come say "hi" if you find yourself in Saskatoon on Sunday afternoon!

Whew!

Just a super quick post to say that my show went up today... and it was looking good, but I didn't see the finished result. My husband left for a meeting in Toronto this morning and wouldn't you know it, my littlest fella was hit with some sort of bug last night while trick or treating so family had to help me juggle things so I could meet the curator for a bit this afternoon to help her lay things out. Little guy had a crazy fever through the night and "hot eyes", lots of aches too. The neighbors had a Halloween party last night and when Tommy woke at 4 a.m. with a fever I could still hear their music pumping! After getting him settled I listened to "Beat it" through the wall while laying in bed. Not a good sleep for mamma! Upon the advice from one of my very best friends who is a physician I actually took Tommy in for a throat swab on Friday night (even though at that time he was showing zero signs of illness) on the off chance he was harboring the bug Sammy had which turned out to be .... are you ready?..... Scarlet Fever!!! Antibiotics worked for Sam right away and I will know if that is what Tommy has tomorrow morning. C-R-A-Z-Y!!! He just woke up at 9:30 and had thrown up in his bed, so he is now in my bed and tonight I will sleep on the inflatable air mattress which I have figured out how to blow up. I was trying desperately to get a fitted sheet on it but it just wouldn't work, try as I might. I finally realized I was trying to get a twin sheet to fit the queen size air mattress. Yes, I am tired and stressed!

Thank you so much for your emails and comments of well wishes, both for my show starting and the kids... I will answer those properly tomorrow. And as soon as I get to see the finished show all hung and professional looking I will post pictures! For now I am posting my awesome business card that my brother-in-law designed for me and that I will pick up this week sometime.

Take care everyone and stay healthy. 

P.S. Oh yeah, and just before I carried sick little Tommy to bed last night Sammy whispered to me, "Bless that poor little fella". Those two boys are everything to me and as important as my art show seemed about  one and a half weeks ago, it sure pales in comparison to them and their health.